A controversial topic: Is it time to make items scarcer or cost more?

[FupDup]

Unfucking the economy is objectively the best thing HC ever did (besides bringing the game back in general). 

[Demobot]

14 minutes ago, Seed22 said:

Live Market was turbo ass. 

 

It also was back when I believe you could get 999 bil on a single toon. OP, I dont think you'd wanna see a Fury of the glad going for 150 bil. 

Influence cap maxed out at 2 billion on live, same as Homecoming. You still had some insane prices though. Purples regularly went for 250 million or more before converters were added to the game (I managed to make a killing by buying up cheaper purples beforehand and then selling them once converters caused prices to average out across all purple sets). 

[tidge]

Double-Inf for no XP was turned off because Farming with (lvl 49 IIRC) sitters was yielding 2x Inf rewards.... so adding almost as much Inf as 2 level 50 sitters, but not as many drops.

[RCU7115]

Bad idea trying to bring the economy on live to the game in its current form.

[Championess]

I really like how much less grindy it feels than what it was on live.  Only my doms ever got built to the max with near 10 billion dollar builds.  On Homecoming it feels like 1/20th of that which is great you can mostly just enjoy playing the game how you like.

 

I wouldn't want anyone new to have to walk into anything more obstructive than what the rest of us have gotten to enjoy since the game has been back.

 

That's not to say I don't see some value in adding a bit more carrot to the stick in some instances.  For one I kind of liked the costume part unlocks for participating in certain content, it felt accomplished and got more interest into that content.  Then there's the new D-Sync's for doing the harder content.

 

I'm more in line with adding a little incentive here and there for any new content to generate participation.

Edited Friday at 06:15 PM by Championess

[ZeeHero]

6 hours ago, Snarky said:

i say we install a device that punishes the player anytime you die

The people asking for what the OP seems to want are the same ones who would want this feature.

[Snarky]

8 minutes ago, ZeeHero said:

The people asking for what the OP seems to want are the same ones who would want this feature.

They should definitely install it.  The game will be much more challenging.  And fun!

[Zhym]

I said before that I think the Homecoming economy is broken.  But it's broken in good way (assuming you aren't a new player).  A lot of the economy on Live was built on keeping the power progression slow and always having things for players to aspire towards being able to afford, all in the interest of maintaining subscriptions.  Homecoming doesn't have subscriptions , so it doesn't need to drag things out. 

 

Yes, inf is easy to get.  But the way it's easy to get is weird.  You either powerlevel a 50 farmer, or you collect reward merits, turn them into converters, then either sell the converters or use them to play the enhancement conversion game.  Neither of these methods are obvious to new players, who quite reasonably think that the way to get inf is by fighting crime (or, for red side, committing it) and doing missions.  But at low to mid levels the inf gained from defeating enemies and completing missions is such a pittance compared to using the market that turning it off completely has no ill effect at all.  That seems a bit broken to me.

 

But I have no idea how I would "fix" that brokenness without breaking things even more.  And as screwy as the current system is, it works—again, unless you're a new player.  And that's a problem that can be solved by educating new users (to the extent there are any these days).  So that's why I think the economy is broken, but it also works.  

[Ukase]

9 hours ago, Troo said:

It's easy to make inf, maybe too easy.. which makes things dirt cheap for many.

As someone who routinely makes a new character, starts them at zero, and "earns" or "markets" a billion before they hit 50 (generally reached by level 20-25, depending on weekend activities - both mine, and the population of the weekend), it's not easy unless you know how. 

Even if you've been playing for a few months, or half a year, depending on how many hours you've played, how high of a level you've reached...there's a lot to learn. I can say this because I have to remember all this stuff once a week or so. 

Let's say they're aware of the ol' standby advice "Convert merits to converters/boosters/unslotters/catalysts and sell on AH." 

Okay..fine. But they're gold side and level 9. And of course they used the 2xp buff. And they've only got 17k to their name. And yeah, they've got 18 reward merits, and after they get the explores for the zones that character can handle, sure. The 28 merits they convert to converters gets 'em around 5M, depending on what they list 'em for. 

But, suppose Yomo had his "noob traps" in for those converters, they see the last 5 sale price of 48k and all they get is 48K each? That just cost 'em a million if they use the last 5 as a guide to list the price for. Or they list them at 65K, and it's the same week one of the shard TFs is the weekly, and they're ignorant of the fact that converters are going to flood the market. So, they have to pull them off, and re-list. 

And let's also discuss the few IOs that seem to frequently give nice returns, like the Miracle unique. If they buy a heal set enhancement that's not in the miracle set, that 15 converter average could easily go up to 30 converters. I imagine the learning curve of when to buy an attuned IO to convert versus when to buy a crafted IO at a specific level is greater than zero for some players. 

Now, most of us that are here - we know these things already. And I think a lot of us forget that many folks don't know this. Or, even more dangerous, are armed with some of the knowledge, but not yet enough to have figured out whether it's a good idea or not to sell this or that. 

Heck, I'm seasoned, and some of what I see on the Market just makes me scratch my head. 
A superior blaster ATO for 4M? Really? Even if there's just one on the AH, I don't know if I can trust the AH last 5 sale price display. 

So, no, I don't think making things more expensive is going to do anything to benefit anyone. It's just going to raise frustrations for the players that are not rolling in it. Look in the US supermarkets now, and see the looks of concern on the faces of most people. That's real life, but who wants to have that same scenario play out in a game? Not this guy. 

[kelika2]

so whats the difference between what you want and someone spending all day on mids making builds?

[battlewraith]

9 minutes ago, Zhym said:

Neither of these methods are obvious to new players, who quite reasonably think that the way to get inf is by fighting crime (or, for red side, committing it) and doing missions.

 

There are longterm players that act like this is the case. Just play the game and you'll get whatever you need.

[Forager]

9 hours ago, Troo said:

The expectation these days seems to be leveling to 50 in a handful of hours (maximizing 2xp, patrol xp, special xp tuned missions) and then getting a complete build immediately while starting to build out incarnates. If this is way off, I'd be happy to hear it.

 

I think that's certainly how a lot of people play...

 

Others just play their character through the task forces, slot with SO's, convert to IOs as they can and only buy what that character can afford.

 

Some bankroll their new toons, some don't.

 

Who are you trying to slow down? Any reductions in influence gain or availability of enhancements would hurt the traditional player exponentially more than the farmers.

 

TL;DR Raising prices hurts poor people more than rich people.

[Yomo Kimyata]

I'm glad someone else made this thread, because I have no moral obligation to try and be neutral.

 

I'd like to look at this from three viewpoints.

 

1.  What does Yomo want?  I think that there is way too much *stuff* out there, and that it is way too easy to get the stuff you want.  This is partly because I get more enjoyment out of gaming experiences where I solve puzzles and earn progression because I am smart enough to do so.  So I'd like to see drop rates of inf and items cut.  I'd like to see enhancement converters to become more scarce by at least an order of magnitude, say ten merits gets you three converters.  I'd like there to be real tangible rewards for the select few who have labored for fun and profit to remove excess money supply from the system, and none of this repurposing costumes that are buried in the code bs.  Let me buy my own personalized title in 50 point font for a trillion inf.  Let me buy Bug Hunter badge for 500bn.  And anyone who complains that they can't get the same thing, well buck up, follow my #%$% guides to the letter and you can and will get the same thing.

 

2.  What's good for the system?  In Live, the economy was fubar for two reasons, imo.  First was that early players were able to generate lots and lots of inf and had nothing to spend it on so prices were high for certain goods when the player-generated economy was introduced.  Second was that it was relatively trivial to manipulate very specific sectors, like luck charms or level 10 Shield Wall proc recipes.  We are in my opinion still suffering from the first point, and I think the fungibility of salvage and recipes/enhancements by level was a stroke of accidental genius on the part of the SCORE board.  But let me be perfectly honest, this economy is still pretty small.  If you gave me five more Yomos, I could tie up every single aspect of this economy and tie knots in it and make it dance to my tune.  I don't because:  I don't want to cause pain to others -- I don't get off on being a dark triad type of sociopath; at least one of the six Yomos would get pissed off because they had too much grunt work and would turn on the rest of the Yomoverse and ruin their collaboration; and I have zero control or effect on what the devs are going to do, because...

 

3.  I have zero control or effect on what the devs are going to do.  Could I buy every single piece of yellow salvage that is seeded at 100k?  Sure, if I wanted to spend literally months clicking buttons.  But then they push one button and put another 10mm out there at 5k this time around.  Change drop rates on Threat DSOs?  Push of a button.  I don't know any reason WHY they would do such a thing, but they are commanding this universe and their actions are not there to maximize subscriber revenue, or even to keep the game running.  Their motivations are to do whatever they want whenever they want for whatever reasons they want.  Fair enough, it's not *my* secret poker game.  But at the end of the day the devs are going to do what they do for whatever reasons they will do it.  And that has exactly zero to do with me, what I want, or what I think would be best for Homecoming.

[MTeague]

Any changes now, would be a massive boost to people who already have tons of resources, and massive screw job to anyone new. So. Being mindful of that, I think the only way to make content truly scarce / rare, AND make it fair, is to

• forcibly reset all characters to lvl 1,
• remove all enhancements from all existing characters,
• remove all influence from all characters,
• remove all items and influence from all emails,
• and prevent AE from being a source of influence or drops at all. 

.... and then, when we no longer have any players whatsoever, there will be a fresh, pristine economy, glistening like white snow in the morning.

 

/sarc, in case you missed it. 

Edited Friday at 06:18 PM by MTeague

[Forager]

24 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I don't get off on being a dark triad type of sociopath; at least one of the six Yomos would get pissed off because they had too much grunt work and would turn on the rest of the Yomoverse and ruin their collaboration

 

Someone write this script!

[Mopery]

1 hour ago, battlewraith said:

There are longterm players that act like this is the case. Just play the game and you'll get whatever you need.

After a time this has in fact become my case, "whatever you need" being completely subjective, of course.

[battlewraith]

7 minutes ago, Mopery said:

After a time this has in fact become my case, "whatever you need" being completely subjective, of course.

Earlier in this thread you described yourself as someone with no life outside the game. If people are willing to spend all of their leisure time playing this game, indefinitely, then I think the claim is true. People should not be spending all of their leisure time playing this game.

[starro]

Keep things easy to access.   We should be helping the new players learn the concepts and make it easy to give loot and things they can mess up and not have to grind a week to try again later.

 

There are plenty of ways for individuals to make the game harder for themselves without dragging down everyone else.    Up team size, levels, play naked without inspirations / enhancements etc etc.

 

 

[Skyhawke]

This and several other topics lately just feel to me like bored one percenters making wild ideas from atop their ivory towers. "The economy bores me. Raise prices!" "x4/8 content no longer challenges me. Raise difficulty!" "I never use this part of the game. Why does it still exist?" 

 

 

[Octogoat]

5 minutes ago, Skyhawke said:

This and several other topics lately just feel to me like bored one percenters making wild ideas from atop their ivory towers. "The economy bores me. Raise prices!" "x4/8 content no longer challenges me. Raise difficulty!" "I never use this part of the game. Why does it still exist?" 

 

 

"Jeeves fetch another billion from the emails I feel like making a brawl character" no longer as fashionable 

[Ukase]

1 hour ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I'd like to see enhancement converters to become more scarce by at least an order of magnitude, say ten merits gets you three converters. 

So, I was reading - because I know you're smart, and I'm always ready to learn something. But I stopped right here. 
I don't know about you, but this exchange would punish players across the board. The only folks who wouldn't really feel it...folks with stacks of reward merits safely tucked into their account email. 

There was a time, back shortly after HC opened the doors I would participate in the zerg, and the more patient clear 1-2 mito spawns method. I did that for maybe 6 months or so. I can't recall what distracted me from it. But on one tank I had 8000 reward merits. I eventually converted them into hero merits, and they're still hero merits on that tank that I haven't played in too long. 

I can only imagine how many Hero/Villain merits some of these mostly one character players like Cassie Knight and others have on their characters. To just pick this one tidbit out of your post is unfair of me, but it's just so awful to contemplate - after players like us already have tons of merits at our disposal - it's just not a good idea. It probably would just encourage me to do what I'm already doing - limiting the creation of alts, and trying to find my favorite 30-40 characters and just playing those. At that point, I wouldn't need converters because I'd already have my big stacks. So, it wouldn't really impact me. But I would feel awful for the new player trying to kit out their characters. 

 

2 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I'd like there to be real tangible rewards for the select few who have labored for fun and profit to remove excess money supply from the system

Well, if I had a badge or a statue to display in your honor, I'd do it. You've improved the way so many of us play with your guides and your generosity. But sadly, I don't have that kind of influence, despite having 1 inf or so less than you. 

[Bionic_Flea]

10 minutes ago, Ukase said:

Well, if I had a badge or a statue to display in your honor, I'd do it. You've improved the way so many of us play with your guides and your generosity. But sadly, I don't have that kind of influence, despite having 1 inf or so less than you. 

 

The Dark Triad Sociopath Yomo would just burn it down.

[Yomo Kimyata]

5 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

 

The Dark Triad Sociopath Yomo would just burn it down.

 

Yomo 3 is a real jerk

[Sovera]

Depends on how well it is done. I've played on other servers who had a stricter idea of how to level and it was mostly miserable for a truly new player. On a second or third character it was better.

 

With EVERYTHING having to be bought with merits since there was no player economy then everything had value. Sadly they did not think about this part and there were no expanded recipe storage either on the character or the AH so I was resorting to the old dreadful method of having mules.

 

But that was the other extreme.

 

I do find that cutting off inf while double XP is on achieves nothing except screw new players since SOs are replacing them is exorbitant at easily half a million every five levels or so. Fortunately at 22 we can swap to generic IOs which is what I keep advising new players to curb the spending.

 

Inf while leveling is already a pittance so doubling down by cutting it doesn't seem to serve a purpose. Not that I personally care because, like most vets, my account is firmly established and even whimsical challenges I sometimes undertake like start a fresh account is countered by experience.

[momentarygrace]

Please stop moving the goalposts for those of us who don't run as fast as you (a.k.a. still work for a living and have ever so much less time to play that we'd like, and are also blessed with altaholism). By the time I figure out how something works and start feeling like I'm catching up, well, I'm not, for reasons.

 

My wife who loves this game intensely but gets to play even less than I thinks I'm a genius, because I help her out with basic tips and sometimes try to explain high level stuff like enhancement set bonuses. Yes, that was supposed to be ridiculous.

 

There are a lot of assumptions being made most of the time about what level the majority of players are playing at, how much inf they have, etc. I'm not saying the assumptions are right or wrong, just pointing out that they are assumptions.

 

Back to my blanket fort.