Topic

The Game Economy

Since I see no recent posts specifically on this, I'm going to put my ideas here and hope a discussion happens.

What do people think should be the basis of the game economy?

I know what I do at the moment - I harvest things, I mine things, I get random drops, I buy things from vendors; I make things; then I donate things and sell things to the vendors.

It's all very solitary and very lonely, and not a system that allows an economy to, well, work.

***My ideal world of Glitch would look like this***
Every single item in the game, apart from those sold by vendors, can be either made from raw resources or found randomly.
Vendors would ONLY sell very basic things to get new players started, i.e. limited use and unfixable tools.
EITHER no vendors would buy _anything_ from the players OR there are some vendors (ideally in starting streets only) who would buy some things (ideally things that new players need) based on market prices and the amount already in stock, and the sold items go straight into the selling stock of the vendors.
Shrines would calculate favour based on current market price of any item.
Auctions would work a lot better (with both a putting items up for bid system and pre-bidding system). The frog system (fixed time delay) should go alongside a "go to a place and collect" system (instantaneous), for people who want to trade.

What I'd like to see happen is that it would no longer be necessary for the developers to buff or nerf any aspect of the game, and supply vs demand would work everything out. Underpowered? If people need the resource then it becomes profitable. Overpowered? If too many people do it, it becomes unprofitable.

What do my fellow Glitchiens think?

Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

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  • @Windborn:  Every Utopia and utopian dream have come to dust at the hands of the greedy and the power hungry.  Unless resources were limitless the aforementioned assholes would quickly grab up most of what was available, and if resources were limitless the game would become incredibly dull.
    Posted 16 months ago by Hawkwell Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Windborn But then no-one would have any incentives to collect cherries, and then there would be no cherries? :/

    Unless you're being ironic, in which case I applaud you.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • "provocative" not "ironic"
    Posted 16 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Unless you're being ironic, in which case I applaud you.
    Posted 16 months ago by Hawkwell Subscriber! | Permalink
  • In which case applause withdrawn :P

    Under a system with no automatic feedback, you're actually forced to check the markets/auctions for what people need. In a system with feedback, you can just do things in game ignoring the markets if you want, but you'd modify your own behaviour to do fewer things that make less currants, making yourself more useful in the process.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • WindBorn, I can see the irony in what you say. Of course nothing will free us from the tedium of collecting cherries, not in Glitch and not IRL.

    But it is possible to build an "economy" without currants, where everything is "free". The trick is to have some kind of benefit (or punishment) according to your actions. For example, you could gain mood or XP for donating to the "commons". Hoarding could cost energy (you need more energy to carry more stuff, or to power your fridge at home). In the end, it would be an economy all the same, with costs and profits, but strategies would vary.

    ... I wanted to stay away from this thread after my previous posts, because what tickles me is the sheer creativity of the Glitch world, and talking about market-based economy sounded (to me) like its opposite. Now I'm not so sure. As I'm not so sure about what I want to see in the game, as long as it is fun and more or less unexpected. "Balanced" doesn't worry me too much. "Interesting" does.
    Posted 16 months ago by Ximenez Subscriber! | Permalink
  • BTW, a Glitch market economy would be anything but a capitalist system. "Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and operated for profit." (Wikipedia) In Glitch no one owns the means of production - they are free to all and all are free to produce and benefit from them as much or as little as they please.  That's pretty utopian even if goods are bought and sold at market-set prices.
    Posted 16 months ago by Hawkwell Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Ximinez - as long as the system responded to the needs of the population, e.g. you have a system where you ask for what you need, and get rewarded for making things others' need and don't get rewarded for doing things others don't need, then yes, you've got a supply-and-demand based system, and it should work better than what we have now. Of course, at high levels mood and XP don't do very much, but it would certainly be possible to modify things to make something work on that basis.

    It might be more easily exploitable than a currant-based system, but we'd need to scrutinise the details of each.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Ximenez

    Yeah, I may just have proposed the de-gamification of a game.  Now someone can be anti-degamification, which is not quite as long a word as antidisestablishmentarianism, but is getting there. 
    Posted 16 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @WindBorn - You are on to something there...
    @Saro - Mood and XP costs and benefits might change automatically according to supply-and-demand issues. Or, in a currant-based system, prices might not be decided by players but according to the real scarcity and/or usefulness of things, calculated by some obscure, unknown-to-players in-game mathematical function.

    ETA: At high levels mood and XP don't matter a lot because we still don't have high level items. Imagine the super-duper-extra tool that works with that extra-hard-metal-thing but requires 100 energy/second to work... Or the recipe that you need to reach level 100 to be able to cook or eat (after you learn Digestion VII).
    Posted 16 months ago by Ximenez Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Gah, computer just ate a long post! I'll summarise instead

    @Hawkwell

    There are a few privately owned means of production: your own time and currants, your house and your learned skills. However, they're not exclusive. Anyone who wants them can get them. No-one will be shut out of the loop like in the real world. (And even public resources are nicely maintained for us by the giants, so no-one can ruin them for anyone else!) This is why I'm much more in favour of totally free markets in games than in the real world.

    @Ximenez

    The thing we want to avoid is someone sitting down and assigning arbitrary "worth" to things, because it'll more likely than not be wrong. A player-influenced system is the best way of determining the true worth of items, in my opinion.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • "When this game becomes a "business" is when I will no longer play."

    + 1 billion!! I do not want this little fantasy world to become a microcosm of greed. I don't care if prices in the real world are based on demand; Glitch is not the real world and does not have to mimic it! There will never be a shortage of pixelated sparkly or a cherry famine. Why should there be "haves" and "have nots" in a fantasy game? Why can't everyone have the opportunity of fortune without having to write a business plan?

    "get a garden, grow crops yourself. get tinkertooling 5, make your own tools. harvest stuff off trees.
    that's your 'work around'."

    I already do all of those things. I suspect you do to. I want to continue to do those things without having it become all about money. I play games to relax and have fun. I don't play WoW or other killing games because they don't interest me. And I don't go looking for an economics game for the same reason. I get plenty of economics in real life.

    I never said I want this game to be just like real life. What I said was, " It is a game so there can be differences between it and the real world. Second, even if you do want it to reflect the real world..." So, I will reiterate: I DO NOT WANT A GAME BASED ON ECONOMICS.

    "the purpose of markets isn't competition. the purpose of markets is to make stuff and trade that stuff. this may involve competition or it may not.

    i have no interest in competition, but i want to make things and sell them to other people in return for resources to help make more things."

    Guess what? You can do that right now. You can do it in the auctions or you can sell directly to another player via a trade. So, you are currently getting exactly what you say you want and at the same time, I have the non-economics based game that I want. Perfect compromise. So, why do we need to change it?
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Saro - Will you please explain to me how what we have now is not working? Many, many people are playing and having fun. People have to work to achieve some things and everyone can do so to get what they want. What about this system does not work? The only thing I can see based on previous posts is that people are not able to drive up the prices on certain items that they would like to be more profitable.
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Audaria

    The game has a currency. People spend that currency and it moves around. Therefore it has an economy. You can't get rid of it, you can't avoid it without doing what striatic suggested. In fact, you're interacting with it every time you play. You said that yourself - you can make things and sell things right now.

    If the economy is changed, you don't have to pay any more attention to it than you do now. The game will be no more "economics based" than it is right now.

    Why do we need to change it? Why do we need to change anything in Glitch? It's a perfectly playable, perfectly fun game right now. But anyone with a suggestion is someone with an idea that they think might make the game, on average, even more fun.

    ETA: the current thing that needs changing is that mining is overpowered and crops are underpowered. Sure you can fix that, but there will soon enough be something else that's overpowered and something else underpowered. However, the discussed mechanism is one that would ensure that the worth of different activities is basically decided by the players, so there will never need to be "powering up or down" fixes again (possible slight exaggeration)!
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I said before that I realize there is an economy (of sorts) in this game. I've also said I don't want this to become a game based on economics. The question I asked is "How is the game 'not working' as you said?" What exactly is not working? Or, if that's too much, what generally is not working? I'm talking specifically about the economic aspect, since that's the part you say is not working.

    Of course anyone suggesting changes thinks those changes would improve the game. I think all suggestions are great. I just don't necessarily think they would all be great for the game. And just as everyone has the right to suggest an idea, so does everyone else have the right to dislike any idea proposed.
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Just read your ETA. And my first thought was Dang I'm sick of hearing "overpowered and underpowered" but beyond that I thought: Well, you want it to reflect real life don't you. In the RW athletes are "overpowered" and teachers are "underpowered" and well, crops are also "underpowered" while minerals are, you guessed it "overpowered." Just a thought.
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • But you've seen the phenomenon: a disproportionate number of players boast that when the game resets, they're going to grab a pick and mine until they're pooped. Where's all the rock going to go? Lots of it will go straight into a vendor, never to be seen again. Do other players really want that much rock? We have no idea without a system that reflects the demand for rock.

    I just think it would be a nicer game environment if all these people's efforts went into making something that other people actually need! 
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • There are obviously different tastes. I respect that.

    But the current economy bore me. I find it dull and rote.

    I would like to see business develop in the game. Right now there is no reason for it. Nor is there any real way to give a business an identity. The most you can do is spam the world with notes about auctions... but in reality, folks are going to go to the auctions and buy the cheapest of what they want.

    (If there is only one person offering something you want and they are charging and arm and a leg, good on them.)

    I would like the game to feel more alive. I like the shifting aspect of group dynamics. The most we have now with the fight over what trees get planted. Nothing else is really effected by the players.

    Where things are now, there is nothing in the game that you can't make easily for your self (at least not after 3 months or so of learning... which will end up being even quickly with the game open 24/7). No one is going have a monopoly of cherries or meat. Right now there is no way to really add VALUE to an item hand crafted.

    We buy stuff from auction (or even vendors) because we are lazy: We just don't want to make them ourselves. That's fine, but dull. (Note: I am talking about home owners, right now. The possible big disadvantage for a player drive economy is that it might screw new players. But, again, if there is a steady influx of new players, there will be a demand and players will fill the needs.)

    The two things that don't quite fit this are actually produce and herbs. (Again, I am talking about home owners.) Herbs currently don't have much use/value and are basically a luxury item. Produce, however, is pretty needed. And if your home doesn't have crop plots, you have to (1) buy from auction, (2) buy from vendors or (3) use community gardens. A player driven economy could place a LOT of power in the hands of garden owners. The community gardens is an option but very very time consuming if you must watch/guard your crops. (Those Alakol gardens are gonna start look real good.)

    I'm rambling.

    To my original thing. I'm bored with the economy. At this point there is WAY to much cash in the game. Honestly, I go about my Glitch life and spend willy nilly at auctions and vendors and still never drop below 50,000. I hardly make anything but Awesome Stews. I don't crow produce. I go to projects and blow tons on the auctions without giving a thought to the price.

    All of this is fine... but it is close to the point where they might as well remove currents and just make everything free. Just give everyone a set amount they can buy per game day (heck base it on level if you want). Currants are so negligible at over level 25 or so there is almost no reason for them.
    Posted 16 months ago by Lord Bacon-o Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Audaria, I'm not clear why you believe the suggested changes will make this a game based on economics.  As far as I can see (as a wrote earlier) the changes (which stoot has indicated are slowly coming) will simply mean certain items will have a one-time price adjust and then prices will tend to float up and down slightly (probably in virtually unnoticeable increments).  I don't see how this will change how the game looks to you or how you play it at all - unless you are already playing an economic game and deliberately taking advantage of artificially high or low prices.  To me, it all looks win-win.
    Posted 16 months ago by Hawkwell Subscriber! | Permalink
  • The game has a market and an economy, so people that are saying they will no longer play when the game becomes "business" are going to be quitting shortly after the game gets into public hands. If there is an economy to be controlled in any fashion, it will.

    Take for example specific musicboxes that sell for 5000c or crystals and barnacles needed for the projects that sell for 3000c+. That people, is business and will lead to free market censorship by people with the currants to control the economy. I for one have been drawn to the allure of doing it in other games and could easily see how MANY people will do it here too. Yes, it's a game, but games reflect certain real life aspects in them by the players and many players like playing with economics. This is why the glitch market needs to be "patched" against things like market pushing.

    <reiterates earlier post>
    Setting prices from the server side prevents people from exploiting the auction houses through the process of "pushing". Pushing allows things like:

    > Resources to be sent from a lower ranked account to a higher ranked one without an appropriate trade-off. (Think of opening endless new accounts to send goods to your higher level one)

    >"Loans" that are not returned within a timely fashion. (Buy this Auction at X price and consider it my loan to you)

    >Trades/Sales in which the higher ranked player does not return the resources within a timely fashion.

    >Trades/Sales made with an exchange rate that differs greatly from the normal rate from which a higher ranked player can get an unfair advantage. 
    Posted 16 months ago by c0mad0r Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Lord Bacon-o

    At the moment, not much attention has been paid to the high-level player.

    I'd imagine it'll get more interesting with the release of more high-level content, e.g. player-made buildings etc.? I can see those being very creative and circulating a lot of your stash of currents back into the economy, if they're done well!

    May I ask, where did you get all the currants from? If it's from a vendor, do you think making vendors reflect the real market would improve the situation?

    ETA:

    @c0mad0r
    > Resources to be sent from a lower ranked account to a higher ranked one without an appropriate trade-off. (Think of opening endless new accounts to send goods to your higher level one)
    Ban multiple accounts?
    >"Loans" that are not returned within a timely fashion. (Buy this Auction at X price and consider it my loan to you) 
    The risk was there when you gave out the loan
    >Trades/Sales in which the higher ranked player does not return the resources within a timely fashion. 
    You knew the risks when you agreed, surely? And anyway, a good trading system won't allow this
    >Trades/Sales made with an exchange rate that differs greatly from the normal rate from which a higher ranked player can get an unfair advantage. 
    People should be free to give things away. People should be able to sell awesome stews for 1c IF THEY WANT TO...

    EATA: In general, wouldn't it be awesome to have a penpersonship and BA branch skill that allows you to draw up a contract? You write something, and once people have signed it you can't change it. The crocs could run law courts! It would be hilarious!
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I get the vast majority of my currants from music box sales to vendors. Seriously. Trees drop so many damn music boxes. Now, yes, if vendors stopped buying music boxes, I would have to change my strategy. Perhaps I WOULD sell raw materials or made food. I would GLADLY craft tools... but there is really no market for them now... except selling them to vendors... which right now feels like just send them into the void for cash. 

    This last test I DID get into a mini-proce war with purple and no-no on the auctions. Not much of one and there really wasn't that much demand or movement in price. It was mildly entertaining to me to flood the auctions with purple marked slightly below the current asking price. But I didn't make that much money from it.

    I am not making a particular complaint about up levels. I know more will be added. But at this point it would take me about a day to make enough money to buy a 50,000 currant home. So I could buy one every day with out a ton of effort. So there will have to be some pretty big changes made to the economy to make me worry about currants after two months after reset.
    Posted 16 months ago by Lord Bacon-o Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Lord Bacon-o

    When vendor's stop selling things we can make (stoot said it would happen eventually), you'd be able to craft tools to your heart's content :)

    I think the massive stagnation in the market would be removed by not allowing goods or currants to come out of or disappear into thin air.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Trading is currently set up to be pretty safe.  You both can see what's being traded, you both have to agree that the trade should take place.  What about that doesn't work for you and allows higher ranking players to take advantage?
    Posted 16 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Yes. Saro. All of what I said is to say I agree with you and am excited to see the gradual removal of the "scaffolding."
    Posted 16 months ago by Lord Bacon-o Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Saro

    People should be free to give things away. People should be able to sell awesome stews for 1c IF THEY WANT TO...

    EATA: In general, wouldn't it be awesome to have a penpersonship and BA branch skill that allows you to draw up a contract? You write something, and once people have signed it you can't change it. The crocs could run law courts! It would be hilarious!


    I agree people should be able to give things away (see earlier post), but what about those that will inevitably be hoaxed or conned into such actions?

    Yeah, I think the whole Bureaucracy skill should be expanded to include interesting things like this as it would make for a strange twist in the game... if not bring to light things that happen in every game lol.
    Posted 16 months ago by c0mad0r Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @c0mad0r

    I think we're still advantaged by the fact that Glitch is fundamentally a game for nice people. And if things like contracts might be allowed, in a community such as this, the risk of a bad reputation might be enough for individuals and groups to not engage in unscrupulous business practises!
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • So much to discuss... But I'll stay with just a little thing.

    We certainly need currants to come out of thin air. Maybe not so many. The reason being that there will always be currants dissapearing, even without intended money-sinks: Players leave the game or choose to hoard them and so on.
    Posted 16 months ago by Ximenez Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I absolutely agree the NPC vendors are need so that you can dump items at. Heck, gems become USELESS if you can't sell them to vendors. But they should be cheap bastards, offering low rates of return.

    Looking at the market for say tools. For the most part, vendors pay 70% less than they sell them for. That means to sell them on auction and make it worth while for buyers, you need to sell for some wear between 95% and say 75% of the sale price from vendors.... and you need to take into account auction fees. Really doesn't give the market much room to move.

    Vendors should sell things high and buy them cheap. Those are really going to create the edge of prices for things.
    Posted 16 months ago by Lord Bacon-o Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Saw someone complaining about "controlling markets" and thought I'd comment on that. Apart from situations where a person is cheating (multiple accounts being an obvious form) the ability of one person to control an entire market is severely affected by the fact that there is unlimited supply of the materials and skills necessary to compete in the market. If someone attempts to control a market someone else will step in and sell the item cheaper. Sure, their item will probably get purchased by the controller, but as long as there is a supply of materials there will be an unlimited supply of people trying to sell the item, and eventually the monopolizer will run out of cash and liquidate. 

    I saw this happen many, many times in WoW. Some market newcomer would attempt to control a particular niche product that seemed fairly controllable, with inflexible supply (enchanting materials for example), and what would happen is that people would become outraged at the high prices, and farmers would begin to force their way into the supply side, increasing supply, forcing the newcomer to either keep buying to keep prices high, or quit and cede control back to the market.

    I don't really understand why people think that buying and selling products to other players is somehow worse than simply destroying the items at the vendor. There seems to be a lot of fear that somehow people will get "screwed" and become unable to make things simply because vendors stop supplying the items we "need". I have yet to read an argument here that convinces me this is the case. There is an argument to be made with crops, since they have such low yield (I can easily eat through a day's crops in a matter of minutes, and if everyone is doing that there won't be enough veggies to go around), but most items in Glitch have infinite supply. If you want something, you can simply go harvest it. The people selling in the AH aren't competing with each other, they're competing against the value of their time. If the time it takes to make something is of less value than buying it from the AH they'll farm it themselves, and sell extras they farm at a lower price on the AH. If the time is more valuable than the price on the AH they'll just buy it from the AH and use the time to do something more valuable.

    At least in Glitch you can throw stuff up and pull stuff off the AH at will without having to travel to an auctioneer. This makes it a lot easier to buy and sell on it. Frankly, I don't see the difference between throwing something up on the auction house or throwing into a vendor hole, except that by selling it to a vendor you artificially inflate the real value of the item, e.g. having to spend ₡250 on a drink in the AH when you can buy it for ₡192 at the vendor. To which I respond, why should someone sell it for ₡192 when they can vendor it for ₡153 and save the AH fees and time? Take away the vendor purchasable item, and the crazy-high vendor buyback percentage (70%-80% value is insane!) and your ₡192 drink may very well sell for only ₡100. 

    Right now there is very little incentive to buy and sell on the AH because items are both readily available for purchase from vendors and those vendors will buy your items for really good prices. I for one am excited for the time when I can sit in my home, buy materials off the AH, then craft them into something more valuable, sell those off the AH, collect my profit, then buy something I want. I like crafting, way, way more than I like running around squeezing chickens and nibbling pigs, or picking trees, and I can't wait to be able to spend my time doing what I enjoy most about the game rather than doing "chores" since the items I want to buy from the AH are being sold to vendors instead of to me.
    Posted 16 months ago by Skwid Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @LBO Exactly right. There are some other simple things that TS could do to free up some market competition. Removing AH fees and cuts would give a good deal of flexibility to people who want to sell items in the AH. I personally rarely sell anything in the AH because the profitable range is ridiculously small (somewhere around 10% of that 30% range after fees) and simply selling it to the vendor is so much easier than putting it on the AH at a reasonable price and hoping it sells because if it doesn't sell I will have lost money on AH fees. Heaven forbid I'm close to a tool vendor because then it doesn't even matter, I won't even look on the AH, I just start vendoring everything in my inventory knowing that this is the best return I'll get on nearly every item, with a few exceptions (street making materials almost exclusively).
    Posted 16 months ago by Skwid Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Somehow I missed this post by SleepyAce:

    "Take a step back from what you might think is the ideal, efficient economy and approach this from Tiny Speckle's lens. I don't think they're intending to build a complex, self-regulating economy. I don't think they would ever want their average player to have to check the markets every time he/she logs in. I don't think they would want their average player to be stunned that a stack of cherries that sold to vendor for 200 currants last week now only earns 30 currants.

    For the casual player, having to deal with a fluctuating market is stressful. Donating to shrines is already hard enough for beginners to understand. I get that you want an experience that's more suited to your level of play but in the long-term, I can't imagine TS imposing a system that would require players to maintain a spreadsheet or feel compelled to play daily. Remove crafted/high-level items and food from vendors? Sure. But impose market conditions on vendors? I doubt it."

    I think he/she said it very well.

    I don't care if the rocks I sell to the vendor just "go away" because they are NOT REAL in the first place. I think the auctions are fine for those who CHOOSE to use them. I object to being FORCED to use them for regular game-play. Someone started an anonymous re-mailing service and another proposed a moving business. I think these are wonderful, creative ideas that allow those players to get their business fix without imposing it on everyone else. I think there should be some items in the game that are rare, and those who are lucky enough to get them should be able to make money based on their rarity - most likely by selling in the auctions. I also think everyone should be able to go to the vendor and buy anything that is NEEDED for the game, such as cutting board, pick, tinkertool, etc.

    I want to be able to do the quests, explore the world, socialize with my friends, do whatever little tasks I choose (such as mining and gardening), and participate in projects. I don't care if I have the most currants, or the least currants as long as I'm able to do the things in game that I choose to do. I do NOT want to be FORCED to hawk my wares in order to play. I do NOT want to have to wait for some other player to decide to make a frying pan and put it in the auction before I'm able to do the associated quest.
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Audaria

    Still a few disagreements between our visions here, I'll attempt to explain mine:

    "complex, self-regulating economy"
    A self-regulating economy is anything but complex. People buy things and people sell things, for whatever price they can agree on. It's actually simpler than what we have now.

    "I can't imagine TS imposing a system that would require players to maintain a spreadsheet or feel compelled to play daily"
    You wouldn't need to any more than you would need to right now. Some people maintain spreadsheets right now, and some play daily right now. You can still play the same way as you always do, the only difference would be that sometimes things would cost different amounts from the price they cost yesterday. Unless you're the spreadsheet-making sort, I doubt that matters to you much.

    "I don't care if I have the most currants, or the least currants as long as I'm able to do the things in game that I choose to do."
    You still wouldn't need to care, and you can still do exactly the same things in the game regardless of how the economy is run.

    "I do NOT want to be FORCED to hawk my wares in order to play." Again, the only proposed change is a different way of selling things. If you want to offload your wares, instead of going to a vendor and selling them for whatever price they offer, you either go to the auction house and sell them for whatever price other people are offering, or you go to the "revamped vendors" and sell them for whatever price they're offering.

    "I don't care if the rocks I sell to the vendor just "go away" because they are NOT REAL in the first place." " I do NOT want to have to wait for some other player to decide to make a frying pan and put it in the auction before I'm able to do the associated quest."
    I hope you see the contradiction there: With a sufficiently large player-base, lots of people will like making frying pans, just like lots of people will like mining rocks. If the frying pans people made did NOT just disappear, then there WILL be frying pans on the auctions, simple as that. The only reason you might want to wait is if you think the current price is unreasonable. I don't think in this system there will be anything that people need that won't just be there in the auctions/revamped vendors!
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • sometimes things would cost different amounts from the price they cost yesterday.

    And that is the core of my problem with your scheme:  unpredictability.  For basic things like frying pans and  tomatoes I want a predictable price, not the fluctuating, player-driven "market value". 
    Posted 16 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Actually, I don't see the contradiction. They're two separate things. There will never be a shortage of rocks in Glitch, unless it's written in, and no matter how many I sell to the vendors (if I actually sold them to vendors, I almost always crush them) there will not be too many. And if I want to pay even more for a frying pan than they would cost at the auction, I should be able to do so. This shouldn't affect you buying or selling at the auction. If anything, having the basic tools available at the vendors will only stabilize the prices at the auctions, preventing them from getting too outrageous.

    From my viewpoint, there is room in the game for both of our styles of play. And maybe they could make some of the higher end items' prices market dependent. Maybe more, as long as there was limited fluctuation or some such restriction. As I've said numerous times, I just don't want the FOCUS of the game to be economics.
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Windborn

    Yes, in that aspect of the game we must make a choice.

    On the one hand, we can buy everything at the same price every day and sell everything at the same price every day. There will be more profitable things to do and less profitable things to do. These never change. If I want to buy that nice shiny expensive thing quickly, there's one fastest route to do it. That never changes either.

    On the other hand, we can have a dynamic system where those high-level ambitious players? They can CHOOSE to make frying pans and plant tomatoes, rather than knowing that there's no point because the vendor sells it. There's more change and there's more choice. There's a better sense of community, because people interact more, even when they don't realise it. Your actions can subtly affect the world we all live in.

    Sure, the prices of things might move a little from day to day. But that's the communication. It's the idea that you can do something to improve the world. You can bet that there will always be affordable frying pans and affordable tomatoes. Why? Because if you want them, lots of people want them. And many of these people will realise that the others want them, and they will fill that niche in the world, making frying pans and selling tomatoes. And if they get lots of currants in return, they know that they're being useful and their services are appreciated.

    And from the casual player's point of view, there will always be an abundance of frying pans and tomatoes. Their prices will just reflect what they're actually worth in the game, in terms of the effort taken to make them. And yes, that might fluctuate. But if the game doesn't change much, then there won't be much change, because their price will reflect their "worth" in relation to everything else in the game.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • What stoot has said about this: http://beta.glitch.com/forum/general/5928/#reply-57920
    "But, we are committed to trying things in all of these areas:
    [...]• (Slowly) removing the scaffolding from the economy: vendors really shouldn't sell things that players can make, nor should they buy infinite amounts at an unchanging price. This one will be tricky to get right  but we have some ideas for how to do in baby steps."
    Posted 16 months ago by Otterlicious Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Yup, that's been mentioned earlier :) But of course, even within the framework there can be lots of different approaches!
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • The focus of the game will never be economics. Currants are a means to an end, what that end is, is up to whomever is playing. Whatever your goal is, you can most likely do it without any currants whatsoever. I don't understand what the difference between buying the one frying pan you'll ever need from a vendor or from a player is. Except that if I buy a frying pan from a player I know that the person I bought it from went through the time and effort to make it, instead of me simply walking up to a NPC vendor and buying it. I know that my currants went to help someone else accomplish their game goals at the same time I'm accomplishing mine.

    The idea of "hocking your wares" sounds bad, but the reality is that it takes seconds to post something up on the AH and you don't have to find a tool vendor to get premium dollar for it. Just click on the item, set a price (or let the system set it for you) and click auction. No hocking needed.

    I don't see a problem with prices fluctuating at all. If prices are too high, I'll just go farm the items myself. Just like we all do right now. If the prices are reasonable I'll buy them. I don't see how this situation isn't better than the one we're in right now. I'm seeing a lot of "If we have an actual economy I'll be forced to buy things from the AH!" Sure, things that cannot be farmed. Things that have be made using skills, skills that anyone can learn. If you want to keep playing the way you are now, there's no reason why you couldn't.
    Posted 16 months ago by Skwid Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I understand what you and Saro want and that you both think it would improve the game. I disagree. Strongly. We are all entitled to have our own opinions. I respect yours and I hope you will respect mine. I think I've enumerated everything enough, but if you want further clarification, please let me know. I'm content to agree to disagree on this one.

    Just as an aside:

    hawk    /hɔk/ Show Spelled[hawk] Show IPA
    verb (used with object)
    1. to peddle or offer for sale by calling aloud in public.

    hock    /hɒk/ Show Spelled[hok] Show IPA
    verb (used with object)
    1. pawn.
    noun
    2. the state of being deposited or held as security; pawn: She was forced to put her good jewelry in hock.
    3. the condition of owing; debt: After the loan was paid, he was finally out of hock.

    I actually meant hawk.
    Posted 16 months ago by Audaria Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I still think a barter system would be more fun and you wouldn't need real life a capitalist system, it would probably enhance communication between players too.
    Posted 16 months ago by Phochai Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Phochai We've already established that a market-based system in Glitch would not be "capitalist" in the real life sense, because the means of production are mostly publicly owned. :)

    I would personally enjoy a barter-based system, but I think the concern would be that doing things would take much longer. Eventually you might see player-run currency emerging anyway! (now that would be great fun)
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I don't see a problem with prices fluctuating at all.

    You don't.  Others do.  If you don't see a problem, it doesn't mean that it's not a real problem.
    Posted 16 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @WindBorn

    Prices wouldn't fluctuate much though, if the system was to work - they'd reflect the true worth of the commodity. 

    It was suggested earlier in the thread that as an alternative, we could keep vendors, who would only sell what they bought (and had a sensible buying pricing algorithm), who would have prices that reset, say every week, based on market prices. That would mean a stable price for players who didn't want to interact with auctions, without having items that are severely mispriced for their worth.
    Posted 16 months ago by Saro Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think adding a barter system to the existing auction house or creating a separate system for barter would rock!  I offer to trade item X of a given quantity for any of the following then propose possible trades you would accept--they would be auto accepted and the trade completes.  Or you could leave it open for offers--where there would be no auto accept and the trade would not compete until the offer was reviewed and accepted.

    Personally I don't mind paying more for something at the auction house because I know it is going to a fellow player instead of a npc sink hole.  I think part of the sandbox concept is having the price of items be something player conduct can alter.
    Posted 16 months ago by Artilect Subscriber! | Permalink
  • There is already a people driven barter system in the game, for example for street trophies and people have been swopping (switching) music blocks to complete their sets, so it has already started albeit in a small way. @ Artilect I like your idea about it being added to the buy out system in game, I think a barter chat channel would just be spammed.
    Posted 16 months ago by Phochai Subscriber! | Permalink
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