The OP's proposal is both extreme & ineffective, and brings great inconvenience into the economy, and punishes the large majority of players just because of a very few exceptions.
Guild Wars 2 has a system a lot like what the OP's proposed - all exotic gears are BoE, all ascended gears are account-bound, there's no p2p trading, you can mail gear and gold to another player, but there's a limit on how much you can send. All kinds of trading must go through a centralized trading-post.
With allllllllll those in place, a quick google of "Guild wars 2 buy gold" still turns up with quite many hits. I guess that's a proof that the above mechanisms weren't effective at dealing with RMT.
And honestly I can really care less about those few streamers or guild friends who gets sponsored and power leveled. As an artisan-focused player I'd take a free & active player economy over "strict fairness" any day.
Also I don't think pvp twinks will even exist in Ashes. Due to the mixed lv zones, corruption, and bounty hunter mechanics, anyone who goes on ganking in a mid-level character in expensive gear will just make themselves a sweet target for higher level players passing by, or high level BH players looking for their preys. i.e. "twinks" will face a very high risk of losing their expensive gear. I imagine it would be much more reasonable for gankers to go with max-level characters in 2nd tier gear.
Anyway, no. Don't turn ashes into another Guild War, don't turn Ashes into another Wow.
If we wanted theme parks we would've stayed in wow, if we wanted fair-land we would've stayed in gw2. I believe many of us are only here because Ashes has promised something different.
Ok, it seems my point didn't make it across properly, or I am wording this poorly. Let me try and restate this. If a player wants to sell what they obtained, via local markets or some type of market place, that is fine, that is the economy. What I was trying to find out is if people are ok with someone just trading any and all gear/money/items to another player at any time for any reason they want to. It just seems it would be tough to verify RMT with this kind of set up.
I guess the best way to give an example would be like this. Let's say a popular streamer or even a new guild member of a large guild decides they wants to start playing Ashes of Creation. They have a few thousand followers or a few hundred fellow guild members playing also or they join during this "free trial" period. They create their character and immediately obtain best in slot gear, and all the materials they needs to either max out, or get a high level in most of the life skills because everyone just drops it on the ground or trades it with them as needed so they can level up. End game content is available as soon as they level up their character which could be power leveled quickly with group content. Also, imagine these guilds declare war on another guild for a grind or resource spot. People are ok with this?
The original post was to cover Gear and silver, not all types of trading. But again, I am probably missing something.
I searched for a bit in the forums and couldn't find a post discussing this, so if it is old news and I am beating a dead horse, sorry. I just wanted to know how other players feel about Player to Player Trading.
From what I found, this is the game's stance on player to player trading.
There will be player to player trading in Ashes of Creation.[3]
Q: Will Ashes of Creation have player-to-player trading? Will there be anything stopping me from gifting a friend that's fresh to the game a bunch of in-game money to help them get on their feet quickly?
A: There won't be anything to stop you from doing that. – Steven Sharif
1. It should not be allowed
2. Gear should be account, character or bound on equip once it is obtained either by drop, crafting, or purchase from crafter.
3. Game Currency should not be traded between players outside of their own account.
4. If gear/currency are going to be traded, there needs to be a set minimum character level for both players to do so unless it is your own account.
My Rationale:
1. Real Money Trading will become a huge issue with the game and the bane of World Chat
2. PVP at lower levels will be discouraging for players with new accounts as they will be fighting current players with top level gear. (Twinks)
3. Encourages players to quickly bypass the beginning game content and areas.
4. Catch Up mechanics will arrive over time. They do in every game.
These are problems I have seen coming. I played World of Warcraft from Burning Crusade until the middle of Battle for Azeroth. During that time I started playing Black Desert Online in Korea and when it was released in NA I switched over and participated in the Alpha and Beta testing and currently still play Black Desert Online daily. The games are night and day different, but both are enjoyable. I mention this because I have seen both sides of the spectrum and it seems Black Desert Online did it right with the player to player trading.
In response to your updated post I would say this:
Congratulations on having friends in high places. Welcome to Ashes of Creation. 😎
If a guild decides to boost a singel member with ressources then they should be able too.
Gold selling and boosting will allways happen.
That doesnt mean you should do nothing against it but it also doesnt mean that you punish the entire playerbase for a few people.
Personally i loved the player to player trading in Ragnarok.
It gave guilds the ability to rend out gear during raids and pvp events.
when i first played BDO and saw no P2P trading it was a huge let down.
Gold sellers will be reported and Steven is a fan of perma ban.
That the gold sellers have to buy the 15$ sub every time they make a new account is allready a big deterend.
To stop free trial account gold selling, all they have to do is lock trading until people payed for their sub.
Acive GMs, Systems that check big transitions and you are done.
As long as the GMs know for example that Guy A just gave Guy B a big number of Gold or many small packages of gold but gave nothing in return. Then it should be fine.
In addition there will allways be people that report the issue.
For now im hoping they stick with no limit Player to player trading.
See how it goes and adjust according to data, not according to what could happen.
Also I don't think pvp twinks will even exist in Ashes. Due to the mixed lv zones, corruption, and bounty hunter mechanics, anyone who goes on ganking in a mid-level character in expensive gear will just make themselves a sweet target for higher level players passing by, or high level BH players looking for their preys. i.e. "twinks" will face a very high risk of losing their expensive gear. I imagine it would be much more reasonable for gankers to go with max-level characters in 2nd tier gear.
.
If there is level bracketed pvp battlegrounds/arenas, I think there will be twinking. Hell Ashes already has a way to ensure your character doesn't level up via the experience debt system, so even if pvp gives experience twinking would be pretty easy to do. Whether or not that is a problem for the game is a totally different issue, some people love it, others think it ruins pvp opportunities for leveling players. Also, the popularity of twinking will depend largely on how much comps and "metas" change at different levels based on gear availability, how stats scale at different levels, and which skills are unlocked when. Low level metas are just reflections of max-level gameplay then it won't be very popular.
Comments
Guild Wars 2 has a system a lot like what the OP's proposed - all exotic gears are BoE, all ascended gears are account-bound, there's no p2p trading, you can mail gear and gold to another player, but there's a limit on how much you can send. All kinds of trading must go through a centralized trading-post.
With allllllllll those in place, a quick google of "Guild wars 2 buy gold" still turns up with quite many hits. I guess that's a proof that the above mechanisms weren't effective at dealing with RMT.
And honestly I can really care less about those few streamers or guild friends who gets sponsored and power leveled. As an artisan-focused player I'd take a free & active player economy over "strict fairness" any day.
Also I don't think pvp twinks will even exist in Ashes. Due to the mixed lv zones, corruption, and bounty hunter mechanics, anyone who goes on ganking in a mid-level character in expensive gear will just make themselves a sweet target for higher level players passing by, or high level BH players looking for their preys. i.e. "twinks" will face a very high risk of losing their expensive gear. I imagine it would be much more reasonable for gankers to go with max-level characters in 2nd tier gear.
Anyway, no. Don't turn ashes into another Guild War, don't turn Ashes into another Wow.
If we wanted theme parks we would've stayed in wow, if we wanted fair-land we would've stayed in gw2. I believe many of us are only here because Ashes has promised something different.
In response to your updated post I would say this:
Congratulations on having friends in high places. Welcome to Ashes of Creation. 😎
Gold selling and boosting will allways happen.
That doesnt mean you should do nothing against it but it also doesnt mean that you punish the entire playerbase for a few people.
Personally i loved the player to player trading in Ragnarok.
It gave guilds the ability to rend out gear during raids and pvp events.
when i first played BDO and saw no P2P trading it was a huge let down.
Gold sellers will be reported and Steven is a fan of perma ban.
That the gold sellers have to buy the 15$ sub every time they make a new account is allready a big deterend.
To stop free trial account gold selling, all they have to do is lock trading until people payed for their sub.
Acive GMs, Systems that check big transitions and you are done.
As long as the GMs know for example that Guy A just gave Guy B a big number of Gold or many small packages of gold but gave nothing in return. Then it should be fine.
In addition there will allways be people that report the issue.
For now im hoping they stick with no limit Player to player trading.
See how it goes and adjust according to data, not according to what could happen.