losing 10% per trade is a whole lot simpler. doesn't need any special systems. this for all items, no faction bonus or special circumstance trading. just simple 10% loss on trading. the more complicated you make it the more loopholes it will have. just lose 10%. eventually the item won't be worth trading. and that's the whole point of it. makes auction halls a whole lot more clean this way too.
losing 10% per trade is a whole lot simpler. doesn't need any special systems. this for all items, no faction bonus or special circumstance trading. just simple 10% loss on trading. the more complicated you make it the more loopholes it will have. just lose 10%. eventually the item won't be worth trading. and that's the whole point of it. makes auction halls a whole lot more clean this way too.
Yep, I have to agree on this one and it doesn't negatively target players either. Why should a player have to deal with their items degrading away because of a trade system that encourages item inflation? A player who just plays the game, earns their items themselves, maybe passes an item to a friend or alt isn't the problem here. It is the people who are farming items over and over for player trade that causes item inflation that ultimately leads to the issues.
This is like I was talking about earlier with solutions that penalize normal play because of the nature of excess from other systems.
make items lose monetary value when traded. have it to where you can't drop the item to force a high price trade. so even with an auction hall, you bought an item for 100k, you cant sell it for more than 90k. problem solved.
I prefer a system that devalues items naturally, such as item degradation. The whole point of this topic is to come up with ways to balance the competitive atmosphere, risk vs reward and a healthy economy without just arbitrarily slapping rules down that dictate how the player plays the game.
For instance, if the item degrades through long term use, its value naturally depreciates.
I wouldn't be opposed to an item degradation system like you suggest; however, I would want it to slow enough that it doesn't overly affect difficult to obtain items such as epics/raid gear, etc.. Where, if an epic degraded too quickly, I would avoid completing the quest as it wouldn't retain its value long enough. Basically, slow enough that it depreciates over long term use, but long enough that it could take Pantheon's progression (and expansion releases) into account. It would be a mechanic that I wouldn't mind testing in alpha/beta.
You wouldn't ever lose the item, it only makes it so the item couldn't be equipped by another player once reaching a worn down state. Something like Pristine, Excellent, Good, Worn, Aged. Upon reaching aged, it would either become NoDrop or would simply not be able to be equipped by other players. It wouldn't apply to things like epics or other nodrop items.
I feel having a natural degradation of items is more immersive and less restrictive than an item magically becoming less powerful upon changing hands. That is only there to discourage Trader gameplay and prevent people from buying and reselling goods. That is not the point of the system I'm proposing. Its there merely to decommission older items and prevent long term mudflation.
There's also nothing complicated about items wearing down. If a given item has 100 points of normal durability and the lifetime durability of the item is 30,000, the item could be repaired from a broken state 300 times before becoming "Aged" and then either NoDrop or unusable by another player other than the final owner. Its simple math.
Appreciate the clarification. Were you also proposing for the items stats to reduce as well with degradation, or simply that once the item becomes "Aged" through regular use that it would be unusable by anyone but the current user as a means to prevent long term mudflation?
Appreciate the clarification. Were you also proposing for the items stats to reduce as well with degradation, or simply that once the item becomes "Aged" through regular use that it would be unusable by anyone but the current user as a means to prevent long term mudflation?
Yes, simply to prevent mudflation. That fungi tunic that has seen 20 players and thousands of battles 3 years into the server would not be viable, except on the player who used the item last.
I think a small item reduction would be reasonable, but I wouldn't think anything major. Maybe a 10% difference between "Pristine" and "Aged".
Again, you are putting words in my mouth. I never insisted on a no-trade MMO and I have made that very clear in two different posts. I making narrow argument that no-AH trade isn't a lot different from AH trade, and you guys are acting like it is night and day because when MMO's first came out things were different (anecdotally).
Buying and selling isn't complicated. And players like us on this forum are probably going to be pretty good at if we choose to play that way. I was agreeing with Sinist that the early game gets pretty trivial after awhile. The evidence for this is every MMO ever. I only brought up p99 because you deflated the presence of RMT severely on that server. Don't just take my word for it, anyone can feel free to ask around on the p99 forums. It simply isn't true that it barely existed or didn't impact the economy. Things were severely inflated around TMOs peak.
You guys are doing a lot of juxtaposition between WoW and Classic EQ, as if the main difference between those two games is that one had an Auction Hall in it. WoW was easy because WoW was easy, Auction Hall or Not. Last I played, the best items for leveling were bought with tokens from dungeons and were no drop. So the AH doesn't have a lot to do with it.
You can say p99 is a bad example, but I think Classic EQ is equally bad. We already discussed the reasons each example isn't perfect.
This -- in my mind -- means all we can do is speculate on is how the mechanics would work to discourage things in MMO economies. I have no idea why you guys have convinced yourself the answer to that is to take out the AH.
To your credit, you are correct, I did misread your post, you never stated we "should" do that, however, there were some reasonably strong implications ;-).
I agree with you in regards to early game becoming trivial as a result of an aging game and the overall playerbase moving on in average levels. That's simply part of an MMO though. The solutions to this "problem" (and I don't agree its a problem in all reality) cause more harm than good. You're basically doing changes the benefit the few new players coming into the game at the severe detriment to the existing playerbase. The real "solution" to the problem is to have new servers being added as needed, and to identify those servers to new players as being newer servers that they would be better to join rather than existing "old" servers.
I do agree with you about WoW vs EQ, I actually didn't play WoW for almost 6 months because of how easy mode it was to me. However in hindsight, given how "modern" mmos are... I'd gladly give my left nut for another game that was more similar to Vanilla WoW than what is out now. Obviously I'd prefer a more EQ like game, but vanilla WoW would be a massive step in the right direction IMO.
I don't recall personally doing any juxtapositions earlier in regards to EQ vs WoW, and I would have argued against those. My personal issue is just simply "AH vs Player Trade", and there is a rather large gulf between them.
The main issue and the reason for bringing up the AH vs Player trade is the argument sinist was making in so much as how rampant player abuse of the trade system would be / is, and how that would affect the playerbase. My specific argument was that the type of behavior he was describing was much more rampant in games with AH's, and while it did occur in EQ, it wasn't nearly to the level as in games like WoW. Then it devolved into people using examples of P99 to support the RMT and abuse of the system argument, and that's really what ruffled my feathers as P99 is not in any way shape or form representative of the norm for 2 reasons. 1. Its an extremely old server that is extremely top heavy. 2. The type of player attracted to p99 are already more "power gamer" types that would be more "ok" with that type of behavior (playing the market, RMT, etc).
As to your last point, I'm sorry but you're just being absurd if you try to suggest that P99 and EQ circa 1999-2001 were even remotely the same as far as abused of RMT and buying items/playing the market, etc. That is just categorically false.
The reason to take the AH out is to facilitate community via forcing people to engage each other to sell and buy items. Secondarily is also creates barriers to entry to filter out the people who do things like buy every single piece of spider silk on the market so they can replace it on the AH at 2x the price and people are forced to pay more for it or do without. This is one of the common types of "gaming" the system that was rampant in WoW and other games with AH's.
On a last note, just to touch back on the first issue of early game being trivialized, that's just flat assed going to happen. That's like trying to combat aging in real life by making it illegal to eat bacon. At some point you're just making stupid knee jerk reactionary changes that ruin the quality of life of the people playing the game, to combat something you can't meaningfully change anyways.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
What if they were able to make it less valuable if passed on by one or more characters? Hear me out. Let's say you're farming a mob and it drops that new shiny sword you've been looking for. That sword happens to have Dmg 10 Delay 18 and Str +10. Now let's say you purchased that same sword from someone who had been camping it (damn mages camping my swords!) but when offering to trade the stats went down Dmg 9, Delay 19 and Str+8. Would that be possible? This is really a win/win. If you really want that sword for lesser stats, you can buy it, if you need to have it at max, you have to camp it. That would also deter some of the people from camping it non-stop unless it was for them specifically. Thoughts?
Shards of Dalaya EQ private server used/uses this mechanic, and to be honest it is bad. All you're accomplishing with this mechanic is to create even MORE fighting over camps, which is the exact opposite of what TLC is all about. This is also what the trade system is designed to alleviate, when players can purchase items rather than camp them, it takes pressure off the camps and allows players to disperse into the world to camp all different kinds of things to yield them an item that may be hotly contested.
It is a contested content game. The point is earning your gear in play, having it say you put in the effort, things being highly sought after and less common.
Your argument is the exact argument current mainstream gamers make to demand they have easier access to gear.
I don't get you people, you labor to claim you want a contested content game, then bitch and moan if there is actually a reward for getting something from a camp.
FFS, you accused me in several posts about wanting it easy, and then make this argument? /boggle
I swear, the more and more you guys defend against any suggestion here, the more it makes me think you guys are using RMT anyway.
I'm sorry but that's just wrong. I could very easily make a strong argument that having gear tokens that you could only get from raiding to buy gear with is promoting "earning your gear from playing the game" Yet this is the type of core mechanic of faceroll easy mode games that is part of the problem.
Overall Sinist I like you and you generally make good arguments and have sound reasoning. That being said the majority of your posts in this thread have been a bunch of arm waving hand wringing alarmist BS. You've constantly made slippery slope arguments, you've passive aggressively insinuated that we only support these things because we like RMT and we like being able to game the market and that we want to be able to "buy" our progression.
Many of us have come back with multiple sound arguments, and you continue to just conflate the issues at hand.
Frankly you're better than this and you know it.
Edit: I just want to give an example of why not being able to buy an item you may want or need and HAVING to camp it is stupid. When I played EQ originally I played with a good friend who was an enchanter. He went quite literally from 53 to 60 in Sebilis, and spent as much of that time as possible in the camp that dropped the Hierophant's Cloak, to give you a point of reference, level 59 took him almost 90 hours of XPing. In that time he saw the cloak drop 4 times, and he lost the roll on it all 4 times. So we're talking about someone who spent several hundred hours trying to get an item and had no luck.
With your system he is just up the creek. He doesn't get to ever have the item, or he just has to endlessly bang his head against the wall trying to get the item at the mercy of RNGesus. What he ultimately was able to do was spend money he had gotten from selling items he won in sebilis, and used that to buy the cloak.
Forcing people to have to "earn" the items by being in the raid/dungeon only works when the items are relatively common, OR you put a token system in place, or some combination of the two like WoW did. When items are rare, having to play at the mercy of RNGesus is one of the most supremely frustrating and frankly stupid things in the world, and IMO it has no place in any MMO.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
My only concern with the whole "aged, pristine, etc" idea, is that it actually promotes further camping of items from poopsockers. Min/Maxers are always going to want the best, they'll do anything for that single stat point, which means they'll have no trouble or problems turfing their aged item for a pristine of the same item. Which will incentivize poopsockers to camp the item to sell to these people at a premium.
I guess there is worse things that could happen, but I have a feeling it would be counterproductive to the goal of incentivizing camping the item yourself vs buying it.
Personally I don't think there is a damned thing wrong with either option, but apparently lots of people do.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
My only concern with the whole "aged, pristine, etc" idea, is that it actually promotes further camping of items from poopsockers. Min/Maxers are always going to want the best, they'll do anything for that single stat point, which means they'll have no trouble or problems turfing their aged item for a pristine of the same item. Which will incentivize poopsockers to camp the item to sell to these people at a premium.
I guess there is worse things that could happen, but I have a feeling it would be counterproductive to the goal of incentivizing camping the item yourself vs buying it.
Personally I don't think there is a damned thing wrong with either option, but apparently lots of people do.
That is why I hesitate to say I think there should definitely be a stat reduction.
On the other hand, I'm not sure giving people a reason to camp items again is such a bad thing. Perhaps not in early EQ with the somewhat limited nature of some of the better items (only 1 source of haste, only 1 or 2 good 2 handed weapons, only 1 good sword, etc) but in a game where there are more options available, I can see losing a stat (10% isn't much, thats a -1 on a +10 item) as a way to bring people back to places less frequented.
Lets be honest, we aren't going to see those extreme bottlenecks we had with vanilla EQ in Pantheon. More likely than not, they will have alternatives for most stats and item effects, especially when there will be a lot of situational gear for different builds and resist sets.
I asked about the stat reduction as I share the same concern as Hrimnir, which I know you said you have hesitation on also. You do raise a good point on bringing people back to dungeons, but, I don't know if the people that would be brought back would be the /pick up group type and I'd fear they'd fall more into the category that Hrimnir suggested - the hardcore that wanted to min/max the -1 stat lost and most likely would group with others (or guildies) to get the item as quickly as possible and be on their way. Or, I could see a scenario where the person joined a pickup group and rolled on an item when his/her is at 90% when the other group member doesn't have one at all. I wouldn't be opposed to your system without the stat reduction though - either way it would still ultimately remove items from the market to slow mudflation.
Item decay, even if it is just "number of possible trade decay" would lead to people camping items more often. Isn't that one of the points we try to reduce? So people leave a camp once they are "done" there?
The system sounds okish, but you just KNOW people want the best version. So trying to sell something with less then maxed value would become very hard. Hell,... some people might even ignore trading and camp it themselves. We would simply shift people from trading to adventuring. Even those that actually want to trade.
Not implying the idea is bad, just unsure if we really solve anything or simply create other problems / shift problems.
Just to make sure we are on the same boat, we want the following as a result:
people should see reasons to talk to eachother
people should want to group up
people should be able to trade and adventure as they see fit / want
people should not lock down content due to whatever reason
people should be able to become insane rich, either by adventure OR by trading OR by crafting
Is this assumtion correct, or are we trying to remove one of those points?
MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.
Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?
Item decay, even if it is just "number of possible trade decay" would lead to people camping items more often. Isn't that one of the points we try to reduce? So people leave a camp once they are "done" there?
The system sounds okish, but you just KNOW people want the best version. So trying to sell something with less then maxed value would become very hard. Hell,... some people might even ignore trading and camp it themselves. We would simply shift people from trading to adventuring. Even those that actually want to trade.
Not implying the idea is bad, just unsure if we really solve anything or simply create other problems / shift problems.
Just to make sure we are on the same boat, we want the following as a result:
people should see reasons to talk to eachother
people should want to group up
people should be able to trade and adventure as they see fit / want
people should not lock down content due to whatever reason
people should be able to become insane rich, either by adventure OR by trading OR by crafting
Is this assumtion correct, or are we trying to remove one of those points?
Those are good goals and I believe what I suggested to be compatible with each.
Like I said, the main point is to decommission really old items (and yes, this holds little relevance to the OP). Reducing stats is not necessary, though depending on how they balance content vs population and the intended frequency of item upgrades, it bring players back to areas that would otherwise be abandoned.
Its easy to think back to a time in our favorite games before mudflation became and issue, but honestly how common was twinking by the time Luclin rolled around? More importantly, how insanely cheap was it to suit a level 1 in full 30+ gear? That was because of the sheer volume of early to mid level items that had been passed down through the hands of dozens of people. All I'm suggesting is that those items eventually be retired, providing players with more of a reason to revisit older content, and make it less trivial to skip content.
I'm not for a second suggesting that the lifespan of an item be so short that you cannot trade it or pass it to your alt after using it for a few months. Only that down the line, the item eventually become worn to the point it can no longer be used by another player.
What if they were able to make it less valuable if passed on by one or more characters? Hear me out. Let's say you're farming a mob and it drops that new shiny sword you've been looking for. That sword happens to have Dmg 10 Delay 18 and Str +10. Now let's say you purchased that same sword from someone who had been camping it (damn mages camping my swords!) but when offering to trade the stats went down Dmg 9, Delay 19 and Str+8. Would that be possible? This is really a win/win. If you really want that sword for lesser stats, you can buy it, if you need to have it at max, you have to camp it. That would also deter some of the people from camping it non-stop unless it was for them specifically. Thoughts?
Shards of Dalaya EQ private server used/uses this mechanic, and to be honest it is bad. All you're accomplishing with this mechanic is to create even MORE fighting over camps, which is the exact opposite of what TLC is all about. This is also what the trade system is designed to alleviate, when players can purchase items rather than camp them, it takes pressure off the camps and allows players to disperse into the world to camp all different kinds of things to yield them an item that may be hotly contested.
It is a contested content game. The point is earning your gear in play, having it say you put in the effort, things being highly sought after and less common.
Your argument is the exact argument current mainstream gamers make to demand they have easier access to gear.
I don't get you people, you labor to claim you want a contested content game, then bitch and moan if there is actually a reward for getting something from a camp.
FFS, you accused me in several posts about wanting it easy, and then make this argument? /boggle
Because you are working on the false premise that trading for items in a working economy is somehow easier than getting the item yourself: something classic EQ proved to be untrue.
Only you seem to believe that playing the game as a trader is somehow a bad thing that trivializes "gameplay." News flash, trading is gameplay.
Exactly..
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
I want game play. It is as simple as that. The adventure potion of the game is structured with rules and obstacles for character progression. There are levels, skill caps, constraints, etc.... rules that guide play to the limitations and expectations of the developers. These systems are balanced and tested for a reasonable risk/reward in play. If something is imbalanced with this risk/reward, they attempt to balance it to achieve this game play, something that they describe in the tenants to achieve in spirit of proper risk/reward.
There is no such attention to player trade. There are no structures, no rules, no means to guide a given result of balance in risk/reward to insure that players are have consequence in choice, properly designed effort in acquisition, etc.. There are no controls, and those lack of controls seriously imbalance the adventure portion of the game. As I said, all those rules, structures, guide of play and progression carefully balanced for the sake of risk/reward and it is all for nothing due to the player market. A player can circumvent many of its requirements in play.
To make it equal in risk/reward as adventure, there are many ways. One is to simulate many real life elements that have an effect on economies. Obviously, players can not dire permanently, so many risks that would effect timing and urgency in the economies that exist in RL can't be applied directly, but concepts of it can. Again, this is spit balling, but you can put in taxes, fines, fees,rent, regulatory compliance measures (activities, etc..), commission costs, product degradation, etc... You can have them reoccurring so as to create need to move products. Things like reoccurring storage costs can cause sitting on a product to be costly.
You can even change these from city to city, culture to culture to reflect the lore and mood of the race and their politics. These things can change too (all controlled by the devs to help influence and spur events wihtin the economy, good and bad).
You can have levels, skills, etc... put in strategy elements that causes players to apply character development aspects, and thinking to succeed. Barting game systems of play, etc... The sky is the limit, but doing so makes it an actual game, putting in risk/reward, win/loss, and all of the pros/cons of various strategy approaches.
This doesn't have to be controlled by a centralized system either. There really is no need, any player transaction of trade can easily be a part of the system. So, the design and structure and all its requirements come up with something as simple as you trading to another player. The point is not to get hung up on the details I am giving, but to realize there is a way to make trading a game and not just a gimmick that circumvents the rest of the games systems.
If that is infringing on peoples "play style", then we are back to the mainstream argument of claiming that a game should cater to multiple "play styles" and saying that player trade that circumvents the rest of the game is limiting options is the very same argument I have heard from players defending the "options" of being able to use a store to circumvent aspects of the game (ie exp/buff potions, gear, etc...). Same argument, different package, I am just surprised that those who seem to be supporting your argument here agree with it.
To me what you're really saying is you want a game, not a virtual world, which is understandable as a preference. Yet again too singular minded when approaching the MORPG genre. WHich has nothing to do with mainstream in the slightest... Mainstream games are singularly focused for the most part, that's their biggest issue. As Dull said above, it was old games that featured multiple approaches, not mainstream themeparks.
The biggest flaw I see in your point is that you're expecting everyone to embrace your goals in such a game. That's where the entire "circumvent" argument is established in your argument above.The game-play you seek from an MMORPG is not what everyone seeks from such a game. Killing and looting is only one small part of MMORPG game-play. I look at it as being as mind numbing as you seem to view other approaches. That was the beauty of older games in the genre, they embraced more than one type of player.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Item decay, even if it is just "number of possible trade decay" would lead to people camping items more often. Isn't that one of the points we try to reduce? So people leave a camp once they are "done" there?
The system sounds okish, but you just KNOW people want the best version. So trying to sell something with less then maxed value would become very hard. Hell,... some people might even ignore trading and camp it themselves. We would simply shift people from trading to adventuring. Even those that actually want to trade.
Not implying the idea is bad, just unsure if we really solve anything or simply create other problems / shift problems.
Just to make sure we are on the same boat, we want the following as a result:
people should see reasons to talk to eachother
people should want to group up
people should be able to trade and adventure as they see fit / want
people should not lock down content due to whatever reason
people should be able to become insane rich, either by adventure OR by trading OR by crafting
Is this assumtion correct, or are we trying to remove one of those points?
Those are good goals and I believe what I suggested to be compatible with each.
Like I said, the main point is to decommission really old items (and yes, this holds little relevance to the OP). Reducing stats is not necessary, though depending on how they balance content vs population and the intended frequency of item upgrades, it bring players back to areas that would otherwise be abandoned.
Its easy to think back to a time in our favorite games before mudflation became and issue, but honestly how common was twinking by the time Luclin rolled around? More importantly, how insanely cheap was it to suit a level 1 in full 30+ gear? That was because of the sheer volume of early to mid level items that had been passed down through the hands of dozens of people. All I'm suggesting is that those items eventually be retired, providing players with more of a reason to revisit older content, and make it less trivial to skip content.
I'm not for a second suggesting that the lifespan of an item be so short that you cannot trade it or pass it to your alt after using it for a few months. Only that down the line, the item eventually become worn to the point it can no longer be used by another player.
If those are indeed the points we are after,... did we not have that with original EQ?
Well apart from the "getting rich by crafting" part, which is a problem all over the MMO World basically. Usually you have to invest so much into it and get so little that is hardly pays off. Very few games managed that part.
Your suggestion is a NoDrop flag after time. This simply removes an item from the market after a while. Not the worst idea ever, really. I am just uncertain if it would do what we want it to. It would certainly increase item value and it would therefore be camped more often. You could make more money with an item for longer and this would increase RMT value as well.
So basically we would help mudflation, but at the obvious downside of also helping out RMT and making farming worth more. Not that i mind that, since again: I don't think we should do or NOT do the right thing, just because of people that abuse whatever is right. Read: Fighting mudflation is good, even if RMT is getting profit as well.
Then there is a personal thing that i talked about with some friends some years ago. I know that stuff that is of "ending use" for me feels bad. Hard to describe actually,... even if i can use an item forever, but can only trade it say... 10 times. I simply dislike the feeling. Even if the item was damn easy to get.
For example i usually don't use potions for the very same reason. I just don't want to use them, because they are limited. And therefore i don't even want them. Not exactly rational, i am sure, but something that quite a few of my friends seem to have in common.
I fear that such a system could give the same feeling about all my gear, even if (and i am 100% aware) it would never "run out" for myself. Hell, i am used to NoDrop gear and stopped caring (much), yet the idea of tradeable gear that BECOMES NoDrop just tiggles that spot.
I am not fond of ideas that make a game "feel" less good. So i can not exactly vote for the idea, even tho i know it would be better then straight up NoDrop and i know it would be good for the game. I simply still don't like it lol.
MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.
Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?
If those are indeed the points we are after,... did we not have that with original EQ?
Well apart from the "getting rich by crafting" part, which is a problem all over the MMO World basically. Usually you have to invest so much into it and get so little that is hardly pays off. Very few games managed that part.
Your suggestion is a NoDrop flag after time. This simply removes an item from the market after a while. Not the worst idea ever, really. I am just uncertain if it would do what we want it to. It would certainly increase item value and it would therefore be camped more often. You could make more money with an item for longer and this would increase RMT value as well.
So basically we would help mudflation, but at the obvious downside of also helping out RMT and making farming worth more. Not that i mind that, since again: I don't think we should do or NOT do the right thing, just because of people that abuse whatever is right. Read: Fighting mudflation is good, even if RMT is getting profit as well.
Then there is a personal thing that i talked about with some friends some years ago. I know that stuff that is of "ending use" for me feels bad. Hard to describe actually,... even if i can use an item forever, but can only trade it say... 10 times. I simply dislike the feeling. Even if the item was damn easy to get.
For example i usually don't use potions for the very same reason. I just don't want to use them, because they are limited. And therefore i don't even want them. Not exactly rational, i am sure, but something that quite a few of my friends seem to have in common.
I fear that such a system could give the same feeling about all my gear, even if (and i am 100% aware) it would never "run out" for myself. Hell, i am used to NoDrop gear and stopped caring (much), yet the idea of tradeable gear that BECOMES NoDrop just tiggles that spot.
I am not fond of ideas that make a game "feel" less good. So i can not exactly vote for the idea, even tho i know it would be better then straight up NoDrop and i know it would be good for the game. I simply still don't like it lol.
I know what you mean by having that feeling that something is looming over your head. I'm the same way. I may buy potions or expendables, but I am extremely hesitant to use something I can run out of and must then worry about getting again.
However, there are always drawbacks, and to answer your question: Did we have [those elements] with original EQ? Yes, originally. Early on those things are not such a problem, but they did begin to rear their head as early as Kunark and Velious. The fact that the economy was so inundated with older items that things once highly sought after became totally mundane was just not a good thing. You can see the end effect on P99 (Nathsar greatsword). The fact that a good sword like that was given to pets or sold to vendors more often than not shows you how even "original EQ" was not perfect.
All that said, the Pantheon team has some ideas on removing items from the world. One of them is the ability to sacrifice items on an altar for long term buffs. Thats a good idea, but really a gamble as players may choose not to take that option in favor of something more tangible (money or items).
Another idea I would suggest would be a system of breaking items down for some sort of crafting component. This would be a little more essential. The item decay suggestion isn't the only solution, but there should definitely be several ways of removing older items from the economy. At least, if the goal is for the lower levels to remain worthwhile and not become trivialized by the accessibility of higher level items.
I want game play. It is as simple as that. The adventure potion of the game is structured with rules and obstacles for character progression. There are levels, skill caps, constraints, etc.... rules that guide play to the limitations and expectations of the developers. These systems are balanced and tested for a reasonable risk/reward in play. If something is imbalanced with this risk/reward, they attempt to balance it to achieve this game play, something that they describe in the tenants to achieve in spirit of proper risk/reward.
There is no such attention to player trade. There are no structures, no rules, no means to guide a given result of balance in risk/reward to insure that players are have consequence in choice, properly designed effort in acquisition, etc.. There are no controls, and those lack of controls seriously imbalance the adventure portion of the game. As I said, all those rules, structures, guide of play and progression carefully balanced for the sake of risk/reward and it is all for nothing due to the player market. A player can circumvent many of its requirements in play.
To make it equal in risk/reward as adventure, there are many ways. One is to simulate many real life elements that have an effect on economies. Obviously, players can not dire permanently, so many risks that would effect timing and urgency in the economies that exist in RL can't be applied directly, but concepts of it can. Again, this is spit balling, but you can put in taxes, fines, fees,rent, regulatory compliance measures (activities, etc..), commission costs, product degradation, etc... You can have them reoccurring so as to create need to move products. Things like reoccurring storage costs can cause sitting on a product to be costly.
You can even change these from city to city, culture to culture to reflect the lore and mood of the race and their politics. These things can change too (all controlled by the devs to help influence and spur events wihtin the economy, good and bad).
You can have levels, skills, etc... put in strategy elements that causes players to apply character development aspects, and thinking to succeed. Barting game systems of play, etc... The sky is the limit, but doing so makes it an actual game, putting in risk/reward, win/loss, and all of the pros/cons of various strategy approaches.
This doesn't have to be controlled by a centralized system either. There really is no need, any player transaction of trade can easily be a part of the system. So, the design and structure and all its requirements come up with something as simple as you trading to another player. The point is not to get hung up on the details I am giving, but to realize there is a way to make trading a game and not just a gimmick that circumvents the rest of the games systems.
If that is infringing on peoples "play style", then we are back to the mainstream argument of claiming that a game should cater to multiple "play styles" and saying that player trade that circumvents the rest of the game is limiting options is the very same argument I have heard from players defending the "options" of being able to use a store to circumvent aspects of the game (ie exp/buff potions, gear, etc...). Same argument, different package, I am just surprised that those who seem to be supporting your argument here agree with it.
To me what you're really saying is you want a game, not a virtual world, which is understandable as a preference. Yet again too singular minded when approaching the MORPG genre. WHich has nothing to do with mainstream in the slightest... Mainstream games are singularly focused for the most part, that's their biggest issue. As Dull said above, it was old games that featured multiple approaches, not mainstream themeparks.
The biggest flaw I see in your point is that you're expecting everyone to embrace your goals in such a game. That's where the entire "circumvent" argument is established in your argument above.The game-play you seek from an MMORPG is not what everyone seeks from such a game. Killing and looting is only one small part of MMORPG game-play. I look at it as being as mind numbing as you seem to view other approaches. That was the beauty of older games in the genre, they embraced more than one type of player.
Where are you seeking a virtual world? Is it a virtual world if trade has no real rules, structures, consequences, or any realistic means of risk/reward that exists in a real world? I hear some of you go on about this concept, but then adamantly oppose any structures that attempt to emulate a world reality.
So what you and others making this argument are saying is you want a virtual chat room where you can play make believe, but do not want any rules that make it a game, nor any structures of reality that make it a world.
Again, I ask you... where are the world like consequences in trade? Where are the influences of government, factions and other elements that drive and direct trade through taxes, regulations, mandates, and various requirements? Where are the pitfalls of running a business, or operating a trade? I mean, the closest thing that exists is crafting, but even there there are no controls of reality that even begin to properly replicate choice and consequence in such a venture. Where are all these needed consequences that exist in the real world to which your "virtual world" is supposed to emulate?
Where are the world realities of living such as needing to constantly deal with the need to eat, drink, clothe, and shelter yourself from the elements or the result is loss of life? Where are the realities of costs in storage, costs to produce and bring to market be the creation and manufacturing of goods, or the providing the resources to be able to sustain gathering products for sale?
You keep going on about a virtual world because it is convenient to dismiss my points about game systems all the while you completely betray your position by ignoring the lack of consequence in your virtual world.
Yet I am the unreasonable one here? hmmmm
One thing on the circumvention.
It is circumvention, even yours and others arguments here do not deny it. You argue that players should have other options to gain the "same" rewards that is not forced into the "achiever" role. This by your very argument is one that wishes to have an option that circumvents the game play portion of the adventure game. Do you deny this?
What if they were able to make it less valuable if passed on by one or more characters? Hear me out. Let's say you're farming a mob and it drops that new shiny sword you've been looking for. That sword happens to have Dmg 10 Delay 18 and Str +10. Now let's say you purchased that same sword from someone who had been camping it (damn mages camping my swords!) but when offering to trade the stats went down Dmg 9, Delay 19 and Str+8. Would that be possible? This is really a win/win. If you really want that sword for lesser stats, you can buy it, if you need to have it at max, you have to camp it. That would also deter some of the people from camping it non-stop unless it was for them specifically. Thoughts?
Shards of Dalaya EQ private server used/uses this mechanic, and to be honest it is bad. All you're accomplishing with this mechanic is to create even MORE fighting over camps, which is the exact opposite of what TLC is all about. This is also what the trade system is designed to alleviate, when players can purchase items rather than camp them, it takes pressure off the camps and allows players to disperse into the world to camp all different kinds of things to yield them an item that may be hotly contested.
It is a contested content game. The point is earning your gear in play, having it say you put in the effort, things being highly sought after and less common.
Your argument is the exact argument current mainstream gamers make to demand they have easier access to gear.
I don't get you people, you labor to claim you want a contested content game, then bitch and moan if there is actually a reward for getting something from a camp.
FFS, you accused me in several posts about wanting it easy, and then make this argument? /boggle
Because you are working on the false premise that trading for items in a working economy is somehow easier than getting the item yourself: something classic EQ proved to be untrue.
Only you seem to believe that playing the game as a trader is somehow a bad thing that trivializes "gameplay." News flash, trading is gameplay.
Exactly..
It is a straw man Distopia. I am not saying that playing a trader is bad thing, but I am saying that the lack of reality of consequence in such causes severe issues in the system. Dullahan claims that trade is "game play", but there are no rules or structure to the system. There are no real means of choice and consequence, no requirement for intelligent play. It is really just a dump area for people to push around goods.
In real life, we have many aspects that drive our decisions in trade. At a minimum we must recover our costs to bring to market or produce a product or there is no point, we go into loss and if we continue to lose, it can result in not being able to afford food/water/clothing or shelter.
If we have a mass of products, we must consider aspects of perishables, product age, storage costs and keeping products in condition. We have continued licenses, taxes, fees, rent, etc... that all drive our need to make profit in our sales.
In all this you have the influence of social structures that drive politics which also affects trade practices, allowances, and even pricing through tariffs and other trade issues between social elements.
Dullahan ignores the fact that little to none of this exists, in fact... there are not even basic rules to simple trading to create such pro/cons, choice and consequence. The price of an item is not driven by any consistent means, for as I said there are no real life drivers that force a person to reduce a price. A person can sit indefinitely on a price and eventually it will sell (I have seen this quite often in EQ2 as all trades are left on the market even with people no longer playing). So all the aspects of reality, of choice and consequence, of rules, and structures that a person must abide to succeed do not exist, yet... this is the very definition of what a game is.
A game is a set of obstacles, objectives, or requirements to which a person competes to overcome (against a system alone or with/against others) according to a set of rules.
That is a game, but this does not exist to any real structure with the player trade. It does with the adventure game and in fact, developers labor intensively to achieve a structure of balance to provide this game play.
So Dullahan is mistaken in his position in not only his accusation that I think being a trader is bad, but also that player trade as it exists in most games today is a game. In fact, I would like to see player trading actually be a game, others here do not. This is apparent in the discussions here. You can not honestly accuse me after reading this that I desire no trade, or that I hate player trade, rather it is I want a real system, a "virtual world" as you put it to exist, not a glorified chat room where trade is chaotic with easy means to manipulate due to now real consequence in its use.
However, there are always drawbacks, and to answer your question: Did we have [those elements] with original EQ? Yes, originally. Early on those things are not such a problem, but they did begin to rear their head as early as Kunark and Velious. The fact that the economy was so inundated with older items that things once highly sought after became totally mundane was just not a good thing. You can see the end effect on P99 (Nathsar greatsword). The fact that a good sword like that was given to pets or sold to vendors more often than not shows you how even "original EQ" was not perfect.
The reason it wasn't a problem you noticed is because it was in its infant stages due to many reasons. Part was because MMOs were new and so populations were smaller. Part was because EQ had no trade system at all, leaving players to "create" their own system which took time for players to work out some standard of practice naturally. Part of it was because RMT was in its infancy in the western market and so no major efforts were in place to create product for sale. Part was because EQs system of camping took time, so new products were not instantly added to the market, Part was due to the fact that the concept of buying ones way through the game wasn't initially openly viewed as healthy game play (ie people thought buying your gear on the market was cheating having to actually earn it in the game) and the list goes on. All mainly because the game was young, new, and these types of problems take time to develop speed.
The reason I know this is because I have a unique perspective coming from Test server during this time. I moved over a littler after the release of Kunark from Test server. On test, the plat trade market did not exist (it was widely shunned) and what trading did exist was random meets of bartering. There was no centralized trading market in EC, no organized approach to trade, it for all intent and purposes didn't exist.
So, when I moved to the production servers, the trade behavior, its effect on the game in many systems were quite obvious. What you and others seem to be affected by is the "boiling frog" principal. Since trading and all of its issues were gradual and slow due to many reasons I mentioned above, you and others were unaware of the changes happening, like a frog who slowly has the water warmed over time to the point of boiling.
Buy the time you did recognize the abuses, the issues, the problems it caused, you were not entirely sure when it began. I am saying it began slowly the moment player trading began due to it not being a system (Brad specifically stated trade was not implemented on release, player trade was an emergent behavior of players using what they had). That means there were no controls, no structures to monitor and guide trade to a healthy result for the game. If it were an adventure issue, where players found a way to exploit a mechanic or lack of attention to a design in order to circumvent progression, it would be attended to (and was often) very quickly. As I told you, I worked testing the anti-pulling code for Velious before I left Test (as did many players who helped devs test various things), even pulling was something they were trying to curb as Brad even thought early on that it circumvented many intended content designs in the game.
Trade however was not simply a subtle attempt through code changes to fix. Since it was not a designed system and there were no developer controls on it to even remotely control or regulate its behavior such as the rest of the game game had (because it was designed for it), they were extremely limited as to the solutions they could apply to deal with it. All you got was desperate attempts to remove currency, stop gap measures to deal the chaos of it.
So when I say player trade is a problem, I am saying player trade without any constraints, systems, checks and balances is the problem and until people accept this and recognize that it needs to be pulled in and made a part of the game system to which the developers have control, then it will never be solved. You will always have the same problem we have had from game to game and that is band aid fixes trying to treat symptoms, rather than the illness. Trade needs to become a system that allows developers a means to balance it with the rest of the game or this is all pointless. /shrug
@Sinist ; Personally in the old days I was more of an RP/PVPer type. My entire guild was, so that was "game" enough for me. That's the thing I'm attempting to point out to you, when it comes down to it.. many approach this genre in different ways. It's hard to not label something many take part in as their mainstay in an MMORPG (trading, playing the market etc..) as a part of the genre's overall game-play options.
Their interest lies in peddling/exchanging wares, another segment is highly involved in spending time to earn loot simply to sell it, so on and so forth, quite often the two examples I showed benefit from the others approach, the trader has the funds earned through trade to exchange with the supplier, who has earned through adventuring. Both styles of game-play offer a different experience, with their own sets of challenges.That's how things typically work in the real world as well.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
@Sinist ; Personally in the old days I was more of an RP/PVPer type. My entire guild was, so that was "game" enough for me. That's the thing I'm attempting to point out to you, when it comes down to it.. many approach this genre in different ways. It's hard to not label something many take part in as their mainstay in an MMORPG (trading, playing the market etc..) as a part of the genre's overall game-play options.
Their interest lies in peddling/exchanging wares, another segment is highly involved in spending time to earn loot simply to sell it, so on and so forth, quite often the two examples I showed benefit from the others approach, the trader has the funds earned through trade to exchange with the supplier, who has earned through adventuring. Both styles of game-play offer a different experience, with their own sets of challenges.That's how things typically work in the real world as well.
I understand that, I really do. I understand that people play games for specific reasons, some for very narrow and detailed "entertainment" processes. I can respect that, but that form of play has a massive effect on the rest of the game. When I first started seeing people come to an MMO claiming that they only wanted to play a trade game, I was a bit confused. The reason being as there were many games out there that specifically attended to the whole "trade" game play. There were tons of single player games, even online games that had such. Now admittedly most of those offerings didn't come in the package that a game like EQ did, they were more text based, or spread sheet based games where players played economic trade systems in battles of control over resources.
Is that what they want though? Is it "trade" as in the full encompassing definition? Or is it "trade" in a more simplistic literal form? If it is the former, then why do they object to a detailed emulation system that tries to replicate a world system as I described? If it is just to move product mundanely in the simplest form, then... why do they object to solutions that would protect adventure circumvention?
Dullahan even said that he didn't like the solution someone brought up about degradation of stats on a trade because he felt it unfairly targeted trade. If the idea is just simplistic trade (the desire to move widgets for cash acquisition), the solution had no real effect on it, people would still trade items with that solution. All it did was not invalidate the "game" portion of the adventure side by allowing players to circumvent it through the lack of structure (and disconnect from the adventure side in balance) that the player trade market had.
Even others objected to the example claiming it was unfair to people who wanted to bypass the game through such a system. So are you saying that people should be able to play the game without respect to rules in the game so they can play the way they want? I understand that, honestly.. I do... but... it is the same position as someone demanding RMT in that they are asking for elements of play that contradict with the main game play design. Should an entire game adjust to serve the desire of a person who only wants to play a certain portion of the game? Because by disregarding trade as a real game system or not allowing developers the control they need to keep it balanced with the rest of the game, that is kind of what is being suggested, that a small portion of the game dictate to the rest of the game.
The reason this is a problem I see with Pantheon is because Pantheon specifically states that risk/reward, great effort and achievement, etc... are the defining factors of what an MMO should be. If a trade system allows such circumvention of systems, of control, of game requirement, then how is the trade system serving the best interest of those tenants?
edit:
I want to add to this to clarify.
Time spent is not equal to risk/reward. If you are to say that they are the same, please give an example. Provide an example of the easiest means to create cash to buy the item and that of the most difficult camp to obtain the item. Here... we will use my example of the Fungi Tunic.
A camp that normally required 2 competent groups (or one very skilled group) to camp, had to deal with holding it (it was a rough camp to hold) until that item dropped, which could be quite a while, multiple hours, and even days/weeks to finally get it to drop and win the loot in your group.
Now, kiting giants were big cash back then (they dropped high cash items) and so kiting classes would farm these giants to make good money quickly. There was no real skill in such examples with some classes, you had snare, you had run speed increases, you had root, etc... in fact many people would do "rest" kiting as they were doing it (ie run a ways, sit down, med and watch till the mob got close, get up and repeat). It was mundane zero risk work, and a even cash flow.
So... where is the equivalency in this example? The person camping has no idea when the item will drop or if they will even win it, not to mention extremely competent players are needed and a constant attention to play is required for hours of play, even days to finally obtain the goal. The kiting player can watch TV and has a pretty solid idea how much money they are earning per hour and so know pretty well when they will have the money and when they will get their item.
Where is this balance you are mentioning? I am not seeing it, maybe you could explain in a bit of depth the elements I am missing here?
@Hrimnir ; - Edit: I just want to give an example of why not being able to buy an item you may want or need and HAVING to camp it is stupid. When I played EQ originally I played with a good friend who was an enchanter. He went quite literally from 53 to 60 in Sebilis, and spent as much of that time as possible in the camp that dropped the Hierophant's Cloak, to give you a point of reference, level 59 took him almost 90 hours of XPing. In that time he saw the cloak drop 4 times, and he lost the roll on it all 4 times. So we're talking about someone who spent several hundred hours trying to get an item and had no luck.
With your system he is just up the creek. He doesn't get to ever have the item, or he just has to endlessly bang his head against the wall trying to get the item at the mercy of RNGesus. What he ultimately was able to do was spend money he had gotten from selling items he won in sebilis, and used that to buy the cloak.
Forcing people to have to "earn" the items by being in the raid/dungeon only works when the items are relatively common, OR you put a token system in place, or some combination of the two like WoW did. When items are rare, having to play at the mercy of RNGesus is one of the most supremely frustrating and frankly stupid things in the world, and IMO it has no place in any MMO.
To be fair and honest, I never thought about this but I also remember Similar instances in my own adventures like your friend, the Enchanter. I don't know if you played Wildstar, but they had a raid system where if you didn't get the exact item you wanted or didn't win the roll for it, you could purchase it as long as you had killed the mob. Artifact items weren't available for purchase but in your example, the cloak would have been. Maybe you get a token for each boss you kill in said dungeon and after so many tokens you can then purchase the cloak. The key point here is you would actually have to be a part of the kill in order to obtain the item that you wanted via tokens. Thoughts?
To be fair and honest, I never thought about this but I also remember Similar instances in my own adventures like your friend, the Enchanter. I don't know if you played Wildstar, but they had a raid system where if you didn't get the exact item you wanted or didn't win the roll for it, you could purchase it as long as you had killed the mob. Artifact items weren't available for purchase but in your example, the cloak would have been. Maybe you get a token for each boss you kill in said dungeon and after so many tokens you can then purchase the cloak. The key point here is you would actually have to be a part of the kill in order to obtain the item that you wanted via tokens. Thoughts?
I'm not a fan of a token system as I believe it trivializes gear acquisition. I "get" the idea behind it as RNGesus can be very punishing - I experienced that with both the cloak of flames and FBSS in EQ. However, I'd rather give the option of purchasing gear through game currency than introduce a token system (not all, but like a mix ala EQ like we discussed). The token system results in everyone getting the gear which then trivializes the prestige (much like your fear with purchasing the Excalibur example).
@Hrimnir ; - Edit: I just want to give an example of why not being able to buy an item you may want or need and HAVING to camp it is stupid. When I played EQ originally I played with a good friend who was an enchanter. He went quite literally from 53 to 60 in Sebilis, and spent as much of that time as possible in the camp that dropped the Hierophant's Cloak, to give you a point of reference, level 59 took him almost 90 hours of XPing. In that time he saw the cloak drop 4 times, and he lost the roll on it all 4 times. So we're talking about someone who spent several hundred hours trying to get an item and had no luck.
With your system he is just up the creek. He doesn't get to ever have the item, or he just has to endlessly bang his head against the wall trying to get the item at the mercy of RNGesus. What he ultimately was able to do was spend money he had gotten from selling items he won in sebilis, and used that to buy the cloak.
Forcing people to have to "earn" the items by being in the raid/dungeon only works when the items are relatively common, OR you put a token system in place, or some combination of the two like WoW did. When items are rare, having to play at the mercy of RNGesus is one of the most supremely frustrating and frankly stupid things in the world, and IMO it has no place in any MMO.
To be fair and honest, I never thought about this but I also remember Similar instances in my own adventures like your friend, the Enchanter. I don't know if you played Wildstar, but they had a raid system where if you didn't get the exact item you wanted or didn't win the roll for it, you could purchase it as long as you had killed the mob. Artifact items weren't available for purchase but in your example, the cloak would have been. Maybe you get a token for each boss you kill in said dungeon and after so many tokens you can then purchase the cloak. The key point here is you would actually have to be a part of the kill in order to obtain the item that you wanted via tokens. Thoughts?
These are good points on both sides for some key examples, they bring up issues that occurred in the game that are being overlooked and show how we led to the problem of systems today. For instance, in Hrimnir's example his complaint is that his friend spent an enormous amount of time camping the items, having them drop and losing out on the rolls.
Two issues here.
1) RNG was bad and certainly could be improved because there were issues of some people constantly getting lopsided results (ie defying statistical principal repeatedly).
2) Hrimnir is missing the point. An item being rare where not everyone has it, not everyone has the chance to get it is why EQ was addicting and why it meant so much to get an item.
This is why buying an item cheapens. I too had issues with some things that I just had bad rolls, terrible luck with camps, etc... and never got the chance to get the item. I was ok with that because that is what made getting some items so dang amazing. When player trade took off and become the go to "gear up" place for people, group gear was no longer valuable as it used to be. That was reserved for raid gear. So in a game where it was primarily designed for the group experience (raids were a very small part of early EQ), group gear was treated as common gear up options for those who used the player trade market.
This brings up your suggestion.
We have had lots of token systems in games, "pick your own loot" features, and various other types of conveniences in mainstream games over the years. When I first left EQ, I thought this was a great idea, because I too had been slighted by the RNG many of times and thought that this would be the perfect solution to removing all the fighting, the disappointment, and massive difficulty that came with loot drops.
After spending nearly 20 years playing MMOs, I can tell you that tokens, "pick your own loot" or other similar systems are bad for game play. They remove the desire, the entire concept of anticipation, of disappointment and rarity in obtaining something. It is the very thing that Hrimnir claims is bad about the loot issues that made loot so valuable and so amazing in reward in EQ. Token systems cheapen that, allowing players to pick their loot, through steady progression is a game killer, and why so many people game hop these days.
Loot should be rare, it should be coveted, people should have disappointment and not everyone should be able to have it so that those who do have it, have meaning in having it.
There is an old design principal that goes "never give the client what they want, give them what they need" and what it means is that what the client wants isn't always what they need. They may think they want something a certain way, but it may be lack of understanding how to express what that is or a misunderstanding in what it is that will satisfy their need (which is ultimately what they want).
If you have ever developed software, or handled similar style projects, you now how important properly establishing the requirements of the solution the client seeks. That if you simply give the client constantly what they ask for, the result is often you constantly redoing what you did because "they didn't mean that when they said that, that what they really wanted was... "
Point is, nothing is gained in sustainable game play if a player is served up what they want constantly and given what they want constantly. This is why mainstream games can't hold anyone, they reward people for simply showing up, allowing them to pick their prizes, and all risk/reward and anticipation in play is removed. Now if getting handed gear, always getting the prize, etc... with the reduced effort and lack of risk is what some want, then all I can do is point to the tenants and explain it doesn't seem to fit with what VR is attempting to achieve.
As you have said, what is the point in buying your item? Is there really any anticipation, risk/reward in simply counting up money until you go to buy the item? You know you are going to get it, you can even reasonably gauge exactly when that will be, what is the point in that?
From my experience, I personally would take being that enchanter in Hrimnir's example a 1000 times over than getting my items handed to me through mundane guaranteed means. That isn't the excitement of a game, of anticipation, or risk/reward, it is a mundane job of earning to buy widgets. /bleh
Comments
This is like I was talking about earlier with solutions that penalize normal play because of the nature of excess from other systems.
I feel having a natural degradation of items is more immersive and less restrictive than an item magically becoming less powerful upon changing hands. That is only there to discourage Trader gameplay and prevent people from buying and reselling goods. That is not the point of the system I'm proposing. Its there merely to decommission older items and prevent long term mudflation.
There's also nothing complicated about items wearing down. If a given item has 100 points of normal durability and the lifetime durability of the item is 30,000, the item could be repaired from a broken state 300 times before becoming "Aged" and then either NoDrop or unusable by another player other than the final owner. Its simple math.
Appreciate the clarification. Were you also proposing for the items stats to reduce as well with degradation, or simply that once the item becomes "Aged" through regular use that it would be unusable by anyone but the current user as a means to prevent long term mudflation?
I think a small item reduction would be reasonable, but I wouldn't think anything major. Maybe a 10% difference between "Pristine" and "Aged".
To your credit, you are correct, I did misread your post, you never stated we "should" do that, however, there were some reasonably strong implications ;-).
I agree with you in regards to early game becoming trivial as a result of an aging game and the overall playerbase moving on in average levels. That's simply part of an MMO though. The solutions to this "problem" (and I don't agree its a problem in all reality) cause more harm than good. You're basically doing changes the benefit the few new players coming into the game at the severe detriment to the existing playerbase. The real "solution" to the problem is to have new servers being added as needed, and to identify those servers to new players as being newer servers that they would be better to join rather than existing "old" servers.
I do agree with you about WoW vs EQ, I actually didn't play WoW for almost 6 months because of how easy mode it was to me. However in hindsight, given how "modern" mmos are... I'd gladly give my left nut for another game that was more similar to Vanilla WoW than what is out now. Obviously I'd prefer a more EQ like game, but vanilla WoW would be a massive step in the right direction IMO.
I don't recall personally doing any juxtapositions earlier in regards to EQ vs WoW, and I would have argued against those. My personal issue is just simply "AH vs Player Trade", and there is a rather large gulf between them.
The main issue and the reason for bringing up the AH vs Player trade is the argument sinist was making in so much as how rampant player abuse of the trade system would be / is, and how that would affect the playerbase. My specific argument was that the type of behavior he was describing was much more rampant in games with AH's, and while it did occur in EQ, it wasn't nearly to the level as in games like WoW. Then it devolved into people using examples of P99 to support the RMT and abuse of the system argument, and that's really what ruffled my feathers as P99 is not in any way shape or form representative of the norm for 2 reasons. 1. Its an extremely old server that is extremely top heavy. 2. The type of player attracted to p99 are already more "power gamer" types that would be more "ok" with that type of behavior (playing the market, RMT, etc).
As to your last point, I'm sorry but you're just being absurd if you try to suggest that P99 and EQ circa 1999-2001 were even remotely the same as far as abused of RMT and buying items/playing the market, etc. That is just categorically false.
The reason to take the AH out is to facilitate community via forcing people to engage each other to sell and buy items. Secondarily is also creates barriers to entry to filter out the people who do things like buy every single piece of spider silk on the market so they can replace it on the AH at 2x the price and people are forced to pay more for it or do without. This is one of the common types of "gaming" the system that was rampant in WoW and other games with AH's.
On a last note, just to touch back on the first issue of early game being trivialized, that's just flat assed going to happen. That's like trying to combat aging in real life by making it illegal to eat bacon. At some point you're just making stupid knee jerk reactionary changes that ruin the quality of life of the people playing the game, to combat something you can't meaningfully change anyways.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
I'm sorry but that's just wrong. I could very easily make a strong argument that having gear tokens that you could only get from raiding to buy gear with is promoting "earning your gear from playing the game" Yet this is the type of core mechanic of faceroll easy mode games that is part of the problem.
Overall Sinist I like you and you generally make good arguments and have sound reasoning. That being said the majority of your posts in this thread have been a bunch of arm waving hand wringing alarmist BS. You've constantly made slippery slope arguments, you've passive aggressively insinuated that we only support these things because we like RMT and we like being able to game the market and that we want to be able to "buy" our progression.
Many of us have come back with multiple sound arguments, and you continue to just conflate the issues at hand.
Frankly you're better than this and you know it.
Edit: I just want to give an example of why not being able to buy an item you may want or need and HAVING to camp it is stupid. When I played EQ originally I played with a good friend who was an enchanter. He went quite literally from 53 to 60 in Sebilis, and spent as much of that time as possible in the camp that dropped the Hierophant's Cloak, to give you a point of reference, level 59 took him almost 90 hours of XPing. In that time he saw the cloak drop 4 times, and he lost the roll on it all 4 times. So we're talking about someone who spent several hundred hours trying to get an item and had no luck.
With your system he is just up the creek. He doesn't get to ever have the item, or he just has to endlessly bang his head against the wall trying to get the item at the mercy of RNGesus. What he ultimately was able to do was spend money he had gotten from selling items he won in sebilis, and used that to buy the cloak.
Forcing people to have to "earn" the items by being in the raid/dungeon only works when the items are relatively common, OR you put a token system in place, or some combination of the two like WoW did. When items are rare, having to play at the mercy of RNGesus is one of the most supremely frustrating and frankly stupid things in the world, and IMO it has no place in any MMO.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
My only concern with the whole "aged, pristine, etc" idea, is that it actually promotes further camping of items from poopsockers. Min/Maxers are always going to want the best, they'll do anything for that single stat point, which means they'll have no trouble or problems turfing their aged item for a pristine of the same item. Which will incentivize poopsockers to camp the item to sell to these people at a premium.
I guess there is worse things that could happen, but I have a feeling it would be counterproductive to the goal of incentivizing camping the item yourself vs buying it.
Personally I don't think there is a damned thing wrong with either option, but apparently lots of people do.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
On the other hand, I'm not sure giving people a reason to camp items again is such a bad thing. Perhaps not in early EQ with the somewhat limited nature of some of the better items (only 1 source of haste, only 1 or 2 good 2 handed weapons, only 1 good sword, etc) but in a game where there are more options available, I can see losing a stat (10% isn't much, thats a -1 on a +10 item) as a way to bring people back to places less frequented.
Lets be honest, we aren't going to see those extreme bottlenecks we had with vanilla EQ in Pantheon. More likely than not, they will have alternatives for most stats and item effects, especially when there will be a lot of situational gear for different builds and resist sets.
@Dullahan
I asked about the stat reduction as I share the same concern as Hrimnir, which I know you said you have hesitation on also. You do raise a good point on bringing people back to dungeons, but, I don't know if the people that would be brought back would be the /pick up group type and I'd fear they'd fall more into the category that Hrimnir suggested - the hardcore that wanted to min/max the -1 stat lost and most likely would group with others (or guildies) to get the item as quickly as possible and be on their way. Or, I could see a scenario where the person joined a pickup group and rolled on an item when his/her is at 90% when the other group member doesn't have one at all. I wouldn't be opposed to your system without the stat reduction though - either way it would still ultimately remove items from the market to slow mudflation.
And /agreed on the situational gear point.
The system sounds okish, but you just KNOW people want the best version. So trying to sell something with less then maxed value would become very hard. Hell,... some people might even ignore trading and camp it themselves. We would simply shift people from trading to adventuring. Even those that actually want to trade.
Not implying the idea is bad, just unsure if we really solve anything or simply create other problems / shift problems.
Just to make sure we are on the same boat, we want the following as a result:
Is this assumtion correct, or are we trying to remove one of those points?
MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.
Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?
Like I said, the main point is to decommission really old items (and yes, this holds little relevance to the OP). Reducing stats is not necessary, though depending on how they balance content vs population and the intended frequency of item upgrades, it bring players back to areas that would otherwise be abandoned.
Its easy to think back to a time in our favorite games before mudflation became and issue, but honestly how common was twinking by the time Luclin rolled around? More importantly, how insanely cheap was it to suit a level 1 in full 30+ gear? That was because of the sheer volume of early to mid level items that had been passed down through the hands of dozens of people. All I'm suggesting is that those items eventually be retired, providing players with more of a reason to revisit older content, and make it less trivial to skip content.
I'm not for a second suggesting that the lifespan of an item be so short that you cannot trade it or pass it to your alt after using it for a few months. Only that down the line, the item eventually become worn to the point it can no longer be used by another player.
"The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
The biggest flaw I see in your point is that you're expecting everyone to embrace your goals in such a game. That's where the entire "circumvent" argument is established in your argument above.The game-play you seek from an MMORPG is not what everyone seeks from such a game. Killing and looting is only one small part of MMORPG game-play. I look at it as being as mind numbing as you seem to view other approaches. That was the beauty of older games in the genre, they embraced more than one type of player.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Well apart from the "getting rich by crafting" part, which is a problem all over the MMO World basically. Usually you have to invest so much into it and get so little that is hardly pays off. Very few games managed that part.
Your suggestion is a NoDrop flag after time. This simply removes an item from the market after a while. Not the worst idea ever, really. I am just uncertain if it would do what we want it to. It would certainly increase item value and it would therefore be camped more often. You could make more money with an item for longer and this would increase RMT value as well.
So basically we would help mudflation, but at the obvious downside of also helping out RMT and making farming worth more. Not that i mind that, since again: I don't think we should do or NOT do the right thing, just because of people that abuse whatever is right. Read: Fighting mudflation is good, even if RMT is getting profit as well.
Then there is a personal thing that i talked about with some friends some years ago.
I know that stuff that is of "ending use" for me feels bad. Hard to describe actually,... even if i can use an item forever, but can only trade it say... 10 times. I simply dislike the feeling. Even if the item was damn easy to get.
For example i usually don't use potions for the very same reason. I just don't want to use them, because they are limited. And therefore i don't even want them. Not exactly rational, i am sure, but something that quite a few of my friends seem to have in common.
I fear that such a system could give the same feeling about all my gear, even if (and i am 100% aware) it would never "run out" for myself. Hell, i am used to NoDrop gear and stopped caring (much), yet the idea of tradeable gear that BECOMES NoDrop just tiggles that spot.
I am not fond of ideas that make a game "feel" less good. So i can not exactly vote for the idea, even tho i know it would be better then straight up NoDrop and i know it would be good for the game. I simply still don't like it lol.
MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.
Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?
However, there are always drawbacks, and to answer your question: Did we have [those elements] with original EQ? Yes, originally. Early on those things are not such a problem, but they did begin to rear their head as early as Kunark and Velious. The fact that the economy was so inundated with older items that things once highly sought after became totally mundane was just not a good thing. You can see the end effect on P99 (Nathsar greatsword). The fact that a good sword like that was given to pets or sold to vendors more often than not shows you how even "original EQ" was not perfect.
All that said, the Pantheon team has some ideas on removing items from the world. One of them is the ability to sacrifice items on an altar for long term buffs. Thats a good idea, but really a gamble as players may choose not to take that option in favor of something more tangible (money or items).
Another idea I would suggest would be a system of breaking items down for some sort of crafting component. This would be a little more essential. The item decay suggestion isn't the only solution, but there should definitely be several ways of removing older items from the economy. At least, if the goal is for the lower levels to remain worthwhile and not become trivialized by the accessibility of higher level items.
Where are you seeking a virtual world? Is it a virtual world if trade has no real rules, structures, consequences, or any realistic means of risk/reward that exists in a real world? I hear some of you go on about this concept, but then adamantly oppose any structures that attempt to emulate a world reality.
So what you and others making this argument are saying is you want a virtual chat room where you can play make believe, but do not want any rules that make it a game, nor any structures of reality that make it a world.
Again, I ask you... where are the world like consequences in trade? Where are the influences of government, factions and other elements that drive and direct trade through taxes, regulations, mandates, and various requirements? Where are the pitfalls of running a business, or operating a trade? I mean, the closest thing that exists is crafting, but even there there are no controls of reality that even begin to properly replicate choice and consequence in such a venture. Where are all these needed consequences that exist in the real world to which your "virtual world" is supposed to emulate?
Where are the world realities of living such as needing to constantly deal with the need to eat, drink, clothe, and shelter yourself from the elements or the result is loss of life? Where are the realities of costs in storage, costs to produce and bring to market be the creation and manufacturing of goods, or the providing the resources to be able to sustain gathering products for sale?
You keep going on about a virtual world because it is convenient to dismiss my points about game systems all the while you completely betray your position by ignoring the lack of consequence in your virtual world.
Yet I am the unreasonable one here? hmmmm
One thing on the circumvention.
It is circumvention, even yours and others arguments here do not deny it. You argue that players should have other options to gain the "same" rewards that is not forced into the "achiever" role. This by your very argument is one that wishes to have an option that circumvents the game play portion of the adventure game. Do you deny this?
In real life, we have many aspects that drive our decisions in trade. At a minimum we must recover our costs to bring to market or produce a product or there is no point, we go into loss and if we continue to lose, it can result in not being able to afford food/water/clothing or shelter.
If we have a mass of products, we must consider aspects of perishables, product age, storage costs and keeping products in condition. We have continued licenses, taxes, fees, rent, etc... that all drive our need to make profit in our sales.
In all this you have the influence of social structures that drive politics which also affects trade practices, allowances, and even pricing through tariffs and other trade issues between social elements.
Dullahan ignores the fact that little to none of this exists, in fact... there are not even basic rules to simple trading to create such pro/cons, choice and consequence. The price of an item is not driven by any consistent means, for as I said there are no real life drivers that force a person to reduce a price. A person can sit indefinitely on a price and eventually it will sell (I have seen this quite often in EQ2 as all trades are left on the market even with people no longer playing). So all the aspects of reality, of choice and consequence, of rules, and structures that a person must abide to succeed do not exist, yet... this is the very definition of what a game is.
A game is a set of obstacles, objectives, or requirements to which a person competes to overcome (against a system alone or with/against others) according to a set of rules.
That is a game, but this does not exist to any real structure with the player trade. It does with the adventure game and in fact, developers labor intensively to achieve a structure of balance to provide this game play.
So Dullahan is mistaken in his position in not only his accusation that I think being a trader is bad, but also that player trade as it exists in most games today is a game. In fact, I would like to see player trading actually be a game, others here do not. This is apparent in the discussions here. You can not honestly accuse me after reading this that I desire no trade, or that I hate player trade, rather it is I want a real system, a "virtual world" as you put it to exist, not a glorified chat room where trade is chaotic with easy means to manipulate due to now real consequence in its use.
The reason it wasn't a problem you noticed is because it was in its infant stages due to many reasons. Part was because MMOs were new and so populations were smaller. Part was because EQ had no trade system at all, leaving players to "create" their own system which took time for players to work out some standard of practice naturally. Part of it was because RMT was in its infancy in the western market and so no major efforts were in place to create product for sale. Part was because EQs system of camping took time, so new products were not instantly added to the market, Part was due to the fact that the concept of buying ones way through the game wasn't initially openly viewed as healthy game play (ie people thought buying your gear on the market was cheating having to actually earn it in the game) and the list goes on. All mainly because the game was young, new, and these types of problems take time to develop speed.
The reason I know this is because I have a unique perspective coming from Test server during this time. I moved over a littler after the release of Kunark from Test server. On test, the plat trade market did not exist (it was widely shunned) and what trading did exist was random meets of bartering. There was no centralized trading market in EC, no organized approach to trade, it for all intent and purposes didn't exist.
So, when I moved to the production servers, the trade behavior, its effect on the game in many systems were quite obvious. What you and others seem to be affected by is the "boiling frog" principal. Since trading and all of its issues were gradual and slow due to many reasons I mentioned above, you and others were unaware of the changes happening, like a frog who slowly has the water warmed over time to the point of boiling.
Buy the time you did recognize the abuses, the issues, the problems it caused, you were not entirely sure when it began. I am saying it began slowly the moment player trading began due to it not being a system (Brad specifically stated trade was not implemented on release, player trade was an emergent behavior of players using what they had). That means there were no controls, no structures to monitor and guide trade to a healthy result for the game. If it were an adventure issue, where players found a way to exploit a mechanic or lack of attention to a design in order to circumvent progression, it would be attended to (and was often) very quickly. As I told you, I worked testing the anti-pulling code for Velious before I left Test (as did many players who helped devs test various things), even pulling was something they were trying to curb as Brad even thought early on that it circumvented many intended content designs in the game.
Trade however was not simply a subtle attempt through code changes to fix. Since it was not a designed system and there were no developer controls on it to even remotely control or regulate its behavior such as the rest of the game game had (because it was designed for it), they were extremely limited as to the solutions they could apply to deal with it. All you got was desperate attempts to remove currency, stop gap measures to deal the chaos of it.
So when I say player trade is a problem, I am saying player trade without any constraints, systems, checks and balances is the problem and until people accept this and recognize that it needs to be pulled in and made a part of the game system to which the developers have control, then it will never be solved. You will always have the same problem we have had from game to game and that is band aid fixes trying to treat symptoms, rather than the illness. Trade needs to become a system that allows developers a means to balance it with the rest of the game or this is all pointless. /shrug
Personally in the old days I was more of an RP/PVPer type. My entire guild was, so that was "game" enough for me. That's the thing I'm attempting to point out to you, when it comes down to it.. many approach this genre in different ways. It's hard to not label something many take part in as their mainstay in an MMORPG (trading, playing the market etc..) as a part of the genre's overall game-play options.
Their interest lies in peddling/exchanging wares, another segment is highly involved in spending time to earn loot simply to sell it, so on and so forth, quite often the two examples I showed benefit from the others approach, the trader has the funds earned through trade to exchange with the supplier, who has earned through adventuring. Both styles of game-play offer a different experience, with their own sets of challenges.That's how things typically work in the real world as well.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Is that what they want though? Is it "trade" as in the full encompassing definition? Or is it "trade" in a more simplistic literal form? If it is the former, then why do they object to a detailed emulation system that tries to replicate a world system as I described? If it is just to move product mundanely in the simplest form, then... why do they object to solutions that would protect adventure circumvention?
Dullahan even said that he didn't like the solution someone brought up about degradation of stats on a trade because he felt it unfairly targeted trade. If the idea is just simplistic trade (the desire to move widgets for cash acquisition), the solution had no real effect on it, people would still trade items with that solution. All it did was not invalidate the "game" portion of the adventure side by allowing players to circumvent it through the lack of structure (and disconnect from the adventure side in balance) that the player trade market had.
Even others objected to the example claiming it was unfair to people who wanted to bypass the game through such a system. So are you saying that people should be able to play the game without respect to rules in the game so they can play the way they want? I understand that, honestly.. I do... but... it is the same position as someone demanding RMT in that they are asking for elements of play that contradict with the main game play design. Should an entire game adjust to serve the desire of a person who only wants to play a certain portion of the game? Because by disregarding trade as a real game system or not allowing developers the control they need to keep it balanced with the rest of the game, that is kind of what is being suggested, that a small portion of the game dictate to the rest of the game.
The reason this is a problem I see with Pantheon is because Pantheon specifically states that risk/reward, great effort and achievement, etc... are the defining factors of what an MMO should be. If a trade system allows such circumvention of systems, of control, of game requirement, then how is the trade system serving the best interest of those tenants?
edit:
I want to add to this to clarify.
Time spent is not equal to risk/reward. If you are to say that they are the same, please give an example. Provide an example of the easiest means to create cash to buy the item and that of the most difficult camp to obtain the item. Here... we will use my example of the Fungi Tunic.
A camp that normally required 2 competent groups (or one very skilled group) to camp, had to deal with holding it (it was a rough camp to hold) until that item dropped, which could be quite a while, multiple hours, and even days/weeks to finally get it to drop and win the loot in your group.
Now, kiting giants were big cash back then (they dropped high cash items) and so kiting classes would farm these giants to make good money quickly. There was no real skill in such examples with some classes, you had snare, you had run speed increases, you had root, etc... in fact many people would do "rest" kiting as they were doing it (ie run a ways, sit down, med and watch till the mob got close, get up and repeat). It was mundane zero risk work, and a even cash flow.
So... where is the equivalency in this example? The person camping has no idea when the item will drop or if they will even win it, not to mention extremely competent players are needed and a constant attention to play is required for hours of play, even days to finally obtain the goal. The kiting player can watch TV and has a pretty solid idea how much money they are earning per hour and so know pretty well when they will have the money and when they will get their item.
Where is this balance you are mentioning? I am not seeing it, maybe you could explain in a bit of depth the elements I am missing here?
With your system he is just up the creek. He doesn't get to ever have the item, or he just has to endlessly bang his head against the wall trying to get the item at the mercy of RNGesus. What he ultimately was able to do was spend money he had gotten from selling items he won in sebilis, and used that to buy the cloak.
Forcing people to have to "earn" the items by being in the raid/dungeon only works when the items are relatively common, OR you put a token system in place, or some combination of the two like WoW did. When items are rare, having to play at the mercy of RNGesus is one of the most supremely frustrating and frankly stupid things in the world, and IMO it has no place in any MMO.
To be fair and honest, I never thought about this but I also remember Similar instances in my own adventures like your friend, the Enchanter. I don't know if you played Wildstar, but they had a raid system where if you didn't get the exact item you wanted or didn't win the roll for it, you could purchase it as long as you had killed the mob. Artifact items weren't available for purchase but in your example, the cloak would have been. Maybe you get a token for each boss you kill in said dungeon and after so many tokens you can then purchase the cloak. The key point here is you would actually have to be a part of the kill in order to obtain the item that you wanted via tokens. Thoughts?
These are good points on both sides for some key examples, they bring up issues that occurred in the game that are being overlooked and show how we led to the problem of systems today. For instance, in Hrimnir's example his complaint is that his friend spent an enormous amount of time camping the items, having them drop and losing out on the rolls.
Two issues here.
1) RNG was bad and certainly could be improved because there were issues of some people constantly getting lopsided results (ie defying statistical principal repeatedly).
2) Hrimnir is missing the point. An item being rare where not everyone has it, not everyone has the chance to get it is why EQ was addicting and why it meant so much to get an item.
This is why buying an item cheapens. I too had issues with some things that I just had bad rolls, terrible luck with camps, etc... and never got the chance to get the item. I was ok with that because that is what made getting some items so dang amazing. When player trade took off and become the go to "gear up" place for people, group gear was no longer valuable as it used to be. That was reserved for raid gear. So in a game where it was primarily designed for the group experience (raids were a very small part of early EQ), group gear was treated as common gear up options for those who used the player trade market.
This brings up your suggestion.
We have had lots of token systems in games, "pick your own loot" features, and various other types of conveniences in mainstream games over the years. When I first left EQ, I thought this was a great idea, because I too had been slighted by the RNG many of times and thought that this would be the perfect solution to removing all the fighting, the disappointment, and massive difficulty that came with loot drops.
After spending nearly 20 years playing MMOs, I can tell you that tokens, "pick your own loot" or other similar systems are bad for game play. They remove the desire, the entire concept of anticipation, of disappointment and rarity in obtaining something. It is the very thing that Hrimnir claims is bad about the loot issues that made loot so valuable and so amazing in reward in EQ. Token systems cheapen that, allowing players to pick their loot, through steady progression is a game killer, and why so many people game hop these days.
Loot should be rare, it should be coveted, people should have disappointment and not everyone should be able to have it so that those who do have it, have meaning in having it.
There is an old design principal that goes "never give the client what they want, give them what they need" and what it means is that what the client wants isn't always what they need. They may think they want something a certain way, but it may be lack of understanding how to express what that is or a misunderstanding in what it is that will satisfy their need (which is ultimately what they want).
If you have ever developed software, or handled similar style projects, you now how important properly establishing the requirements of the solution the client seeks. That if you simply give the client constantly what they ask for, the result is often you constantly redoing what you did because "they didn't mean that when they said that, that what they really wanted was... "
Point is, nothing is gained in sustainable game play if a player is served up what they want constantly and given what they want constantly. This is why mainstream games can't hold anyone, they reward people for simply showing up, allowing them to pick their prizes, and all risk/reward and anticipation in play is removed. Now if getting handed gear, always getting the prize, etc... with the reduced effort and lack of risk is what some want, then all I can do is point to the tenants and explain it doesn't seem to fit with what VR is attempting to achieve.
As you have said, what is the point in buying your item? Is there really any anticipation, risk/reward in simply counting up money until you go to buy the item? You know you are going to get it, you can even reasonably gauge exactly when that will be, what is the point in that?
From my experience, I personally would take being that enchanter in Hrimnir's example a 1000 times over than getting my items handed to me through mundane guaranteed means. That isn't the excitement of a game, of anticipation, or risk/reward, it is a mundane job of earning to buy widgets. /bleh