New World's latest blog post is a long one, but it tackles many different points of issue with the MMO from Amazon. Specifically, the team at New World talk about exploits, the current state of the economy and much more in this community update.
To get the big thing out of the way first, New World's blog post talks the in-game economy. Many players have felt the pinch in what has looked like a deflated economy in the MMO since its launch, however Amazon seemingly disputes that claim. The post states that more gold is actually being earned than is going out - though that could simply be due to the fact that on many servers players went back to the barter and trade system versus using the in-game markets due to the feeling of deflation - and with the addition of Outpost Rush and fixing the Azoth Staff Bug, Amazon feels certain that the increase in gold at level 60 will work itself out.
"Touching on the current state of the economy: From a data standpoint, the economy is performing within acceptable levels. All servers are creating more money than is being removed, and by a good margin. However, the economy is tighter at the end-game currently. When we look at surplus income generated by level, it’s very high in the 1-35 level range, decent in the 40-59 range, and gets narrow at 60. This means that as more players get to level 60, this will start to put more pressure on the economy."
Amazon states they are watching this closely and if the in-out dynmanic (amount of gold into the player versus out via the various gold sinks) becomes negative, the studio will take action to correct this. The team is also increasing gold earned in Expeditions starting with Starstone, as well as reducing durability loss in PvP, reducing attribute respec costs, and extending the taxation periods on housing without raising the rates.
Trading posts are now linked as well - and this is huge. Before each settlement had its own economy and trading posts were separate. This meant the more trafficked regions (*cough* Everfall *cough*) were simply more profitable and easier to maintain than say, Ebonscale Reach or other late game areas. As a result, companies that owned those far-flung regions were unable to afford maintenance costs, upgrade and project costs and taxes due to the lack of traffic and trade going on there.
Now the trade posts are linked, meaning you'll be able to list and buy things anywhere in the world - though the fees and taxes associated with the transaction will be dictated by the region you're currently within. This should go a long way towards spreading the wealth, so to speak, to all corners of Aeternum, making each region worth interacting with the economy within.
"All Trading Posts will been linked. This change was made to strengthen the economies less traveled territories, and ensure item availability in all territories.
- Fees for buy and sell orders are defined by the Settlement that you’re posting them from.
- Transaction Taxes on purchases you make are defined by the Settlement in which you are making the purchase.
- Items listed in sell orders that expire are returned to the Settlement from which they were posted.
- It is no longer possible to place items on the trading post for 28 days. The maximum is now 14 days."
The blog post also addresses the exploits within the economy and gold farming that is going on. To restrict the ability of gold sellers to operate, New World is now restricting trade between players till you reach level 10, or your account is more than 72 hours old. This should hopefully cut down on the ability of farmers to trade currency and sell in-game gold.
The economy has seen quite a few exploits as well, as we've reported in the past. These should be cleared up, but the team took a second to apologize once again for needing to shut down trade in New World to do so. The team reiterated as well that financial loss, especially settlement maintenance, will be made up for with a "make good."
"Regarding Coin and Item dupes, we apologize for disabling the player traded economy. Players found a Coin/Item dupe bug when player trading and were exploiting it heavily (they will be penalized for that behavior). We took immediate steps to mitigate the long term economic impact, by disabling trades in the short-term, while we worked on addressing the root cause. It was not a decision that was made lightly, but we feel the ability to trade and improve settlements is an important, and fun aspect of our game we aim to preserve. We have permanently banned players who exploited the Coin/Item dupe issue."
New World is also addressing war lag during the 50v50 battles and how it plays, specifically with how the war turns into a zerg or a spamfest. Amazon talks about their plans to "preserve balance," and will be updating in a future War design devblog. Additionally, they touch on Invasions and how players can feel when companies remove them from participation. One of the key areas of New World's design is that players control the battle, which also means that they control who is fighting in the melee. This could lead to some players feeling as thought they don't have a fair shot at actually joining one of these events, with a majority of players on the outside looking in consistently during Invasions (and wars for that matter). Amazon is looking into potential solutions, though doesn't really have anything more to share at this time.
You should check out the full post as it goes into greater detail about how the client-server relationship works (Amazon once again reiterating that the game is not client authoritative), as well as moderation efforts and much more.
