Influence sink...good? bad?

[SomeGuy]

On 10/25/2021 at 11:20 AM, Ukase said:

I'm not opposed to giving inf away. But, 

1. It has to be my idea. Nothing is more stinky and creepy than a beggar. 
2. Anecdotally, the only time I've given inf away and that player kept playing the game is once - and despite my telling them it was a gift, they repaid me in a few months. It's just anecdotal, but folks I've given large sums of inf to - they just stop playing. 

 

 

 

Bro. I felt this in my heart. I dunno how much PLing I've done in the past, or inf donations I've done, in the vain hope someone would play with me. Just for them to ding a 50 on a cold dom corruptor or defender. Then roll a sentinel.

[UltraAlt]

15 hours ago, 0th Power said:

New inf sink: Fishing Mini-Game.  Can be located on the Talos boardwalk.  Could have tournaments and records, and think of all the lies to be told...

 

Perhaps I should host this once a week.

250 million for a players fishing permit - one time fee.

Players pay me another 1 Billion for logging the the length, weight, and type of each fish they caught and then then post it on the forums for all to see their "big fish tale".

 

Nah, no one would fall for that. Might as well be asking for a motorcycle that  you can hold on your shoulder that fires like a cannon while a team mate is sitting on it.

[Dona Eis Requiem]

You could always host Arena battles. Set a regular schedule for the day(s) and type of battle.

No betting (obviously), you could award a purse to the winner(s).

It would be something different that utilizes a different part of the game. 

[Ukase]

16 hours ago, Gerswin said:

Wow I wish I could sell you transcendents for a billion a pop. I compulsively hoard mine and never use them to craft incarnate stuff. I multibox farm tinpex and DA arcs for that. Most of my 120+ toons have 400 or more emps stored, and my emp farming toons have a large multiple of that.

I've got about 30 T-merits stashed. But they spend a lot faster than they come in, for sure. It's part of the reason I opted to get all the badges on more characters. Gives me more time to accumulate them. My primary account is actually set on t-merits. It's the secondary account that I play while the first account is soaking damage, or dishing out damage for various badges that I'm having to farm the emp merits for. Just tedious, no big deal, really. 

On the one hand, HC has already done quite a bit to make the incarnate grind less grindy with the emps & threads dropping at certain vet levels. I like the HC method a LOT more than the old version of dealing with Astrals & Emp merits for not only incarnate stuff, but recipes & IOs as well. 

On the other hand, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me that 2xp turns off at 50, when there's more XP to be had, even if it is incarnate XP. I mean - the more inf we sink, the better, right? 


Smart play with the TinPex. I enjoy Apex...but Tin Mage just seems dull to me. Nothing to dodge like in Apex. 

[Yomo Kimyata]

20 hours ago, Aurora_Girl said:

Go to space and measure your inf-peen with the cosmos (generally speaking, not to any one person in particular, other than Jeffrey). 

Excellent idea!  I would certainly spend 100bn for a space base where I could eat space caviar with my pals.  You should post that in the Suggestions forum!

[MHertz]

If there's going to be a money sink, then it probably shouldn't turn money into power — better gear, better protection, faster earning potential — money already does that, and we haven't managed to solve the sink problem that way. Therefore, money is going to have to turn into something else. Two things come to mind.

 

The first thing money can turn into is vanity.

• Imagine being able to pay a pile of cash and get your name on one of the buildings in the game (for a certain amount of time). Instead of "Cook's Electronics" in Blyde Square, we'd get Yomo's Tech Haven, with a lighted sign and everything. Or you could put up a billboard advertising (or bragging about) your SG. Your character's face on a flag. Yes, this would take some developer time, but it wouldn't have to take an abusive amount of coding or excessive testing. It's a texture; it just has to be evaluated for content. You'd be Bruce Wayne.
• Imagine being able to pay a pile of cash to rename some IOs. You pay for 1,000 Ukase's Blast recipes to drop, and suddenly people are talking about your character like you're a big-time Iron-Man-style arms dealer. This would take some dev time, too, but it would be a way for your character to live forever. You'd be on all the wiki sites that talk about what gear to buy, what build to pursue. And maybe your branded version could be 1% better than Positron's version — just that much.

Another thing money can turn into is political power.

• Suppose you could invest a spectacularly large amount of money into a corporation or a country which is part of some macroeconomic mini-game. After all, if you're the kind of player for whom money is a game, then the developers should create a financial end game that deals with large sums spent on specific political or economic effects. Maybe your corporation is pushing magic stuff in an attempt to make magic better or more plentiful. Sale prices for magic salvage at all vendors goes down by a small amount. Meanwhile, someone else is pushing science, which negates part of your efforts to push magic. It'd be a macro-scale economic game that doesn't specifically make you more money (but from which more money might be made). You'd never be able to push prices down to zero, but there would always be one origin that was "cheapest" and another that was "more valuable." Billionaires would be able to fight over this, mostly for the sake of bragging rights. Or, you know, some other macro mini-game centered around money could be imagined, like founding a corporation that is now fighting with other corporations. Do real monetary PVP. Yes, this would take a lot of developer time to make. But it would provide a real financial end-game for those who have too much money to spend and nothing to spend it on.

[Ukase]

20 minutes ago, MHertz said:

If there's going to be a money sink, then it probably shouldn't turn money into power — better gear, better protection, faster earning potential — money already does that, and we haven't managed to solve the sink problem that way. Therefore, money is going to have to turn into something else.

I only highlight this portion because out of all the replies, this part speaks to me the most. So, I thank you for that. The rest of your post was also quite interesting - I'd give 100 billion to rename Artillery Blast to Ukase's Blast, for sure! But it would have to be permanent, lol. 

So, given your logic here, it's a fun idea - (to me) - but a poor one. I now consider the question answered. So thanks everyone! 

[MHertz]

1 hour ago, Ukase said:

The rest of your post was also quite interesting - I'd give 100 billion to rename Artillery Blast to Ukase's Blast, for sure! But it would have to be permanent, lol. 

I considered that, but I don't think that's a good idea. Two things would be true: you still have the knowledge and ability to make more money, and other people might come along in 2 years and have even more than you did.

 

So you spent 100 billion, but that Nouveau Riche guy comes along with 101 billion and wants to change your branding to theirs. But they can't, because you got there first? That's it? First come, first served?

 

Even supposing some newer, richer guy never turns up, you're still making money. What happens when you've bought every vanity thing that's for sale? Nothing? Too bad, so sad, it's all sold? And now we need a new distraction for the super-rich?

 

Permanent sales in perpetuity limits the size of the money sink to, what, a hundred IO set names? That would only extract a certain amount of cash from the game, and when that money sink is used up, it's done. It's a hard-limited amount of content. My suggestion would either be to rename all of that set on a monthly basis, or to essentially manufacture 1000 units of a vanity duplicate version with your name on it, which will drop in the normal course of the game. (Maybe you get an author's copy for one of your toons.) If you want another thousand units pumped into the economy, pay again. That keeps the money sink alive and collecting for as long as people are earning.

 

It's the same as buying a megayacht or an luxury jet as a vanity possession. It's not a one-time purchase; it must be maintained, harbored, licensed, staffed, fueled, and so on.

Edited October 28, 2021 by MHertz

[Shenanigunner]

On 10/26/2021 at 7:28 AM, The_Warpact said:

Lvl 1 first one to make it from zone in PI to Portal Corp wins. Any deaths is disqualified.

 

I did that several times on Live, without using any of the current transport systems and with trams that didn't connect to all zones. I won when my player with zero XP danced in Portal Court.

[Ukase]

2 hours ago, MHertz said:

I considered that, but I don't think that's a good idea. Two things would be true: you still have the knowledge and ability to make more money, and other people might come along in 2 years and have even more than you did.

 

So you spent 100 billion, but that Nouveau Riche guy comes along with 101 billion and wants to change your branding to theirs. But they can't, because you got there first? That's it? First come, first served?

 

Even supposing some newer, richer guy never turns up, you're still making money. What happens when you've bought every vanity thing that's for sale? Nothing? Too bad, so sad, it's all sold? And now we need a new distraction for the super-rich?

 

Permanent sales in perpetuity limits the size of the money sink to, what, a hundred IO set names? That would only extract a certain amount of cash from the game, and when that money sink is used up, it's done. It's a hard-limited amount of content. My suggestion would either be to rename all of that set on a monthly basis, or to essentially manufacture 1000 units of a vanity duplicate version with your name on it, which will drop in the normal course of the game. (Maybe you get an author's copy for one of your toons.) If you want another thousand units pumped into the economy, pay again. That keeps the money sink alive and collecting for as long as people are earning.

 

It's the same as buying a megayacht or an luxury jet as a vanity possession. It's not a one-time purchase; it must be maintained, harbored, licensed, staffed, fueled, and so on.

I see no problem with the game being renamed to City of Ukase! 

[gamingglen]

23 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

Excellent idea!  I would certainly spend 100bn for a space base where I could eat space caviar with my pals.  You should post that in the Suggestions forum!

While sitting in a hot tub with beauties all around?  You'll have to define your own "beauties". 

Edited October 28, 2021 by gamingglen

[gamingglen]

Pay to have one of those protest signs to have your name. 

 

I said once, probably in some chat, that a "Save Sally" sign should exist as part of a protest emote.  If the devs can figure out how to make various protest emotes then that might be easy to duplicate.

I say this because I want a "Down with Ukase!" when you buy your mayorship of any city.  😄  

[Ukase]

6 hours ago, gamingglen said:

Pay to have one of those protest signs to have your name. 

 

I said once, probably in some chat, that a "Save Sally" sign should exist as part of a protest emote.  If the devs can figure out how to make various protest emotes then that might be easy to duplicate.

I say this because I want a "Down with Ukase!" when you buy your mayorship of any city.  😄  

All press is good press! 

[Rumors]

In a way, I think wealthy players are the inf sinks of the game.  I mean, just think about it.  What would happen if these players hoarding tons of inf, enhancements, convertors, and whatever other valuable, tradeable stuff all just opened the flood gates and dumped everything onto the AH?  Massive bids on everything, tons of rare enhancements and stuff now for sale for cheap, and so on.  It'd be economic chaos!  But by sitting on billions of inf and having SG bases full of purples for their next half dozen alts, they're actually keeping the market stable!

 

But yeah, the problem of being richer than you can ever feasible use is... not something that can be easily solved.  Add something in for the super wealthy and poor 13-inf-Joe is going to start complaining that they can't have it too and that it's too expensive and grindy.  And even if you ignore them, that's still limited dev resources being spent on pleasing a small handful of players.  Anything in game is just asking for trouble.    But ummm, I guess you could have something set-up where you could spend 1 or more billion to have a gold forum name for a month?  Something like that?  No clue.

 

And personally, I've not chased insane wealth because I don't want to smash face first into the, ummm, I think Law Of Diminishing Marginal Utility is the right one. 

[Yomo Kimyata]

11 hours ago, Rumors said:

In a way, I think wealthy players are the inf sinks of the game.  I mean, just think about it.  What would happen if these players hoarding tons of inf, enhancements, convertors, and whatever other valuable, tradeable stuff all just opened the flood gates and dumped everything onto the AH?  Massive bids on everything, tons of rare enhancements and stuff now for sale for cheap, and so on.  It'd be economic chaos!  But by sitting on billions of inf and having SG bases full of purples for their next half dozen alts, they're actually keeping the market stable!

 

But yeah, the problem of being richer than you can ever feasible use is... not something that can be easily solved.  Add something in for the super wealthy and poor 13-inf-Joe is going to start complaining that they can't have it too and that it's too expensive and grindy.  And even if you ignore them, that's still limited dev resources being spent on pleasing a small handful of players.  Anything in game is just asking for trouble.    But ummm, I guess you could have something set-up where you could spend 1 or more billion to have a gold forum name for a month?  Something like that?  No clue.

 

And personally, I've not chased insane wealth because I don't want to smash face first into the, ummm, I think Law Of Diminishing Marginal Utility is the right one. 

 

I think this is spot on.

 

@Rumors is the first one to be invited over for space eggs!

 

[Luminara]

1 hour ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

 

I think this is spot on.

 

@Rumors is the first one to be invited over for space eggs!

 

[Gerswin]

100 billion for the "Huge" crotch bulge belt costume option would have an enormous inf sink potential.

[Dazl]

14 hours ago, Rumors said:

In a way, I think wealthy players are the inf sinks of the game.  I mean, just think about it.  What would happen if these players hoarding tons of inf, enhancements, convertors, and whatever other valuable, tradeable stuff all just opened the flood gates and dumped everything onto the AH?  Massive bids on everything, tons of rare enhancements and stuff now for sale for cheap, and so on.  It'd be economic chaos!  But by sitting on billions of inf and having SG bases full of purples for their next half dozen alts, they're actually keeping the market stable!

 

But yeah, the problem of being richer than you can ever feasible use is... not something that can be easily solved.  Add something in for the super wealthy and poor 13-inf-Joe is going to start complaining that they can't have it too and that it's too expensive and grindy.  And even if you ignore them, that's still limited dev resources being spent on pleasing a small handful of players.  Anything in game is just asking for trouble.    But ummm, I guess you could have something set-up where you could spend 1 or more billion to have a gold forum name for a month?  Something like that?  No clue.

 

And personally, I've not chased insane wealth because I don't want to smash face first into the, ummm, I think Law Of Diminishing Marginal Utility is the right one. 

Also goes to show you, it’s not the amount of influence in the system that causes inflation it’s how people use it.