Upcoming Economy Rework and Goals
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Here's a counter suggestion: before vials, pipes, enchantments can be sold in shops, they must first be sorcelglassed, teardropped, pipetanked, prelinked to cures, charged to full, and preservation oil'd (does that even work?).
I don't want to build my own end product. This isn't IKEA. I want a nice, comfortable, and functional item I can plop down and immediately use.
Explorer (80%), Achiever (53%), Socializer (53%), Killer (13%)
Bartle Taxonomy
(test yourself)
It was noted that tinderboxes, vials, and pipes don't really matter if you can get them to be non-decay because their most basic form is an arts item which anyone with minimal investments into the skill can generate freely, sorcelglass and the like are just skins that you're effectively applying to them putting those into the more "purely creative" category.
The more relevant aspect around vials for profit isn't the vials themselves, it's the potions which you consume and have to replace. Enchantments are also a thing that you consume it's just that they have generic charges rather than specific ones like alchemy sips. Therefore, diving into it, it isn't unreasonable to expect that similarly the "vessel", jewellery in this case, not decaying could be made effectively irrelevant if the consumable is that actual profit part.
The suggestion around that specifically was ideally to just replace the part of your restocking where you recharge your cube with a different command that achieves the same thing for you but could significantly help other players that would otherwise have to track down specific enchanters and creating a reason.
I also look forward to your suggestion as to why people should stock armour and weaponry to ensure it's readily available.
There has been a lot of requests here to make things more active/engaging but then on the flip side, people want to have the option to not engage in the economy at all (mostly by having non-decay, self-sufficiency etc). Those seem pretty polar opposite goals.
Here are a few more questions that could use some answers in general.
1) Is the economy actually a problem for everyone or just a certain subset of players (like newbies etc)?
2) Should trading and economy be pushed as a viable gameplay route (ie, Merchant players that can make money as their IC identity and role)
- Is this currently an option?
3) Is there a route to allows players to both engage or not-engage as they see fit (ie Opt-in?).
- Is this a worthwhile path?
4) Would a better option just be just to nuke the economy and not even worry about it and only fix the commodity issues and call it a day?
- This option would be along the lines of just making basic supplies available in a shop. People can choose to have shops, but they'll have to understand that literally nobody has to or will engage with them outside others that choose to. The only worry about a glut of things would be to preserve db space rather than any economical issues?
There is, for instance, no remaining substantive reason for armor to exist as an object everyone is required to buy. The armor value has become a commodity, with any given set of armor working exactly well as any other to access that value. The armor value differs based on acrobatics or forging, and no longer derives from the armor!
The only reason* to continue requiring armor purchasing is "so that people need to pay forgers for armor". The only reason to force acrobats into robes is aesthetics, which... I personally find much more compelling, actually.
@Uzriel was correct in underscoring the need for a solid goal statement, however aspirational, and a general way to measure benefit vs. effort required to implement.
The ultimate goal is obviously "attract and retain players" and I think the previous theory was to give players "something to do" by forcing them to participate in grind to access other parts of the game. In other words, drive engagement by punishing people who don't engage to some level with decayed equipment.
I have a fewIdeas about what interesting goals could be, and some potential ways to implement a Lusternian economy based around them... but honestly, given the context:
4) Yes, nuke the player gold economy.
Any serious idea for resetting or making something good out of it will require a BIG effort for planning and execution, mostly without half steps. Absent the capacity to do that, nuke it, circle around and build up more gradually.
There would be some work required, not literally just deleting code... but cutting away the massive baggage of outdated expectations will be a boon and will simplify any future projects hugely.
*aside from inertia resulting from Tradition, resources needed to change, or a combination of both.
1) Newbies really struggle to find resources, especially things like people willing to tattoo. If you don't play for a while and come back to half your stuff decaying, that's painful. New player or old, there are so many things to acquire you spend a good deal of time acquiring consumables.
2) It sucks to say this, but in my view, no. I really don't see how 15 trades will be fairly balanced, not even considering the low/highmagic/class restrictions.
3) Not sure.
4) See #2, nuke it and focus on commodities and their interactions (e.g. research upkeep).
Non-decay, multiple trades, cord/tam all converge to basically bandaid over the issues on the "customer" side of the economy but they don't actually address the supply issues. More invested players can also help bandaid this by flexing to trades that newbies and the like need, but this is entirely reliant on such players being around, being able to flex when its needed, etc.
2) One, possibly two, seemingly real newbies have come into the game in Serenwilde in the past few weeks with the expectation that trading/the economy are just that, a viable gameplay route. This is something that has basically always happened with older players "correcting" that view of things.
That this happens, imo, is an indicator that there is a potential group of players out there for Lusternia. One of those recent cases there is even a concern that their roleplay might result in them being unable to generate gold, they'd set it up coming into the game because they expected to be able to invest in trading. Given Lusternia is so often praised for the roleplay side of things my experience is that we attract a wide range of potential players, the trading economy is a system for just a different group of those potential players and not fixing it up would effectively tell them they should go to one of the other IREs where this stuff is in a better state.
There are only so many people right now that are going to invest their time and energy into a text-based competitive PvP game, so shouldn't the focus be on systems that will engage the diverse range of potential people who would engage with a game with a major selling point of the roleplay experience?
These systems can also provide downtime activities for players. As someone who has had a lot of experience with that being the only person from my org logged in typically I just log straight back out again. Activities like astral/aether bashing and grimkeep work when you've got groups of people around but less so when you don't or the people around aren't up for them. A lot of these trading type activities could be more chill and relaxed than those but still encourage you to keep logged in which helps with population concerns.
3) Depends on what you mean by this. There are routes which mean players wouldn't need to personally get into trading/comms generation, etc and opt out of that side, but an economy does need customers to work.
I'd actually be really interested to see some concrete examples of games where opting out is actually even an option in a healthy and successful game. It doesn't even seem as prevalent in the other IREs? The only games which really come to mind where you're not regularly investing time and energy to stay at peak performance are ones like Black Desert or Warframe where it's an investment to get there and once you do you have other options to then also get to peak performance. (Warframes economy including a notable example of how exp progression is an economic activity)
A hurdle for Lusternia, unfortunately, is that it doesn't have a progression mechanism like these other games do so it's more obviously maintenance.
4) Loops into the above, it basically limits potential play styles/potential players.
But also, the economy is one of those things that has been put off for years and years, there's been "quick fixes" for things that could be done now but it's always seemed like something "we'll get to one day". I don't think its really great after years of players being told to have patience for it to finally get its time as a priority and instead it just gets nuked.
If there was some more in-depth looks at resolution and it just wasn't possible that could be different, but it also seems like it should be possible as we have other examples of very similar games where it seems to be working better.
edit: Also, if the nuke route was chosen, I'd want to see any development time salvaged then just reallocated towards other aspects of the game like guilds, families, and orders which similarly tend to get put off until later rather than just pulling forward the PvP project.
That would at least mitigate some of the worries of decay.
I kind of feel like the big problem is if we say "nothing is profitable enough to bother with", then the next question is, "well, relative to what?" And I think this is especially where aethertrading is really acting with negative leverage on the game. Literally, no other trade venture is as profitable. How would you even begin to try to make the other aspects of trades as profitable without severely nerfing aethertrading in kind?
Personally, I'd say relative to other gold making ventures.
Tradeskilling and shopkeeping is time that you spend not really doing anything else but producing and making available stuff that players need, with the incentive for doing that being profit. If the profit from that isn't more than other activities in the game then it's not worth it.
There are variables there, of course.
Bashing and Influence as the big two. You have the gold/min you can generate but it's also minus the cost of consumables and other equipment that you need to be able to reach that gold rate. (i.e comparisons should be on net income not gross)
However, they can really generate up to four currencies at least, you can get gold from drops, exp/essence from killing, esteem/god essence for offering/shrine stuff, and credits through dailycredits.
But if you're looking at making gold and bashing/influencing for it is more effective than trading on top of also giving exp, essence, credits etc what's the reason to choose the less effective route? Even if trading is more effective for gold generation than bashing and influencing, there are still those other reasons to pursue those activities and they should be giving enough gold to keep engaging in them.
It feels like an old mechanic that didn't properly translate across an overhaul. Making armour cosmetic and removing extra damage from abilities would make people feel more free in how they present themselves.
2. Excluding aethertrading, I am doubtful that playing as a merchant/shopkeeper is really a viable way to make money in comparison to time that could be spent bashing/questing. There's a big tendency for people to undercut driving prices down (seriously, I doubt player trades can be profitable for this reason alone, which I don't think any system can fix), or if you can catch a friend with the trade, they will generally make jewelery/clothes/forged items at no cost if comms are provided. There may be a few trades (herbs, alchemy, selling golden tonics, etc) or niches that are exceptions but not the rule.
3. No idea on number 3.
4. I personally don't have a problem with the existing systems in place or there being an economy system of some kind. My concern in a "fix" that adds a ton of new must-have upkeep items, and see point 2 for why I don't think that would actually make trades profitable.
As I've stated earlier, I personally don't view shopkeeping/trades as a money maker but as a creative outlet, so my answers are from that point of view.
Implement more things like aethertraders to give people a PvE avenue for their tradeskills to create profits as well as be a comm sink. Lusternia is too low pop to support a thriving economy simply between players without introducing annoying mechanics like high decay rates or a heavy reliance on consumables.
Remove as much as possible equipment bloat. The goal here is to get rid of as many hoops as possible to play the game.
Dissociate comm generation from village control. Punishing low-pop / losing orgs for not being able to compete is no bueno.
To that end I would make it so that all of the necessary items like vials/enchantments/etc. are inherently held by players, perhaps folded into skillsets which unlocks them without needing the actual items, then have the trade-created items reskin and allow for customization. For example, players could drink/smoke from the (liquid)rift without the requirement of a vial, but with a teardrop sigil you can link a vial to specific liquids so that the sip message will use your custom sorcel.
Trades currently are not a viable gold-making route compared to time invested. The one exception i would say is aethertonics/candies/scarves for those few that are very popular - but also many of those items are priced below the cost goop is otherwise valued at because of how easily people can get goop for free.
At present it doesn't feel viable to be a merchant first and whatever class/guild second, because of time needed to craft and source comms (shops sold out of fruit? You can grind 4 an hour!).
Trades being gated is more annoying on some than others - there's often tailors and bookbinders about for example and people seem more likely to keep them active for the trans ability, but having to switch out of low magic so i could take up tinkering just to make some avarice enchantments because there was literally none around was annoying, let alone the people who class flex just because there's a need...wow. Lusty is a game and i feel people should be able to play their fun class and that there really shouldn't -have- to be a sacrifice on part of someone's fun because tattoos are needed, for example. This char went almost an entire year to get tattoos because a) i would prefer the aesthetics of my own city's cartel designs and b) i didn't actually want to put someone else out by asking them to classflex just for me.
Slight tangent but also relevant - the trades who can't utilise the aethertraders (anything but cooking, tailoring and jewellery) are at a huge disadvantage to generating aethergoop. This is definitely not newbie friendly and people are then picking trades that can utilise the system here, rather than what is necessarily what they'd enjoy the most or more beneficial for their class, eg forging.
if comms were able to be bought as needed, there would also no longer be a need to hoard stockpiles. There could be a base cost for commodities, which would help with shopkeepers pricing goods - artifacts will allow some to price better or produce in bulk but everyone starts on the same foot, whether you're casual and time poor or online for 12 hours grinding.
And i'll say it again - i hate decay. My runes are spread over all of my enchantments deliberately to cut down on my decay.
Removing conveniences like aetherplex shopping can slow prices sliding, but it's otherwise always going to result in the pricing direction we know and love. No amount of gold sinking will revalue gold. Possibly there's some kind of solution involving a reliable way of using gold to buy experience/essence or other bashing benefits directly, but that eventually runs into the issue of flagging interest in essence "economy" too.
I really think that player to player gold economy should be all but scrapped (or ignored), at least for a while. It's not fixable without reimagining the assumptions about economics that underpin it.
Go ahead and make necessary items like cures, armor, weapons obtainable from npcs. Then there's more space to work on the fun, voluntary parts of trades, revamp the trade skills, etc.
Basically, the answers to these questions are getting divided down the middle of the vocal player. On one side are those who would like to see trades as a viable RP identity and money making path. A true newbie is most likely going to assume this is the case based on the fact that the game is pitched as the RP IRE and one would assume that the roleplay space of trader involves making lots of gold. This also gives players who just are not as interested in PvP a viable outlet and a way to feel like they're engaged in the game.
Overhaul the economy so that it doesn't rely on players to be customers in order to make money, or so that there is no viable path to permanently and completely opt out.
Maybe carve out a similar system to aethertraders or a more easily accessible but less rewarding space for newbies that allows for trader characters to sell "orders" to NPCs with some regularity at a hiked up price just for gold and some essence (or experience for non-demigods) instead of it all being about goop. Maybe they request partially refined items, herb packets, decorations etc.
This does just become more of a wellspring for gold but it opens up a path that some players seem to want to go down. Prolific traders could be rewarded in dailycredits, rankings and so on, maybe places in orgcredits and so on, so they feel like they're contributing to the success of their org.
"Hallifaxian goods are flooding the market, raising their reputation throughout the basin."
Some people just want more mini-systems and ways to interact with the game in meaningful ways. Timequakes really brought life to the basin, more little frequent, constant events would be a lot of work, but they'd make things seem like a real living world.
Because we've already been down that path and it still leaves a wide open gap that doesn't feel right. Tradeskills still can't make money, but are still 'required' until you spend enough goop and credits to opt out over time. It's not commodities or skill gating that's holding back tattoists, it's the fact that someone needs tattoos all of once and will likely only pay you a pittance for your time that you could have instead spent bashing to make more gold, xp, and DC. People don't go chef to sell any of their mechanically beneficial platters, kabobs, and treats, they do it to refine 34 pies for Gioia or so they can herofete for free, or just to sell a bowl of ice cream every few weeks for the arrpees. It's another can-kick to push the issue down the road for a few months until the cracks are exposed again. If tradeskills aren't meant to matter, then let's clear out the stuff that makes it look like they do. If they are meant to matter, let them.
Dissatisfaction with the economy was a big part of the forums blow up a few years back, for example. These same core issues of profitability and availability were still present then as they are now. And, as always really (even now lets be honest), when players started actually talking about how those issues could be resolved other players started arguing that it only needed a minor or quick fix.
Goop wares, increased scarcity of commodities, and aethertrading were among those quick fixes that would allegedly avoid investing a lot of time and work into fixing the economy. They were meant to try to bring value to trading and to address item availability, but all those quick fixes have really just added up to the situation we're in now.
It seems pretty clear by this point that quick fixes just don't work in this context and worse, they may have not only actually consumed time for their creation but potentially also have just made the actual rework require even more time.
A pretty simple example is that goop generation wasn't a part of the economy back then where now a rework has to also consider goop generation mechanisms possibly requiring additional coding time to replace/enhance aethertrading separate from aspects addressing those initial issues.
The quick fix arguments are also typically responsible for inflating the number of consumables that exist because it was quicker/easier to make new stuff or have promotional items significantly more readily available than invest time into the broader level issues. Pipetanks, teardrop sigils, sorcelglass, etc seem to be all just quick fixes to give those trades something to sell in shops, for example.
edit: In the end, Lusternia has always managed to attract players who have wanted to invest in trading. Dissuading newbies early on from the view that trades can be profitable is still happening regularly enough that it should be rather concerning given other views that we aren't really getting many true newbies.
Even if you made it abundantly clear on the website that the game wasn't for people interested in that, let's be honest you're still going to get people asking the question and then being disappointed when the answer is no.
Meanwhile, resolving it would ideally broaden the types of players Lusternia can appeal to rather than limiting such.