Ironore, I've read your other posts in these forums and I do like your ideas. However, here are my thoughts and concerns:

I understand that a castle does not only require gold, or a form of currency to function. I do understand that guards need to be fed, pelts laid out as beds, stone for wall repairs etc, etc, yet guards do like to be paid. I do not work to get paid food, but I get work to get paid currency, then to buy the food.

However, what if we mixed our ideas? Here is a brief background of the current harvesting system:

Wildlife drops pelts. (each related to their own kind, which means, a panther pelt has different properties than a cugar pelt).

Trees 'drop' wood. (most trees will be able to be cut down. again, each type of wood has its own properties).

Stone nodes drop related stone ores. These ores are ONLY found in caves. Iron caves will only drop iron, bronze only bronze, etc. I did not like EQ2's system where you could go mine everywhere. In this design, players will be able to 'control' these areas unoffically. Interesting turmoil shall come about.

So, our ideas mix here:

Humanoids do NOT drop money. Instead, there are a fixed amount of gold, silver, and copper ore nodes. (100 copper = 1 silver, 100 silver = 1 gold). The 'respawn' timer will be in my hands, the hands of the developer to moniter if there is enough/too much/too little gold in the game.

This enhances the group play even more. Instead of going to that rare gold ore mine solo, and risk being killed by a group of PKers, you'd be a group to protect you harvest the valueable material. Even then, groups would be formed to go attack them in order to get away with some quick, hard earned cash.

Also, the style will be more realistic, with a hint of fantasy.

In regards to selling our customers money.. Wurm Online does that. As a former player, I did not like it. It does solve some issues.. but adds many more. What if one guy decided to buy $1000 dollars worth of gold? Stuff like that.

Mythos is doing a similar system.. I'll see how that works.

Blessings,

Originally posted by MarleVVLL

Ironore, I've read your other posts in these forums and I do like your ideas. However, here are my thoughts and concerns:

I understand that a castle does not only require gold, or a form of currency to function. I do understand that guards need to be fed, pelts laid out as beds, stone for wall repairs etc, etc, yet guards do like to be paid. I do not work to get paid food, but I get work to get paid currency, then to buy the food.

However, what if we mixed our ideas? Here is a brief background of the current harvesting system:

Wildlife drops pelts. (each related to their own kind, which means, a panther pelt has different properties than a cugar pelt).

Trees 'drop' wood. (most trees will be able to be cut down. again, each type of wood has its own properties).

Stone nodes drop related stone ores. These ores are ONLY found in caves. Iron caves will only drop iron, bronze only bronze, etc. I did not like EQ2's system where you could go mine everywhere. In this design, players will be able to 'control' these areas unoffically. Interesting turmoil shall come about.

So, our ideas mix here:

Humanoids do NOT drop money. Instead, there are a fixed amount of gold, silver, and copper ore nodes. (100 copper = 1 silver, 100 silver = 1 gold). The 'respawn' timer will be in my hands, the hands of the developer to moniter if there is enough/too much/too little gold in the game.

This enhances the group play even more. Instead of going to that rare gold ore mine solo, and risk being killed by a group of PKers, you'd be a group to protect you harvest the valueable material. Even then, groups would be formed to go attack them in order to get away with some quick, hard earned cash.

Also, the style will be more realistic, with a hint of fantasy.

In regards to selling our customers money.. Wurm Online does that. As a former player, I did not like it. It does solve some issues.. but adds many more. What if one guy decided to buy $1000 dollars worth of gold? Stuff like that.

Mythos is doing a similar system.. I'll see how that works.

Blessings,

In regards to selling our customers money.. Wurm Online does that. As a former player, I did not like it. It does solve some issues.. but adds many more. What if one guy decided to buy $1000 dollars worth of gold? Stuff like that. Let him as long as he can't under cut you in price, make sure that if he does decide to re-sell it, that it sells at a loss to him.

The guys from Roma victor sell there own gold, have a chat with them about pro's and con's of selling your own gold.

I still think the gold with weight is very smart way to go, might not stop the gold sellers but it will slow them down and make it very hard to make a profit.

It sounds like you have got a pretty good system going there.  You have hit right on the most important factor, and that is deciding how much should come from the nodes. 

As to other things being mentioned, for sure, gold, as everything should have some weight.

I don't agree with selling gold.  I like the idea of a fantasy world where what you do THERE matters, not how much money you have in RL and can use to your advantage and the detriment of others.  If you can gain such an advantage in game, then fine, but just dumping it in at once, no good.

And one last picky thing, tho I see it as a common mistake in many games.  Don't have any bronze nodes for mining.  Bronze is not a natural mineral, but rather an alloy of tin and copper.  1:10 ratio roughly.

Concerning the selling game currency, yeah, I've really thought about it. The main purpose of creating a MMO is to provide a revenue for those who worked on it so that we can live and function. One option to generate MORE revenue was to sell in-game currency. However, as Ironore suggested, it isn't the optimal thing to do.

Also, in Wurm Online, the players under-cut the developers gold value. Since coin can be generated in-game and via website, all they have to do is work hard enough to get a lot of 'gold', and then sell it below the price of the website. It happens on the offical forums of the game. Even if I lowered the price to sell it below the players, players would rack it up when I lowered the price, only to when I'd raise it back up, to undercut me. They wouldn't make a ton of profit, but I'd still be missing out on potential business.

Also, yes, refined ore (specifically copper, silver, and gold) which smelt into coins will have signficant weight. Another primary developer is, and I quote, "almost whole heartly against this idea, as if I killed an orc in the woods, they'd have some coins in their pocket."

I'll write an article and send it his way today, discussing the procs and cons of each, and how it will actually help the game grow closer as a cummunity. Instead of a single gold farmer killin' orcs all day, instead you get a group of people (GROUP) rushing towards the gold cave to get that ore, only to be met by an opposing faction. They both call for backup, and have large scale attacks over a single mine. That is all hypothetical, but it very well could happen, depending on how rare we make coin to be.

Also, yes, we will take careful analysis on alloys. For instance, steel is a alloy of iron and coal. Likewise you mentioned bronze.

This is what the system looks like right now in a bigger picture:

There will be over 100 areas (large areas) for players to explore. They will be filled with plains, mountians, ruins, rivers, lakes and caves. --- lets focus on the last part.

Each cave will have only one or two types of ores (depending on the type) to be mined. The cave may or may not be inhabited by 'mobs'. Some will be lengthy, others, smaller, but the deeper you travel into the cave, the more numerous the nodes become.

Special mines, such as gold, silver and copper mines, will be few and far between. They will usually be rather hidden, and spawn their nodes as the GM team sees fit. They may or may not be inhabited as well.

Once a node is mined, and the player receives the amount of ore desired (without weighing them down), they return to a settlement with a forge. They then smelt the ore and receive smelted ore. They then turn to a blacksmith who has skill in making coins.

That is how currency will enter the system.

How will it leave?

Repairs, settlement upkeep, and mounts.

Other options are still being considered but this looks good to me. A few kinks here and there, but if pulled off right... I might be addicted to my own game! ;)

Blessings,

Originally posted by redcap036

Ok it's pretty late in the morning for me and I had this really stupid idea, why fight the current!

Instead of fixing the game against gold farmers and sellers, allow them to do there thing, but make it that they have to buy a licence from you first to be an official gold seller, anyone can be a farmer or try, the successful one are the ones that want to become gold sellers and  there the ones who have to come and get a license from you to have the right to sell it in game, Always have more than two gold sellers, that way you will have competitive gold prices, not to mention these guys will be the first to track down and report any illegal gold sellers.

I liked the weight idea, how cool would I be if not only did the gold farmers and sellers have to mine the gold, they would have to also hire players to help protect the gold,( from other players!) while it was being transported by cart to town for processing and storage in a bank.

Anyway just a thought. :)

While I appreciate your brain power, your first suggestion is not an option. Here are two reasons why:

Why would they buy a license if they could do it anyways for free?

If we did allow that to happen, what about selling characters and items too?

Concerning your last part, that is exactly what we are planning on doing!

We figure if money is not easy to come buy, and the money that does exist is worth a lot, then gold farmers would really have to compete for it... that will not be an easy task.

That would require the gold farmer to: Level up mining and smithing to a decent level and then have a group of buddies fight off other groups that are seeking after the gold. If they manage to get the gold, they'd have to get it back to a settlement (which could be far away) to be refined. After that, they will have to smelt it. Depending on their skill, they might not get that much gold after all.

In actuality, the main way to abtain gold in the game will be to control settlements... which can be taken over.. :-)

Blessings,

Make the faucets competitive. That way the farmers have to compete with the regular players. May not stop farming but it makes farmers part of the game.

SWG had a good idea.  random pop ups.  you know when you register for a site and it comes up with the weird text that bots cant read?  put that in random pop ups in the game (every 2 hours or so) and make it worthwhile.

e.g in Star wars it popped up when you were mining for minerals.  it would say that a more concentrated source of the mineral (easier to mine) is located nearby.  ask the player to type in the text he sees (and bots cant) and then give him a waypoint/minimap marker to the location.

as for gold sellers...you cant get rid of them.  what cant discourage them is if crafting is a vital part of the game.  raids and their epic gear only fuel more gold sellers and levellers.  if a crafter (after a lengthy process) can craft (some) of the best items in the game then it would reduce the selling slightly.

Make all drops BOP and make them components to self only crafting for your amour and weps an such, gives a player more to do and a knowledge that they CAN obtain the good gear even on casual, just takes longer.

We will not have BOE/P on items, except some very rare, or 'epic' type items. We will, however, have a system in place where any item can only be worn two or three times. Items can also break (get destoryed). Also, since many NPCs will not have money, there will be a system in place to dismember items for a small fraction of the orginal ingredients and the quality of them (note: small faction).

Items with BOE/P, we feel, take away from the game. However, we will have some items labled with 'solus-unus', which means that a user can only have ONE of that particular item. EQ1 tagged items with 'lore', which functioned in the same way. This does make the problem with currency a bit tougher, but it adds the 're-sale' value aspect to the market.

Blessings,

Originally posted by MarleVVLL

We will not have BOE/P on items, except some very rare, or 'epic' type items. We will, however, have a system in place where any item can only be worn two or three times. Items can also break (get destoryed). Also, since many NPCs will not have money, there will be a system in place to dismember items for a small fraction of the orginal ingredients and the quality of them (note: small faction).

Items with BOE/P, we feel, take away from the game. However, we will have some items labled with 'solus-unus', which means that a user can only have ONE of that particular item. EQ1 tagged items with 'lore', which functioned in the same way. This does make the problem with currency a bit tougher, but it adds the 're-sale' value aspect to the market.

Blessings,

you say We alot, do you hear voices? 

Ha!

No, I am referring to the design team behind the project.

Blessings,

Originally posted by MarleVVLL

Originally posted by redcap036

Ok it's pretty late in the morning for me and I had this really stupid idea, why fight the current!

Instead of fixing the game against gold farmers and sellers, allow them to do there thing, but make it that they have to buy a licence from you first to be an official gold seller, anyone can be a farmer or try, the successful one are the ones that want to become gold sellers and  there the ones who have to come and get a license from you to have the right to sell it in game, Always have more than two gold sellers, that way you will have competitive gold prices, not to mention these guys will be the first to track down and report any illegal gold sellers.

I liked the weight idea, how cool would I be if not only did the gold farmers and sellers have to mine the gold, they would have to also hire players to help protect the gold,( from other players!) while it was being transported by cart to town for processing and storage in a bank.

Anyway just a thought. :)

While I appreciate your brain power, your first suggestion is not an option. Here are two reasons why:

Why would they buy a license if they could do it anyways for free?

If we did allow that to happen, what about selling characters and items too?

Concerning your last part, that is exactly what we are planning on doing!

We figure if money is not easy to come buy, and the money that does exist is worth a lot, then gold farmers would really have to compete for it... that will not be an easy task.

That would require the gold farmer to: Level up mining and smithing to a decent level and then have a group of buddies fight off other groups that are seeking after the gold. If they manage to get the gold, they'd have to get it back to a settlement (which could be far away) to be refined. After that, they will have to smelt it. Depending on their skill, they might not get that much gold after all.

In actuality, the main way to abtain gold in the game will be to control settlements... which can be taken over.. :-)

Blessings,

* Please keep in mind that the amounts I have used here are only examples and are up to you to set what they would be in your game. 

Originally posted by redcap036

Hi, ok please remember that any suggestion I give is really only for ingame, outside of the game there really is no chance to secure or stop this trade, ask Blizzard.

- keep in mind that all illegal gold sellers still have to be ingame to transfere gold, unless they can hack your server or something.

Why would they buy a license if they could do it anyways for free?

Because if you sell them the license which gives them the right to sell gold ingame, anyone who does not have a license would be stealing from you and breaking the EULA , as you offer gold selling as a part of your game worlds service, remember Blizzard does not sell gold, so one of the justifications that illegal gold sellers have, is that they offer a service that blizzard does not offer.

Legal gold sellers have to use a credit card service like PayPal or some such for real world payments,( Legal gold sellers are not allowed to take or use other player credit card details)

- This would be the main reason I would allow Legal gold sellers ingame and why players would use them, player credit card security and protection.
 

Legal gold sellers, have the right to transfer large amounts of gold from there ingame bank account to anther player,( via the ingame bank only( and a small fee payed to the game owners by the legal gold seller))

- Illegal gold sellers, can not transfer gold from the bank to another players ingame bank account, they have to do it by hand,( in limited amounts set by the weight rule, e.g.: only 100 to 1000 gp* Max only, then they would have to go back in the bank get the next amount and bring it back out to the buyer, who by the way has to go and bring the first lot back into the bank to deposit it in there account, then go back to the seller to get the next lot.

- So imagine if a buyer spent $20 real world for say 20,000 gp*, how annoying would that be, not mention this would be very easy to spot if this were happening ingame in a bank,( GM's and legal gold seller would spot them fairly fast) not to mention also that the Illegal gold seller has to trust the buyer not to run off with the 19000gp that they already have been given by the Illegal seller, while he /she goes back to get the last 1000gb so he can be payed there $20 for the illegal service.

If we did allow that to happen, what about selling characters and items too?

Items;

Q: What if I want to buy a item that's cost more than 1000gp?

A: You would get a letter of credit from the ingame bank,( free) which can only begiven to an npc merchants.

Q: What if I want to give/share my gold with my friend?

A: Again you would get a letter of credit from the ingame bank,( transaction fee applies (small fee)) which can only begiven to that player and gets transferred into there ingame bank account. for amounts over 1000gp.

selling characters;

- Sorry, there is really no way to tell the difference between a player who is power levelling there own character and someone who is illegally power levelling for someone else, if you figure this out, you could sell the idea to blizzard and retire for life.

* Please keep in mind that the amounts I have used here are only examples and are up to you to set what they would be in your game. 

Some issues:

If we, the design team, actually allow gold farmers to function, then that is an open door for a runied economy. It would be like if Blizzard allowed gold farmers to function.

Also, even if we did allow such a system to exist, there will still be the majority of gold farmers going against the EULA. 'Why pay for something if you can do it for free' would be their thinking.

In regards to the scenario where legal gold sellers/gms spotting illegal ones - thats the entire point of the weight system in regards to currency. If gold wieghs a lot, then people buying 'a lot' of gold will be easy to spot. Not to say some will get by the system, but it will be easy to find the rebellious ones.

In regards to selling characters, you missed my point. My point was, if we make selling gold legal, why not we just go the full way and sell characters and items too? Would it not be hypocritical not to do so? (Sorry for double negitive)

The system could work, I suppose, but it does not look good in my opinion. I mean, if I were to play a MMO and the developers took the easy route to allow gold farmers just so that they wouldn't have to deal with the issue, AND make more money, then I probably wouldn't play the game.

Blessings,

Originally posted by MarleVVLL

Originally posted by redcap036

Hi, ok please remember that any suggestion I give is really only for ingame, outside of the game there really is no chance to secure or stop this trade, ask Blizzard.

- keep in mind that all illegal gold sellers still have to be ingame to transfere gold, unless they can hack your server or something.

Why would they buy a license if they could do it anyways for free?

Because if you sell them the license which gives them the right to sell gold ingame, anyone who does not have a license would be stealing from you and breaking the EULA , as you offer gold selling as a part of your game worlds service, remember Blizzard does not sell gold, so one of the justifications that illegal gold sellers have, is that they offer a service that blizzard does not offer.

Legal gold sellers have to use a credit card service like PayPal or some such for real world payments,( Legal gold sellers are not allowed to take or use other player credit card details)

- This would be the main reason I would allow Legal gold sellers ingame and why players would use them, player credit card security and protection.
 

Legal gold sellers, have the right to transfer large amounts of gold from there ingame bank account to anther player,( via the ingame bank only( and a small fee payed to the game owners by the legal gold seller))

- Illegal gold sellers, can not transfer gold from the bank to another players ingame bank account, they have to do it by hand,( in limited amounts set by the weight rule, e.g.: only 100 to 1000 gp* Max only, then they would have to go back in the bank get the next amount and bring it back out to the buyer, who by the way has to go and bring the first lot back into the bank to deposit it in there account, then go back to the seller to get the next lot.

- So imagine if a buyer spent $20 real world for say 20,000 gp*, how annoying would that be, not mention this would be very easy to spot if this were happening ingame in a bank,( GM's and legal gold seller would spot them fairly fast) not to mention also that the Illegal gold seller has to trust the buyer not to run off with the 19000gp that they already have been given by the Illegal seller, while he /she goes back to get the last 1000gb so he can be payed there $20 for the illegal service.

If we did allow that to happen, what about selling characters and items too?

Items;

Q: What if I want to buy a item that's cost more than 1000gp?

A: You would get a letter of credit from the ingame bank,( free) which can only begiven to an npc merchants.

Q: What if I want to give/share my gold with my friend?

A: Again you would get a letter of credit from the ingame bank,( transaction fee applies (small fee)) which can only begiven to that player and gets transferred into there ingame bank account. for amounts over 1000gp.

selling characters;

- Sorry, there is really no way to tell the difference between a player who is power levelling there own character and someone who is illegally power levelling for someone else, if you figure this out, you could sell the idea to blizzard and retire for life.

* Please keep in mind that the amounts I have used here are only examples and are up to you to set what they would be in your game. 

 

Some issues:

If we, the design team, actually allow gold farmers to function, then that is an open door for a runied economy. It would be like if Blizzard allowed gold farmers to function.

Also, even if we did allow such a system to exist, there will still be the majority of gold farmers going against the EULA. 'Why pay for something if you can do it for free' would be their thinking.

In regards to the scenario where legal gold sellers/gms spotting illegal ones - thats the entire point of the weight system in regards to currency. If gold wieghs a lot, then people buying 'a lot' of gold will be easy to spot. Not to say some will get by the system, but it will be easy to find the rebellious ones.

In regards to selling characters, you missed my point. My point was, if we make selling gold legal, why not we just go the full way and sell characters and items too? Would it not be hypocritical not to do so? (Sorry for double negitive)

The system could work, I suppose, but it does not look good in my opinion. I mean, if I were to play a MMO and the developers took the easy route to allow gold farmers just so that they wouldn't have to deal with the issue, AND make more money, then I probably wouldn't play the game.

Blessings,

Ok I'll just point out that in no way Am I trying change your mind about anything to do with your game, it's all up to you in that regarded, I don't see this conversation as just being about your game, but about any future games in general, your game although is a good example for what we are talking about.

If we, the design team, actually allow gold farmers to function, then that is an open door for a ruined economy. It would be like if Blizzard allowed gold farmers to function.

- As you know Blizzard doesn't have legal or official gold sellers and there game world economy is already stuffed by illegal gold sellers, so the Question really should be, What if blizzard did have legal or official gold sellers in the game.

Also, even if we did allow such a system to exist, there will still be the majority of gold farmers going against the EULA. 'Why pay for something if you can do it for free' would be their thinking.

To protect or enforce your Eula outside the game, you would most likely need a legal team of lawyers, I can't help you with this and your in the same boat as blizzard with this one.

- far as I know, all buyers have to go to the illegal gold sellers websites to buy ingame gold, using they credit cards and if there lucky PayPal or equivalent service.

- far as I know, all gold sellers have to come ingame to pass the gold over to the buyer, ( usually via the ingame mail service or by meeting the buyer somewhere.)

I kinda feel I that I've answered this one already, the newest and best answer I could give here is a question, why would the buyer go to the illegal gold sellers website, when the legal gold dealer ingame can offer so much more of a service, security, cheaper fair prices, faster delivery of larger amounts of gold and not to mention no worries about getting banned for using the service. also if you program it right they wouldn't even need to leave the game to make the transaction.

In regards to selling characters, you missed my point. My point was, if we make selling gold legal, why not we just go the full way and sell characters and items too? Would it not be hypocritical not to do so? (Sorry for double negitive)

This would all depend on what style or type of rpg you were planing to create and how fair about the price you would be, morally I don't see a problem, it is obvesly something pepole want so there is a market for it.

The system could work, I suppose, but it does not look good in my opinion. I mean, if I were to play a MMO and the developers took the easy route to allow gold farmers just so that they wouldn't have to deal with the issue, AND make more money, then I probably wouldn't play the game.

Personally I would consider a mmo developers that allowed official gold sellers in the game or as part of there game, to be game developers that did indeed deal with the issue or try to, when I pop into  a game and see line upon line of spam ad's filling the chat channels and heaps of bots camping the spawning grounds, then I know that games developers took the easy way out and didn't deal with the issue.

Unfortunetly there are not many game developers that have dealt with the issue, so there is not much choice about it........at the moment :)

ok hope this helps.
 

Sorry for the delayed responce.. was in the middle of Kansas for the 4th (here in the states), so I couldn't respond.

In regards to professional and LEGAL gold selling teams, in my eyes, a game would have to be developed from that perspective to make it work. Otherwise, the game would get flooded by these gold sellers who now have a legal aveune to make money. it is a very dangerous move to make as a developer, so I'm unsure if anyone will ever take the bait and do it that way. However, if someone ever did, I'd be careful to watch to see how it turned out. Who knows.. maybe its the next greatest thing :-)

Blessings,

Originally posted by MarleVVLL

Sorry for the delayed responce.. was in the middle of Kansas for the 4th (here in the states), so I couldn't respond.

In regards to professional and LEGAL gold selling teams, in my eyes, a game would have to be developed from that perspective to make it work. Otherwise, the game would get flooded by these gold sellers who now have a legal aveune to make money. it is a very dangerous move to make as a developer, so I'm unsure if anyone will ever take the bait and do it that way. However, if someone ever did, I'd be careful to watch to see how it turned out. Who knows.. maybe its the next greatest thing :-)

Blessings,

Glad you've enjoyed the discussion.

Here is a point that could be ripped apart a bit more:

The difference between allowing a player to 'farm' gold with a license and a game company who sells gold.

What is the difference?

Both put money into the economy that 'grew on a tree'.

Both generate income for the company.

Only one generates money for the farmer.

Both could potenially cause a negitive stirring amoungst the community.

I may be missing something.

However, it appears that both options are VERY similar, yet only one allows for a legal income for the player. Hmm - interesting to say the least.

Blessings,

Originally posted by ironore

The most important thing is to have the design support the players in setting their own goals in both cooperative and competitive interaction with one another. 

I've read a lot and like the discussion but really have nothing to say as I'm not lazy :D

That being said not to hijack the tread I must add that this encompasses everything ANY game should be designed around and been saying the same thing in different ways for a few years now. But after reading your comment in the quoted post I will never say it any different then your example. And also if you don't mind that  line just became my new sig.

Originally posted by MarleVVLL

Glad you've enjoyed the discussion.

Here is a point that could be ripped apart a bit more:

The difference between allowing a player to 'farm' gold with a license and a game company who sells gold.

What is the difference?

Both put money into the economy that 'grew on a tree'.

Both generate income for the company.

Only one generates money for the farmer.

Both could potenially cause a negitive stirring amoungst the community.

I may be missing something.

However, it appears that both options are VERY similar, yet only one allows for a legal income for the player. Hmm - interesting to say the least.

Blessings,

Hope this helps :)