Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Player Driven Economy
Devorandom
Member, Leader of Men, Kickstarter, Alpha One, Alpha Two, Early Alpha Two
So I got kinda curious, based of a conversation in a different thread, about what the community thinks a Player Driven Economy is. I think it is just the Buying and Selling of items in the game world being done primarily through transactions between players. What do you guys think?
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That being said, when you're seeking a player driven economy as a developer, I think they are just going to create the tools needed to do anything you want in game. Undercut another competitor? Create monopolies? Steal from others? All of those means of nefarious capitalism are going to be implemented in game, or allowable. Now the consequences of such are another matter
I hope I can be good enough at stopping caravans to be hire able by these merchant lords.
@devorandom That's fine, just covering all bases- the link pretty much aligns with my thinking of a player driven economy, much like EvE online, for example. Developers provide the in game tools that allow them to do what they want, and the rest is up to the imagination of the player. Its far different than merchant fixed pricing that we often see with traditional MMOs. Even ESO has dipped a little into player driven economy simply by not having a World Auction House or Galactic Trade Center (Wow and SWTOR, respectively.) But ESO stops there. This seems to indicate one can take this SO much further.
I don't think ti'll be this simplistic. Open player economies also encourage the sale of not just goods, but services too. Because nodes have different resources and the further away you transport a resource the higher a price such items will go for, you're going to have to move product. That requires protection. with the value of these carted goods lootable, I think you're going to have guild spies trying to get their hands on information regarding resource caravan routes, you'll then have guilds that run fake information down the pipe to weed out spies and moles, and you're going to have mercenary companies being paid actual in game currency to protect raiders while they down a world boss, so other players can't grief and wipe a raid. these are intangible services that will still be of value and thus part of the economy.
You say that not having an auction house makes an economy player driven, but how so? An auction house is completely player driven.
Really, as soon as we set foot in Verra are the monsters are going to drop freshly minted... what? Verra-bucks, Verra-orbs/Vorbs, Verra coinage/Voins...?
One can see monsters dropping ore and ingots as well as other resources early on then as server data shows a high number of players deaths coins can be added to monster loot drop table.
Not quite. You left out "free exchange of goods and services between players...". While NPCs should be hirelings for such tasks as helping to sell goods they should not be the primary shop keepers.
IS has stated that there will be gold sinks but with the addition of the item degradation mechanic PCs rather than NPCs should be the main beneficiaries of the mechanic. This would allow currency to float around and throughout the economy rather than tossed into a bottomless pit. Granted, while this will drive some inflation I hope that a restriction on currency drops by monsters will curb the Zimbabwe style inflation we have seen take place in WoW.
An auction house is not completely player driven. Did they create the AH? Nope.
Here's an example I am hoping conveys my thoughts on this. I am not an economist, far from it in fact. You have Player1 who doesn't want to use the developer implemented AH. He does just fine by going to the the popular town of Bantwood to announce his wares in the local zone chat. When an MMO expansion comes out, a new zone appears that includes the latest armor, dailies, quests, trinkets, etc. that the game has. This is to drive the player to visit this location and /or have a convenient hub nearby all the shiny new things. This in turn, dries out population elsewhere. Lack of population means Player1 in Bantwood has less people seeing his eloquently crafted marketing offers in chat. There is also nothing that player can do to alter the reality of the situation other than move to the new zone, but no player impacted his strategy- a developer did. In a player driven economy, player1 can make Bantwood more attractive than the new zone.
Now, this is a very crude example of how developers often interfere in player driven economics.
Auction houses are a convenience solely created by the developers, not the player. If item A cost 100g, someone trying to rip someone off for 400g is unlikely to fly (unless he's the only one selling- people can be desperate). But you remove that convenience factor of an AH, and now players have to work to move goods to a location where they can get the best price. That will fluctuate and you will have to rely on other players to understand the market better. With an AH, you just needs yourself, or maybe a mod that tells you when to buy or sell.
It was merely an example of a service that can be traded, thanks to developers not meddling in how trade is conducted. Services have more meaning in a game with a more open world philosophy. Can't recall being able to sell dungeon runs or PvP protection in an Auction House
But because I have noticed that people feel that there is more to it than that ive begun thinking that a player driven economy should have sub-types such as crafting based economy or a grind based economy.
But by your definition wouldn't any game that had options other than the auction house count as a player driven economy, and that would be every MMO.
So as certain gear types become more popular the following would occur:
-Players that gather will gather more of those base materials to sell generating a currency flow out to farmers
-Materials purchased will be used by those smiths who make a profit, generating a currency flow into the city
-Players travel from points A to B with currency to buy gear, generating a non-static currency flow.
Players cause the demand and meet it with supply. This process generates currency flow between different types of players and different locations.
When the players choose to stop shopping in a certain location, that economy could tank.
When players jump to the next cool set of gear, supply and demand will also shift, potentially disrupting (or improving) local economies.
That's it for me. I am not an economist and I have to say my answer does lean towards how I believe the Ashes economy will work.
There can be different kind of mechanics to spice up the system, like how the trading is actually happening (marketplace, auctionhouse, shop, f2f). At the end, it does not matter how the trade is accomplished, more important is, that it is done by players.