The Pretty Good AE Debate

[SwitchFade]

7 hours ago, blue4333 said:

 

If more people are putting recipes, purples and LOTGs on the AH, regardless of activity (farming, TF/SFs, PI missions) wouldn't prices drop as a result of the supply?

 

Then making farming less desirable would reduce that supply.

I'm sorry, that's not how economics works.

 

The determinates of supply and demand do not operate in isolation, as you are implying. Price fluctuation is not solely driven by one determinate.

[arcane]

FWIW as annoying as SwitchFade is about economics, he was basically correct about the long term market effects of the last major patch-induced shift (when no xp / double inf option was nerfed). 

[ShardWarrior]

1 hour ago, Ukase said:

As far as I know, there's no cash money trading hands for something as easy to get as influence. There's no evidence of it.

 

You are not looking nearly hard enough then.  Absolutely this is going on.  Here only. 

[Marbing]

20 minutes ago, ShardWarrior said:

 

You are not looking nearly hard enough then.  Absolutely this is going on.  Here only. 

Saying it is one thing, proving is another. Please provide evidence of this and send it to the HC team so they can take care of it. Especially if it is so easy to find.

[Starforge]

23 minutes ago, ShardWarrior said:

 

You are not looking nearly hard enough then.  Absolutely this is going on.  Here only. 

Citation needed.

[Ruin Mage]

"bro just look around, its absolutely happening."

said no one with concrete evidence ever.

[Sabrehawk]

The pretty long AE debate.

[Ukase]

So, someone absolutely gave me proof that there is someone using a domain registrar based out of Toronto that seems to be hiding the domain owner's name - for all the good that would do me, I don't know any player's real life name, lol. 

The only thing I could think of would be to entice them to come out of hiding by selling them some of my influence, but 1) I'm sure they'd want me to give them my influence first, and 2) not sure they'd follow through with paying me cash and honestly, wouldn't feel comfy telling anyone where I live or give my banking info in order to get the funds. I'm sure there's some app or something that would make it easy and anonymous, but I wouldn't want anonymous. I'd want the name, address and in-game global, but anyone can just start over with a new account easily enough. It'd be like playing whack-a-mole.  

And to be clear, the only reason I would consider such a thing would be to get them shut down, whomever they are. 

But the prices I saw being charged, I just ...I can't even...It's hard to take it seriously. It's not like it was 5 bucks for a billion. It's like a LOT of money, given how easy it is to make it in this flavor of CoH. 

So, I would ask any of you to ask me how I make the influence I make, legitimately, rather than line the pockets of some nefarious evil person. I would sooner teach you all to figuratively fish than have you buy a rotten over-priced fish from this rascal. 

I honestly think I'm gonna vomit. 

Edited August 6, 2022 by Ukase

[Yomo Kimyata]

I make my inf the old fashioned way, in winner-take-all dance contests.

[Grouchybeast]

48 minutes ago, Ukase said:

The only thing I could think of would be to entice them to come out of hiding by selling them some of my influence,

 

Or you could report it via Support, and let Homecoming deal with it.

[Bill Z Bubba]

I have to ask: What, exactly, could HC do about it other than play whack-a-mole with accounts involved? It's not like they'd have any legal footing for any kind of action. Don't get me wrong, I assume that people who would pay for in game money with real money are probably stupid enough to harm themselves by breathing incorrectly, but I'm certainly curious.

[Widower]

Before you all start blowing up the old inbox, yes, we know. We ban their accounts when we can, but as far as I'm aware, we don't have a lot of options beyond that.

 

I hadn't checked up on their prices in a while though - you can buy 45 vet levels for $450! If there's one thing we can all agree on, that's truly absurd.

 

[Bill Z Bubba]

13 minutes ago, GM Widower said:

Before you all start blowing up the old inbox, yes, we know. We ban their accounts when we can, but as far as I'm aware, we don't have a lot of options beyond that.

 

I hadn't checked up on their prices in a while though - you can buy 45 vet levels for $450! If there's one thing we can all agree on, that's truly absurd.

 

 

I... wow. I mean, I KNOW some people have more money than sense but damn.

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 minutes ago, Krimson said:

I'm trying to figure out the logistics of how you even deliver it. Like, "Okay, so we're gonna do some runs on the Dreck map for the next few days. We can get it done in a single day if we forego eating, sleeping and going to the bathroom..." And that's ACTIVE farming, not AFK.

 

I dunno. Not even sure how many vetlvls per hour my farmer gets when I'm PLing new alts. Maybe 3 per 5 maps, 9 an hour maybe if I'm really pushing it? Still... madness. "I'm gonna pay real money for shit that means nothing in an 18 year old game! I IS SO SMART!!!"

[Bill Z Bubba]

On the other hand, $100/hr to play a video game does sound kinda nice...

[ivanhedgehog]

44 minutes ago, GM Widower said:

Before you all start blowing up the old inbox, yes, we know. We ban their accounts when we can, but as far as I'm aware, we don't have a lot of options beyond that.

 

I hadn't checked up on their prices in a while though - you can buy 45 vet levels for $450! If there's one thing we can all agree on, that's truly absurd.

 

$450?? my high school guidance councilor did me so wrong!!!!!

[Darmian]

Oh my.

[Ukase]

1 hour ago, Krimson said:

If you do the Dreck Map, you can get about 2 per run, more or less. But there is no way you are gonna AFK on that map. Unless it's to actually take a break.

Well...you can't truly afk, but what I have done is I'll take two-three accounts, depending on what I'm after. 

One farmer goes to one mob, the other two go to two other different mobs. I tab out, watch Netflix, or play on the other server with the 4th account. (remember, you can play with 3 accounts on one shard, but there's no rule against playing a 4th account on a different shard) 

It's all about timing. Sometimes, the bosses rez, and the timing's off. So, I'll wait an extra couple of minutes. Every 5 minutes, I tab in, move to the next mob, and so on. Takes about 45 minutes for the Dreck map, and sometimes, if I'm paying closer attention, takes 35. It can vary, though, as sometimes, the freaks fly off, and return, which can slow things down. 

It's technically afk, but to have any efficiency, you're tabbing in more often than not. 

[lemming]

7 hours ago, Grouchybeast said:

To be fair, they actually changed AE very significantly right away (normal rewards instead of tickets is a huge change) and then did a couple of tunings over time (halving XP fairly quickly, and then later removing the patrol XP exploit) which in combination with other changes have kept inflation largely under control.  It's going an awful lot better than it did on Live, anyway.

I'm pretty sure normal rewards were an option before HC got involved.  It used to be custom enemies didn't give XP, but that was solved in issue 17

[lemming]

23 hours ago, Neiska said:

 Live was before my time, but I do seem to remember reading somewhere, that base "upkeep" was a thing at one time. Now I doubt such a system would be embraced any more than any other suggestion.

Upkeep wasn't via influence, but via prestige.   And I would jranger any suggestion to bring back base upkeep so fast...   I like touring all these different bases built by some serious artists out there.    (meanwhile, I'm quite happy in my industrial box with teleporters and boxes for my stuff)

[lemming]

31 minutes ago, lemming said:

I'm pretty sure normal rewards were an option before HC got involved.  It used to be custom enemies didn't give XP, but that was solved in issue 17

Hmm. I might be wrong.  May have been DevChoice only ones that gave the choice of XP.  There's a note in the Score Doc about that.

 

And this may be of interest.  I had read it when I first came to HC, but forgot about it

A NOTE ABOUT MACROS AND AUTOMATION
 
Using macros, scripts and autohotkey-like tools to automate game tasks is not against the code of conduct or the rules. The main reason for this is that heavily automating most game functions (so they can be triggered with just a couple of buttons) is necessary to accomodate players with various levels of disability or accesibility issues, and I have no intention to ever have to require a player to justify their need for such features.

That said, if those features are used to fully automate play while AFK overnight in order to farm rewards, I will disrupt them as gently as possible. This patch is an extremely half-hearted attempt at preventing overnight reset and reentry, becuase I am fully aware that the automated script will only need a moderate amount of tweaking to locate the new clickbox for the door. Any other fixes I can think of are a lot more disruptive, and I'd rather not have to implement them.

[ShardWarrior]

7 hours ago, Starforge said:

Citation needed.

 

4 hours ago, GM Widower said:

Before you all start blowing up the old inbox, yes, we know. We ban their accounts when we can, but as far as I'm aware, we don't have a lot of options beyond that.

 

There is your citation.  The Homecoming folk already know about these sites and are doing what they can.  It is not a good idea to post links to the various gold farming sites in this thread for all the world to see and advertise for them.  Anyone requiring proof of their own can spend the literal ten seconds using Google to do the research on their own.

[ZacKing]

8 hours ago, Marbing said:

Saying it is one thing, proving is another. Please provide evidence of this and send it to the HC team so they can take care of it. Especially if it is so easy to find.

 

Google is your friend.

[ZacKing]

5 hours ago, GM Widower said:

Before you all start blowing up the old inbox, yes, we know. We ban their accounts when we can, but as far as I'm aware, we don't have a lot of options beyond that.

 

8 hours ago, Shadeknight said:

"bro just look around, its absolutely happening."

said no one with concrete evidence ever.

 

Do you need more evidence or is what a GM posting about it happening sufficient for you?

 

 

Edited August 7, 2022 by ZacKing

[Bill Z Bubba]

But does this knowledge change anyone's view about farming? It's going to happen whether AE gets nerfed or not. And the harder the lockdowns get, the more money folks like that will make. Not off me, of course, but I have an IQ higher than a turnip. Yea, yea, I know... barely... but still.