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The Player Trade Market, Problems and Solutions

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  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    Hrimnir said:
    Sinist said:

    however the difference with your responses is that it carries a narcissistic need which is why you keep "assessing" me and then attempting to admonish me for my discussion.

    Oh, man, this, this is ripe.  Thank you for the chuckle, the cognitive dissonance is strong.
    What is wrong with you? Seriously, you and the others jump from the TLC to this one and all you do is attack trying to stir up the same crap you did in the last one. All because you refuse to accept the weakness in your own arguments. You then stalk and chase to dismiss like you are afraid anyone might listen.

    Amathe points out the same thing, you dismiss and make your responses about me as ignoring the points.

    You did the same with Juris in the other thread.

    If you and the others here are an example of what subs will be in Pantheon, the game is in great danger because it already looks to be filled with WoW subscribers,, the same forum tactics, the same childish attacks.
     

    BTW, I find your signature ironic.

    Post edited by Sinist on
  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    @Mendle

    I want you to consider something, think on this a while.

    How is it that I can not properly explain myself, that I am unable to get my message across because of my delivery and yet... I have over 540 points, 289 agrees, 27 insightful, 37 awesome, and 27 LoL to which pretty much ALL of that is earned just in the Pantheon forums discussion and only in the last couple of months here of discussion?

    Maybe you can explain how your assessment of my discussion, that you claim is lacking, unable to properly explain its points and that is why nobody understands me is valid?

    So apparently everyone is nodding their heads, not complaining about my long posts before, not complaining about my direct and honest comments (I don't cater to peoples egos or soft punch poor logic) and then all of a sudden, that changes? Why?

    I didn't change, I spoke my mind, I did not fan boy Pantheon, nor did I attack it like an anti-fan boy. I spoke plainly and specifically.

    Yet I take a position on something that is counter to some of the core Pantheon crowd and they go rabid, and continue to push fallacy after fallacy, attacking me personally, calling me a liar, dismissing, and falsely summarizing me to anyone who even attempts to discuss the topic with me?

    Yeah, I am the unreasonable one here. Yep, its all me....

    So maybe explain that? Hmm? So all of a sudden I am terrible at getting my point off? Yeah, I thought so. /boggle

    Oh, and the reason they spent such effort to try and silence me? It is because they can not defeat the arguments with logic and so they are deathly afraid VR might find reason in my discussion, so they lash out emotionally.

    If my discussion was so off base, so ridiculous, etc... people wouldn't even bother.

    It is a sad state when there are only a few who aren't even subbing to the Pantheon forums that have to defend the tenants of the very game against those who do sub to it and proclaim to support it. Oh the incredible irony!
    Post edited by Sinist on
  • JurisDictumJurisDictum Member UncommonPosts: 31
    edited January 2016
    Something to keep in mind with forums, is there is an inherent response bias. As in, people that feel strongly about something respond -- while those that don't feel all consumed by the topic do not. An example would be how the Diablo 3 forums have posts pop-up constantly by people requesting /petitioning for an auction hall to be reintroduced to the game (the game is currently itemized so that everyone gets their own personal loot table and cannot trade with anyone who wasn't in the game when the item dropped). The thing is, Blizzard has polled people multiple times and compared playtime numbers, and it is clear that only a pretty small minority wants trade in that game.

    In that particular case, the will of the gold farming industry might be bleeding through making an exaggerated amount of posts. However, forums are like this in any context. If you go to the comment sections on political articles -- it is overwhelmingly extreme opinions (not even including the vast quantity of trolls).

    When someone on a forum tells you they don't care about the topic, they are generally lying to you and/or themselves.

  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Something to keep in mind with forums, is there is an inherent response bias. As in, people that feel strongly about something respond -- while those that don't feel all consumed by the topic do not. An example would be how the Diablo 3 forums have posts pop-up constantly by people requesting /petitioning for an auction hall to be reintroduced to the game (the game is currently itemized so that everyone gets their own personal loot table and cannot trade with anyone who wasn't in the game when the item dropped). The thing is, Blizzard has polled people multiple times and compared playtime numbers, and it is clear that only a pretty small minority wants trade in that game.

    In that particular case, the will of the gold farming industry might be bleeding through making an exaggerated amount of posts. However, forums are like this in any context. If you go to the comment sections on political articles -- it is overwhelmingly extreme opinions (not even including the vast quantity of trolls).

    When someone on a forum tells you they don't care about the topic, they are generally lying to you and/or themselves.

    I know the gold farming industry is quite large, which is why when I see posts from people who adamantly support design concepts that facilitate it, well... it makes me extremely suspicious. I am honestly baffled by the amount of defensiveness concerning the trade topic.
  • casdegerecasdegere Member UncommonPosts: 15
    Sinist, you seem to keep hammering your point though as many have pointed out, you're not quite on base. This game is still in development. Changes will come and go. You have spent alot of words debating something that might change at release. For the other  your concerns are no different than any other persons who hate RMTs, Gold pharming and Bots in MMORPGs. Lore, level specific, bind on pick up and bind on equip will help curb your assertions. This and a game that won't be easy to bot through combats that might not be the same each time. Perhaps you might consider limiting what subjects you post on to those you know more than you do now. Otherwise you sound emotionally ignorant as if you have a stake in a games failure or success.
  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    casdegere said:
    Sinist, you seem to keep hammering your point though as many have pointed out, you're not quite on base. This game is still in development. Changes will come and go. You have spent alot of words debating something that might change at release. For the other  your concerns are no different than any other persons who hate RMTs, Gold pharming and Bots in MMORPGs. Lore, level specific, bind on pick up and bind on equip will help curb your assertions. This and a game that won't be easy to bot through combats that might not be the same each time. Perhaps you might consider limiting what subjects you post on to those you know more than you do now. Otherwise you sound emotionally ignorant as if you have a stake in a games failure or success.
    Oh I understand Cas, and if you read my discussion in this thread and the previous TLC one, I am just throwing out ideas. VR is going to do what it will do and the bulk of this discussion has just been to throw out alternative ideas to issues, to discuss the key points of problems within existing systems, etc...

    Don't let the detractors here fool you, my discussion has only been to conceptualize solutions to problems with various systems. The other thread about TLC was dealing with that issue, and I brought up many solutions from the adventure side of the game that would approach that issue, but would not be as abrupt and punishing to honest players as the TLC solution was.

    I brought up trade as an issue in that thread to show how it is what caused most of those issues to which TLC, BoE, BoP, etc... were created. My argument was that trade was the main problem and so the solutions should be focused on trade itself if any resolution was to be made (as opposed to treating the symptoms that trade caused on the adventure side which resulted in TLC, BoP, BoE, etc...).

    Brad asked us to consider various solutions to the issues with trade caused problems, with RMT focused abuses, etc... that still served the focus of allowing trade.

    My solution was to make trade more of a game system, giving developers more power over trade like they have with the adventure portion of the game.

    This is all just discussion, just spit balling ideas, but some... do not want ANY change to the existing trade system. They want absolutely free, completely open systems.... which is what gold sellers want so they can continue their sales. A system that gives more control to the developers and allows them to focus play is counter to the reason people buy gold to circumvent game play.

    So I do realize the game is still being developed, I do realize that my comments are not declarative to VR, that they will design as they see fit.

    My comments are to discuss and spitball concepts that may give ideas to VR and only healthy debate will achieve such, not by pussy footing around peoples feelings, or avoiding pointing out illogical positions, but by good debate over the pros/cons of a given issue.

    Can you honestly and in good faith say that those who have been attacking me have attended to that? Or... has their positions been to promote the status quot?

    As I mentioned, you bring honest discussion, honestly looking to focus on the issues of the discussion and while you may not get agreement with me, you will always get honest discussion.

    Start dismissing, throwing out fallacies? Well, what can we conclude from a person who wishes to discuss the person making the argument while ignoring the argument itself?

    As for the Botting issue.

    I have covered this in the thread where we discussed botting heavily. Botting will be an issue. Brad seems to think otherwise, but technology is different today, and having a detailed knowledge of security, I know he won't be able to stop botting or boxing without putting an extreme amount of effort to it, to which... I have yet to see any promotion of such qualified experts.

    The best way to fight the abuses that come from botting/boxing is to kill it at the source. Trade is the key source to why people bott/box to any extensive effect. It is a market, a trade, a profession and no offense to Brad, but hearing a company that lacks the resources to go all out on the game telling me they have all the solutions to the security side? Sorry, maybe that works for the laymen, but it won't fool people like me. It will be an issue. That is for certain.
  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    Well, I have been currently playing EQ's new server (Phinigel) and it is as I have expected, the level of abuse that trade has created within an extremely short amount of time is amazing. In a month and a half, players have achieved plat levels that took almost a year AND dupe exploits to achieve.

    Explain to me how Pantheon will be different by mimicking the same aspects of such systems?


    Then again, if Pantheon's goals are to provide players the "option" to buy their progression through plat advancement as well as having to adventure in the game, then I guess, all is as planned?

    Though, me personally? If you have to "buy" your advancement rather than actually complete it according to its original design, are you playing the game? Or are you just another person "buying" your way like all the other plat/RMT gamers out there? If you have to lie to yourself in your entertainment, what does that really mean?
  • GdemamiGdemami Member EpicPosts: 12,342
    Amathe said:
    I think I get what Sinist is saying. Every item in the game comes into the world through the defeat/completion of specific content. You get an x by killing a y. All content has an assigned/intended level of difficulty/risk. But if you can just buy the x, with no equivalent effort and risk, then you have circumvented whatever progression the obtainment of x represents.  

    The problem is that the reason people go and kill y to get x is so that they can sell x. Nearly all of the items you get in mmos are crap and useless to you personally. If you can't buy and sell those items, then a lot of content will become just a one off encounter that you won't ever want to repeat. 
    That is the point of the market - players will decide for themselves the worth of specific content...and there is no problem with that, it is actually the best balancing mechanics you can come up with.
  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Gdemami said:
    Amathe said:
    I think I get what Sinist is saying. Every item in the game comes into the world through the defeat/completion of specific content. You get an x by killing a y. All content has an assigned/intended level of difficulty/risk. But if you can just buy the x, with no equivalent effort and risk, then you have circumvented whatever progression the obtainment of x represents.  

    The problem is that the reason people go and kill y to get x is so that they can sell x. Nearly all of the items you get in mmos are crap and useless to you personally. If you can't buy and sell those items, then a lot of content will become just a one off encounter that you won't ever want to repeat. 
    That is the point of the market - players will decide for themselves the worth of specific content...and there is no problem with that, it is actually the best balancing mechanics you can come up with.
    Actually, it is not. You see, when there is duping, over farming, and many coordinating effects on the economy that produce unrealistic results as it concerns the game economy, well.. it isn't the "best balancing mechanics". If it were then all the aspects we know to be detrimental to gaming economies wouldn't exist and we wouldn't have over a decade of attempts by game developers putting in measures to stop it.

    Then again, only gold selling promoters and those who exploit to promote such abuse would claim otherwise.
  • WizardryWizardry Member LegendaryPosts: 19,332
    Keep RMT out and automation out aka botting or scripted cheats of any kind and your game will be just fine no matter what design it uses.
    As soon as you allow add-ons the shit hits the fan,big time mistake by devs to allow add ons of any kind.
    Nobody knows the game better than the developer,if they want to endorse a product for use within their game,then so be it,otherwise keep those hands out of the cookie jar.

    Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.

  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Wizardry said:
    Keep RMT out and automation out aka botting or scripted cheats of any kind and your game will be just fine no matter what design it uses.
    As soon as you allow add-ons the shit hits the fan,big time mistake by devs to allow add ons of any kind.
    Nobody knows the game better than the developer,if they want to endorse a product for use within their game,then so be it,otherwise keep those hands out of the cookie jar.

    There is no way to control such without putting in controls and constraints on player trade as has been discussed in this thread. If any are willing to provide alternate solutions, by all means...

    Those who say there isn't a problem, that no actions should be taken... well... Might I point you to the abusers. They always want the exploits to continue to exist.
  • DullahanDullahan Member EpicPosts: 4,536
    Shameless bump of silly conspiracy thread.

    Did not read.


  • HrimnirHrimnir Member RarePosts: 2,415
    Sinist said:
    Something to keep in mind with forums, is there is an inherent response bias. As in, people that feel strongly about something respond -- while those that don't feel all consumed by the topic do not. An example would be how the Diablo 3 forums have posts pop-up constantly by people requesting /petitioning for an auction hall to be reintroduced to the game (the game is currently itemized so that everyone gets their own personal loot table and cannot trade with anyone who wasn't in the game when the item dropped). The thing is, Blizzard has polled people multiple times and compared playtime numbers, and it is clear that only a pretty small minority wants trade in that game.

    In that particular case, the will of the gold farming industry might be bleeding through making an exaggerated amount of posts. However, forums are like this in any context. If you go to the comment sections on political articles -- it is overwhelmingly extreme opinions (not even including the vast quantity of trolls).

    When someone on a forum tells you they don't care about the topic, they are generally lying to you and/or themselves.

    I know the gold farming industry is quite large, which is why when I see posts from people who adamantly support design concepts that facilitate it, well... it makes me extremely suspicious. I am honestly baffled by the amount of defensiveness concerning the trade topic.


    And here it goes.  More insinuations.  All of our arguments are "illogical, weak, wrong, etc".  So, clearly rather than we just disagree, it means we're all secret gold buyers.

    It's so beyond ridiculous.  It's like saying that someone who argues lets say for lower corporate tax rates (in the US) is just a secret corporate shill, and they couldn't possibly have any logical basis for their argument, its just simply that they have a "secret" agenda.

    What you can't seem to wrap your head around is that just because you DISAGREE with someone's premise doesn't INVALIDATE their argument.

    "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

  • HrimnirHrimnir Member RarePosts: 2,415
    edited January 2016
    Wizardry said:
    Keep RMT out and automation out aka botting or scripted cheats of any kind and your game will be just fine no matter what design it uses.
    As soon as you allow add-ons the shit hits the fan,big time mistake by devs to allow add ons of any kind.
    Nobody knows the game better than the developer,if they want to endorse a product for use within their game,then so be it,otherwise keep those hands out of the cookie jar.


    This too.  I remember in WoW someone actually made an addon that would play a rogue better than a person could in a raid.   You could literally turn the addon on, tell it what raid you were doing, and it would just do its thing and you could go walk around and cook dinner and play your xbox, and blah blah.

    They need to have a robust, customizable UI, but absolutely CAN any player control as far as mods/addons.  This will go a very long way in reducing botters and such, which in turn reduces gold farmers.

    The other issue is this type of game is going to be a poor choice for gold farmers.  The community of this game is going to be far less inclined to participate in that type of behavior than in a more casual friendly game like WoW or (especially) any of the Asian MMOs like Blade and Soul etc.  Those games particularly in those regions don't have a stigma associated with gold buying and such.  Its a perfectly normal behavior over there.

    So, while im sure some gold farming companies would start trying to peddle their wares in pantheon, they would get so few people actually buying gold and such that it would eventually fizzle down to a non issue.  This happened in Rift.  Gold sellers out the wazoo in the first few months of the game, but it died down to maybe 1-2 in game mails a week, and the occasional zone wide chat which was quickly ignored.

    "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

  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Dullahan said:
    Shameless bump of silly conspiracy thread.

    Did not read.
    How is this not trolling?
  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    Hrimnir said:
    Sinist said:
    Something to keep in mind with forums, is there is an inherent response bias. As in, people that feel strongly about something respond -- while those that don't feel all consumed by the topic do not. An example would be how the Diablo 3 forums have posts pop-up constantly by people requesting /petitioning for an auction hall to be reintroduced to the game (the game is currently itemized so that everyone gets their own personal loot table and cannot trade with anyone who wasn't in the game when the item dropped). The thing is, Blizzard has polled people multiple times and compared playtime numbers, and it is clear that only a pretty small minority wants trade in that game.

    In that particular case, the will of the gold farming industry might be bleeding through making an exaggerated amount of posts. However, forums are like this in any context. If you go to the comment sections on political articles -- it is overwhelmingly extreme opinions (not even including the vast quantity of trolls).

    When someone on a forum tells you they don't care about the topic, they are generally lying to you and/or themselves.

    I know the gold farming industry is quite large, which is why when I see posts from people who adamantly support design concepts that facilitate it, well... it makes me extremely suspicious. I am honestly baffled by the amount of defensiveness concerning the trade topic.


    And here it goes.  More insinuations.  All of our arguments are "illogical, weak, wrong, etc".  So, clearly rather than we just disagree, it means we're all secret gold buyers.

    It's so beyond ridiculous.  It's like saying that someone who argues lets say for lower corporate tax rates (in the US) is just a secret corporate shill, and they couldn't possibly have any logical basis for their argument, its just simply that they have a "secret" agenda.

    What you can't seem to wrap your head around is that just because you DISAGREE with someone's premise doesn't INVALIDATE their argument.

    I didn't simply disagree, I showed your argument to be invalid. It is as simple as that. Basic logical argument dictates the premises you made are invalid because you did not properly support them.

    If you don't like that, make better arguments.

    You mocking the application of logic isn't helping your case, it is another fallacy, but it is unbelievable irony because you are attacking the very thing to which you must provide to have a valid point.



    Post edited by Sinist on
  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Hrimnir said:
    Wizardry said:
    Keep RMT out and automation out aka botting or scripted cheats of any kind and your game will be just fine no matter what design it uses.
    As soon as you allow add-ons the shit hits the fan,big time mistake by devs to allow add ons of any kind.
    Nobody knows the game better than the developer,if they want to endorse a product for use within their game,then so be it,otherwise keep those hands out of the cookie jar.


    This too.  I remember in WoW someone actually made an addon that would play a rogue better than a person could in a raid.   You could literally turn the addon on, tell it what raid you were doing, and it would just do its thing and you could go walk around and cook dinner and play your xbox, and blah blah.

    They need to have a robust, customizable UI, but absolutely CAN any player control as far as mods/addons.  This will go a very long way in reducing botters and such, which in turn reduces gold farmers.


    Yes and no. As long as you have inputs, you have a means for automation. You do realize some boxing/botting software can obtain and return inputs simply by the screens coordinate system, that a mouse movement and click can be simulated to any means?

    Botting is a symptom, if you fight it rather than what causes it, you will never make any head way on reducing it.

    Hrimnir said:
    The other issue is this type of game is going to be a poor choice for gold farmers.  The community of this game is going to be far less inclined to participate in that type of behavior than in a more casual friendly game like WoW or (especially) any of the Asian MMOs like Blade and Soul etc.  Those games particularly in those regions don't have a stigma associated with gold buying and such.  Its a perfectly normal behavior over there.
    There was massive plat farming in EQ, huge problems with duping and item RMT long before the Bazaar was even out. Don't you remember SoE and the devs talking about these issues? You seem to be under this naive belief that somehow Pantheon will only have the salt of the earth players who would never consider partaking in such a practice and that because of this, plat selling will be at a minimum.

    That is out of touch with reality as history shows you to be wrong and todays practices make the behavior widely accepted in most games, yet you think it is going to all be different?


    Hrimnir said:
    So, while im sure some gold farming companies would start trying to peddle their wares in pantheon, they would get so few people actually buying gold and such that it would eventually fizzle down to a non issue.  This happened in Rift.  Gold sellers out the wazoo in the first few months of the game, but it died down to maybe 1-2 in game mails a week, and the occasional zone wide chat which was quickly ignored.


    EQ is currently rampant on its new Phinny server with spam of plat selling, yet... you seem to think that regional trading and people having to peddle their own wares will stop a professional plat seller from paying people to actually do it?

    Also, I find it amusing how you say a reduction in spam mails means anything as it concerns the practice. Do a Google for buying gold in RIFT and tell me how many thousands of sites you get hits on for it. Just because some spam is died down, doesn't remove the problem or the over all effect it has on the games systems.


    It is like you don't want RMT to go away.



  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    What is completely ridiculous is that I come back, make a comment in this thread about my experience in the new Phinny server with the rampant plat selling there after only being out a little over a month and you guys pile in attacking like you are trying to bury the comment.

    Why?

    You guys are acting like gold buying shills trying to defend against any comment or means that puts the practice in a negative light.

    In both these threads, you have completely attacked any discussion about gold selling that actually tried to effectively reduce the practice at its source. All you guys seem to suggest are solutions that will do absolutely nothing to solve the problem.

    Regional markets like EC? Won't work, didn't work in EQ.

    Better spam filters? Sure, will stop the abuse of chat, won't even deal with the RMT problem.

    Brilliant ideas, I mean really... lets do what really doesn't work! Why that will work! /boggle


  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    Anyway, back to the issue.

    The current EQ server Phinigal has rampant inflation in just over a month of the games release as well as rampant RMT (looking at the plat selling sites, they can't even keep up with demand).

    Now certainly, some of the problems are due to fast leveling (the leveling there is nowhere near release EQ), and apparently they have increased drop rates which would certainly be an issue to increase plat into the system, but the game has just basic EQ release features, much like the suggestions here and yet... rampant RMT and item pricing is way up.

    I found it interesting because looking at the prices generally being advertised, most of them are at levels that took much much longer to evolve from in release EQ.

    So, this will be a problem and none of the solutions given by the detractors are making a dent on it.

    Another thing that has become quite popular in the RMT business is getting average players to sell their plat to the plat selling sites. I know of people who actually play game specifically for this purpose as it can be very profitable if you know how to work the market to make money quickly.

    Pantheon can not follow the same solutions or the result will be the same. Something has to be considered that actually affects the progression of this abuse.
  • AmatheAmathe Member LegendaryPosts: 7,630
    Sinist said:

    There was massive plat farming in EQ, huge problems with duping and item RMT long before the Bazaar was even out. 

    I was always poor. Mostly I made what little money I had by killing minor named mobs (e.g., Chief Goonda) for items to sell.  

    EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests

  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Amathe said:
    Sinist said:

    There was massive plat farming in EQ, huge problems with duping and item RMT long before the Bazaar was even out. 

    I was always poor. Mostly I made what little money I had by killing minor named mobs (e.g., Chief Goonda) for items to sell.  

    Yep, eventually selling to a vendor to make cash wasn't enough to keep up. You eventually had to buy into the player market to be able to use it through such practices.

    Your point is also why low level spawns became excessively camped. They were much easier for a player to just farm with little risk so they could make money, especially camps where an item was useful indefinitely (ie Hadden's earring).

    The plat farming was more of the plat sellers focus. They would find lowbie zones and mass kill for vendor sales. That combined with numerous attempts to find dupe bugs and the like. Remember the early crafting dupe that allowed players to make ridiculous amounts of cash? It was the cause of the massive increase in plat in the economy and it was brought to you by plat farmers who were 24/7 looking for exploits to increase currency totals in the game.

    The goal of a plat seller it to imbalance the market to that of basic game play money accrual. Basically, make it so the average player has no reasonable game play means (vendor sale of items) to be able to collect enough money to use the player trade market, then players either must work the market or buy plat online.

    Think about it, you go out and grind for hours/days selling cash items, etc... only to realize you are nowhere near the ability to buy anything in the market. So, either you camp "hot" items to buy in, or you buy plat. Basic reasonable game play isn't enough to use the market. This is the same practice that companies with RMT stores use today by designing content to be overwhelming in its requirements (ie massive long debilitating grinds) in order to spur store use.

  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    edited January 2016
    I got to thinking about a way for a developer to control the markets to avoid issues, but still give players the flexibility of choice and control over the sale to an extent. Before you start making all kinds of critiques, this is a very rough mention, not a fully outlined system. There will be holes, issues, etc...


    Basically, trade is facilitated by the game system. You set base prices to every item in the game. This is what the developers have established to be the "natural price" of a given item. The natural price is basically an economic principal of the price of a goods that is equal to its cost of production.

    As I mentioned in previous discussion, there are no controlling factors that establish the value of an item in the game. This puts a number to such by the developers and they can balance such however they see fit in the game in order to drive the economy in ways to reduce abuse or damage to the over all game system. How they cause such an effect could be numerous ways such as I previously mentioned with factions, politics, supply/demand, etc...

    Now, the players would have control over trade to an extent. They can adjust prices based on their own skills that are specific to a list of trader types, similar to how we have crafting skills. These skills could be all kinds of price negotiation tools and abilities that the player develops.

    Now, any time a player trades, this transaction window comes up, and when a player passes the item to trade, its natural prices are established. From there, the players play a trade game or the like (think Vanguard diplomacy, but more barter focused and relevant to a real trading concept). It could be as complex as chess, requiring player mental ability and using many of the character development tools mentioned above.

    This system could be made in such a way to handle single player to player trades, actual auctions (imagine playing a raid style game of wit with risk and chance as well as some influence of character development), to any type of medium.

    Also, adventure and crafting systems could be tied in to have an effect on the trade systems as well (adjusting natural pricing, etc...).

    Obviously this is an extremely rough concept and yes... there are a lot of unforeseen issues, but it has some solid positives to its implementation such as:

    1. With control over the trade system, RMT can be much more easily identified and dealt with than it is with completely open systems.

    2. A game system to trade allows for proper balance of risk/reward in respect to the rest of the game.

    3. Inflation can be more easily dealt with as well, and many means to remove currency and items from the game can be more easily attended to with such.



  • WizardryWizardry Member LegendaryPosts: 19,332
    Yes i witnessed a healer bot in FFXI that shocked me,i never figured anyone would get a bot to play as a normal player.It  took me a while to figure it out but being a long time gaming vet,i usually spot cheats eventually.
    The best and only way is to keep as much server side as possible but sadly developers are looking to unload as much as possible onto the client.Of course there is a fine balance to keep a game running lag free but still i get annoyed not even over botting or RMT but also with people that hack files to find out new content before anyone else.Yes that means exploiting the Auction house before anyone else even knows.

    I rather see loading zones than putting 90% of the files on client side.

    I just know this,NOT one single developer has shown me the effort or got it right.We always end up with exploits,scripted cheats,RMT and the game suffers because of it.The gaming community on a whole is so sad we even see outside the game cheating to manipulate results for monetary reasons in these Moba's for example.

    Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.

  • SinistSinist Member RarePosts: 1,369
    Wizardry said:
    Yes i witnessed a healer bot in FFXI that shocked me,i never figured anyone would get a bot to play as a normal player.It  took me a while to figure it out but being a long time gaming vet,i usually spot cheats eventually.
    The best and only way is to keep as much server side as possible but sadly developers are looking to unload as much as possible onto the client.Of course there is a fine balance to keep a game running lag free but still i get annoyed not even over botting or RMT but also with people that hack files to find out new content before anyone else.Yes that means exploiting the Auction house before anyone else even knows.

    I rather see loading zones than putting 90% of the files on client side.

    I just know this,NOT one single developer has shown me the effort or got it right.We always end up with exploits,scripted cheats,RMT and the game suffers because of it.The gaming community on a whole is so sad we even see outside the game cheating to manipulate results for monetary reasons in these Moba's for example.

    Yep, which is why I think the approach to a solution has to change. As it is now, all the solutions are doing is treating the symptoms, not the main cause.

    Player trade is at the center of all of it. Now if you could create a means to allow players to trade with a reasonable amount of freedom, but still contained with in a system of structure and rules, it would go a very long way to limiting the means to which RMT can excel.

    It isn't trade that is the issue, it is trade that exists outside of any reality within a games system. Player trade in games today is really just two people outside the game agreeing on exchanging something within it. With that lack of control by the developers, it is no wonder RMT is rampant in every game out there.

  • Kobin24Kobin24 Member UncommonPosts: 28
    @Sinist What are your play times?  Wanna get some groups together?
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