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GC Buying & Selling

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I know Entropy has made his view clear on gc farmers and their affect on his income and EL development.

 

I also know that people buying/selling gc are incolved in high risk transactions.

 

What do you think are the pro's and con's of people being able to buy & sell gc in EL?

 

Let's start with these assumptions:

1. The only gc only comes from the game like it does now (not the shop selling gc and adding to the game).

2. EL is paid a 'tax' on the transactions (to partially offset Ent's lost income).

 

This is not are you for or against it! This is what is good or bad about it for EL & the community?

 

This is a discussion on the concepts involved ... flames, rants, and votes will be considered off topic and deleted!

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whats good about it :

 

if you have lots of spare cash sitting around you can power level your way from 0-100 in any skill within a few months depending on how many hours you grind of course

 

another pro would be ( if I understand your suggestion correctly ) that nobody could get ripped off as all transactions go through the game somehow

 

another pro would be perhaps the mini events would get scrapped :whistle: ???

 

whats bad about it for the El community : the first point about people with lots of spare cash, somehow theres a feeling that spending 100s of $$ levelling your character is like cheating in a way - as other people sit and do the long road of gather / mix / train or gather / sell / train. The cash for GC thing negates the longest part of the system, gathering, hence the speedy levels. Kinda sucks.

 

Plus, if you are going to sell GC through some sort of NCP , you are going to have to keep an eye on the current GC - $$ transaction rate unless you plan on banning unofficial GC sales ? Assuming thats right if it was me i'd just cut straight to banning all GC sales and be done with it. Someone in a previous thread about GC sales compared WoW to El and how hard it is for WoW to ban all the GC sellers , but thats because there are millions of chinese workers doing it as full time employment, it doesnt compare to Els playerbase of 7-800 peeps ( still be more work banning it, but in return would not Cash $$ sales for items increase ? )

 

ramble ramble

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Pros: Saves hours \o/

 

Cons: Ent gets nothing and people get scammed

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There's probably a lot of pros and cons in a lot of areas, but i'll just mention those that most affect/annoy me (PK related ofc):

 

EL has a lot of expensive equipment and consumables in it, items that usage of all the time is supposed to be "unsustainable".

(i.e. PK'ing often and always using acc/eva pots, always using bronze swords, always using dragon armors and/or orange spam gear and always replacing it very quickly after it breaks, etc.)

The problem I find is that it's not actually unsustainable for a couple of types of people;

1. People who can bare to do an extreme amount of hours of tedious, boring and repetitive resource gathering tasks, and are willing to do many more hours of that than PK'ing.

2. People who buy gc.

 

So for me, the Cons are:

GC Selling offers one way for people to PK using a method that's supposed to be unsustainable.

 

...and the Pros are:

GC Selling offers one way for people to PK using a method that's supposed to be unsustainable.

 

I don't like competitive PK costing as much as it does, and GC selling is one method that's allowing people to do it, so in that respect, it's bad.

 

On the other hand, so long as it is physically possible for competitive PK to have such a high cost, GC selling is great, because if i've got the choice of doing 5 hours of repetitive resource gathering tasks to be able to do 1 hour of competitive PK, or doing 1 hour of RL work and earning enough RL$ to buy the gc for 1 hour of PK, i definitely pick the RL$.

 

1 hour (work) for 1 hour (pk), or 5 hours (work) for 1 hour (pk)... easy choice, no?

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As far as I'm concerned the issue should be what's best for EL. What's best for EL is having Ent making a living from it. If he can't then we are all screwed out of a darn good game. Having said that, the one and only person who should have the right to sell gc is Ent...all others should be banned. Would it piss me off if some newbie bought millions of gc and used it to level themselves? Yes it would. Would it piss me off to the point that I'd quit EL? No. GC buying isn't even necessary. You could just as easily get a bot and load it with shop bought items. Ent gets paid and we get free EL.

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The good thing about being able to buy/sell gc for $ is that when I was unable to spend my own real life money on this game I managed quite successfully to get my character p2p for life, and a bot with 1 blessing. Without being allowed to buy $ with ingame gc this would not have happened, and I think that there is nothing wrong with what I have done, after all the $ that I got from selling the gc went straight to Radu as it was used in the EL shop.

 

The problem comes when gc is sold for real life money (whether it be for dollars, euros or real money) which is then spent on something outside the game (i.e. not in the EL shop). At that point a very real value is being deducted from EL, and I am sure the effects on the game are real too, as Radu doesn't benefit from it, and so the motivation for him to improve EL and keep it free to play are reduced.

 

In the last year my circumstances have changed dramatically and I am now able to spend my own money on this game (not a lot as I R poor IRL), which has only been a few hundred dollars worth. A couple of p2p for life for a few friends a bot with double blessing and some efe, ele and rostogol stones.

 

I don't buy gc to level really fast, as I don't see the point, but then I find I can enjoy playing EL and interacting with the community without having to level really fast.

Edited by Ringil_Oddsocks

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People buy GC for the sole reason: some stuff in EL is just too expensive and they'd rather spend that 100$ for 750kgc or so (current rate).

If people could get a better rate from radu ofc they'd buy from him, the only reason he isn't making these sales is because people are offering better rates elsewhere. and for some people, the risk of being scammed isn't a factor to a smart buyer.

 

It is bad for radu's income, but take a guess who buys more then 80% of the GC.

PKers do, lower the cost of competitive PKing and you've got a good long term solution.

 

On the other hand, so long as it is physically possible for competitive PK to have such a high cost, GC selling is great, because if i've got the choice of doing 5 hours of repetitive resource gathering tasks to be able to do 1 hour of competitive PK, or doing 1 hour of RL work and earning enough RL$ to buy the gc for 1 hour of PK, i definitely pick the RL$.

 

1 hour (work) for 1 hour (pk), or 5 hours (work) for 1 hour (pk)... easy choice, no?

 

There is prolly a good reason radu doesn't sell GC from the shop. I think it's because if more ppl bought from him and he is just spawning it into the game that could be very bad for the economy.

Edited by bigkav

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Pro's:

 

Allows people to concentrate on leveling on the skill they want to, and not being forced to grind on a second skill to be able to afford to grind on the first.

Since grinding in any mmo can get extremly boring, only having to grind on what you choose to is a major plus

 

 

 

 

Con's:

 

If the GC comes from 3rd party's rather than the EL shop, removes income from the game

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Certainly gold coin buying exists.

 

I recently sold 560k for a shop item at a ratio of 8:1, now this type of gc's selling benifits the person that bought them, and the EL shop. I see no issues with this type of selling.

 

Recently I tired playing a game called regenum online. There they have a two currency system. Gold coin, and a perimum. The premium currency could only be bought from the game website. And was put directly into the players bank when the transactioin was approved. There where npcs that sold all the shop items and services, and only took this premium currency. This premium currency could also be traded amounst players. Something to take a look at.

 

1 of the cons of buying and selling gc's amounst players is the risk of getting scammed. Each trasaction has a considerable amount of risk for each party.

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If such a tax were imposed on transactions aside from those for items or services from the EL shop, I think this could work*. The tax (if a large enough percentage) would act effectively like a subsidy for shop purchases, making them relatively less expensive, and thus financially worthwhile. This may be what is needed to bring player purchases back to the EL shop, rather than what is essentially black market purchases.

 

* This can only work if illegal multiplaying rules are strongly enforced, otherwise everyone and their mother will make farming alts, deal with alternative currency (e.g. iron ore), and evade the tax time and time again. This issue can be minimized by enforcing a rule of one player per person (not IP) at a time, which has been previously rejected.

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There they have a two currency system. Gold coin, and a perimum. The premium currency could only be bought from the game website. And was put directly into the players bank when the transactioin was approved. There where npcs that sold all the shop items and services, and only took this premium currency.

Yeah lots of games have this, perhaps worth considering for EL.

 

Too bad about the unbalanced classes or Regnum would be pr0 RvR game.

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i will only buy shop items for people. i will never buy from farmers no matter the rate. i believe the best way for the shop to keep up with farmers is to offer more/ better items thats are only availiable from shop. like when the thermal serp was by far the best weapon and only availiable from shop. now that sword is barely competative so not much demand. there will always be people willing to buy shop items for people that want to pay in gc so there should not be any complaints from people who refuse/cant spend any money. any since i know some alts work to sell their gc just so they can rebuy for their main to bypass the multi rule, at worst the alts are woring to buy from shop.

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Pro's: a way to enjoy the game without hours of endless boring grinding

 

cons: takes $ away from shop i guess

 

just farmed yeti with an OS, 27k gc in 5-6 hours, enough for 1 rosto... which is good in 1 invasion.

its not easy to farm yeti since spawns mostly taken and 1 yeti isnt worth it, keeps gc low, so yeah buying gc is good

 

As far as I'm concerned the issue should be what's best for EL. What's best for EL is having Ent making a living from it. If he can't then we are all screwed out of a darn good game. Having said that, the one and only person who should have the right to sell gc is Ent...all others should be banned. Would it piss me off if some newbie bought millions of gc and used it to level themselves? Yes it would. Would it piss me off to the point that I'd quit EL? No. GC buying isn't even necessary. You could just as easily get a bot and load it with shop bought items. Ent gets paid and we get free EL.

 

it is neccesary, and getting a bot and load it with shop bought items is way more expensive then gc buying.

besides, if we suggest something to make gameplay better for a group of players and get called greedy fucks... guess where money wont be spend.

 

if i didnt have to wait hours for a spawn and could grind gc normally there wouldnt be a need to buy gc for me (same applies to a group of others), i could save the $ and spend on rosto's from shop.

if you wait hours for a spawn you have 0% chance of losing your rost in that time, a loss for Ent, but hey were greedy fucks suggesting something that works out for both players and shop sales, but i guess he's happy with the income atm

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Adding a tax to transactions is just epic fail, no way in hell people will hand their irl money over when there is no way for the admins to know the exact amount or if the transaction even occured at all.

 

It isnt a concern for us that Radu is getting less money. No offence intended, but he is the one making the rules. The administrators can forbid irl trading like most other mmorpg's have, and the store would probably be used more.

 

Longterm fighting probably should get a little more income, and pking should become cheaper. That said, making pking cheaper doesnt mean that armors and essences needs cheaper ingredients. The problem is rostogol stones.

 

X has a rostogol stone, he can wear the strongest gear in game. That means that Y has to also get expensive gear to match X. Someone dies, they lose rosto, buy new, repeat. Tedious no? If people risked to drop their stuff it would be risk vs reward using expensive stuff. People would use cheaper armor for pking, manufacture players would get a great demand for the old school gear and pkers would be able to pk for less money.

 

And oh, a skilled pker would probably get more kills than deaths. Loot anyone? :icon13:

Edited by HeLLRaiZeR

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Pros: Same things listed above about saving time, blah blah blah.

 

cons: Less income for radu, cause for updates like mini events.

 

 

There are a limited amount of solutions to fix this...

 

1. Force fair trades similar to that used in runescape (I said before but nobody seems to like even though it has been proven to stop rl trading)

 

2. Get rid of no drop maps along with overpowered armors/weapons and lower the cost of rostogol stones via the shop.

 

3. Give actual incentive to buy from the shop like running random specials on certain items that are not purchased much.

 

4. Allow people to multi play with alts. (I know a lot of people have a problem with this but it would cut a lot rl trading I would think.)

 

 

EL is a great game and I fell in love it but it seems like rl trading has made radu very unhappy considering all the work he put in. I also think that in this case radu should try something new at least to test it out and see how it works for him and others.

 

If changing a few of the current procedures starts to ruin the game he has the power to change things back before things get out of hand but we will never know unless he tries.

 

This following quote was in a article I read recently...

 

RuneScape content boss Imre Jele says that those of you buying MMO currency are effectively funding digital organised crime, not to mention cheating and ruining the experience for everyone else.

 

Speaking exclusively to Eurogamer about the growing problem of illegal real-world trading, Jele said, "The biggest concern about illegal real-world trading is - sorry for this example as I know it's not politically correct - it's a bit like prostitution.

 

"It's not necessarily the prostitution which is a problem, although you might have moral problems with it. The real problem is the organised crime that's built around prostitution; the human trafficking, the drugs, etc.

 

"And that's the same with illegal real-world trading. The problem comes in when they start doing other illegal activities. One of the biggest is the use of stolen credit cards," he added.

 

Apparently players can make more in-game gold if they shell out for a GBP 3.20 monthly subscription. This puts a huge financial burden on developer Jagex and carries significant legal ramifications as well.

 

RuneScape is a web-based massively-multiplayer online role-playing game that boasts around 6 million active players around the world. It recently took measures to stamp out real-world trading by banning unbalanced trades where one person typically gives another a pile of gold or a valuable item for nothing in return - because they have paid for it in real-life.

 

The results have been very positive, according to Imre Jele, but he is at a loss as to why more do not follow his example but continue to provide a breeding ground for the multi-million-pound illegal real-world trading business.

 

"I have friends all over the industry and I know they don't try do anything about this, which to me is shocking," continued Jele. "It seems to me that the bigger half of the MMO industry puts their heads under the sand and pretends like it is not happening."

 

He feels real-world trading is out of control, and that even the likes of Blizzard with World of Warcraft will get to a point where it cannot control the amounts of money changing hands illegally.

 

To beat it, the nature of MMOs will have to change. Imre Jele believes new persistent worlds will be designed with real-world trading in mind. And one option available is to simply make your experience so much fun that no one feels the need to "cheat" the grind in the first place.

 

"To be honest, I think instead of real-world trading, games have to be designed in a way that they provide enough fun while you are getting somewhere; if I am incapable of providing you with enough fun while you collect that 1000 gold for a steed, then the game is not good enough," concluded Jele.

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Thats one way to look at it, there's plenty games that are builld on real money interactions, making it easy and safe for people to trade and pay with real money for in-game items. So i would not say its bad perse, and yes where there's real money people get weird idea's and start criminal activities thats the nature of people i guess, and it happens every where if it involves money :)

 

Having a 2nd system for real money into EL looks like a huge programming job and will not likely be done, altho it can produce a good income for EL wich will benifit all players.

 

I always liked it in EL that you can start a small buisness within the game for some real money, opening potential new options like the countless BOTs we have now and few other options, stopping this creativity by banning all 'off-side' trading could be cutting our own throuth.

 

But maybe that time is over and we need to focus on keeping the game alive and kicking by generating a more reliable income, banning all gold sellers & buyers would probably be the best way, but then make it possible that you can 'sell' gc to the game for paid for options, ea. pay for BOT's and shop items that are now unavailable for gc because this is imo the main reason people 'need' to buy gold from gold sellers.

 

EDIT: This will however probably cut down the $ income for EL and so we end up in a vicious circle where we have to ask ourselves do we need to protect people by making the game so that their safe from getting scammed, or spend their last $ on game items rather than food, or maybe get enslaved into making $$$ on EL :D

 

EDIT 2: Sorry things keep popping up :D i think allot of money is made by teh EL team because of $$ buying/selling allot of BOTs and BOT upgrades are paid in this way i believe and we would have allot less of them if we couldn't buy/sell gc for real money, ea. allot less income for EL.

 

 

Cheers,

Whisky

Edited by Whisky

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As I sayd in another thread, the base idea of make gc buyable between players with a $ tax on the transition could be a solution for a lot of problems, like:

 

- gc farming: this will not be considered anymore a game problem, 'cause people who make money with EL will pay a tax to the game maintenance (the gc farming can be a way of enjoy the game - like the pk game style and so on - ...but in the actual system if you make the gc farmer you are an enemy of the EL economy) like it happen in the real life in every society.

- black market emerging: this will allow the pratice of the "black market" to be naturally downsized, avoiding also the scams due to the non protected money/gc transitions

 

of course the introduction of the possibility to exchange gc per $$ inside the game must carry with it the ban for who pratice the black market outside the official channel, that could be more work for the mods.

 

the only negative side of this system can be the fact that not all the players will put their money to the game, and this will mean that some players will rise up much fastly than other ones, but this is what really happen with the black market system (or with who buy items on the official EL shop), so it's better to legalize it...or not? I dunno how complex the implementation of a sort of "bank" can be...of course systems like paypal have to be used mainly...

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Here are my views on GC buying/selling:

 

1. It definitely helps PK. Pkers can buy gcs and use that to replace the armor they lose because of breakages/broding. However, people are greedy and will always raise the $/gc price or whatever so this is not a good method on the long run.

 

2. GC buying creates an unfair advantage because there are always people like me who don't have paypal in their countries or simply don't want to put money in the game.

 

3. There have been suggestions that making the game easier will eliminate GC buying/selling. This is simply not true for many reasons. If Radu makes the game easier, people will still be greedy and want even faster experience. If you need quick overall points, there's always A/D. I'm not much of a fighter and I've done 3 million overall in one day before.

 

4. People who want to buy GCs can buy rostogols and EFE from EL shop and sell it ingame instead of feeding people who have no real life skills but instead abuse some online game to generate $$.

 

I suggest Radu finds a way to get rid of people who make actual US dollars profit from EL and instead promotes buying stuff from EL shop and selling it ingame for gcs.

Edited by hussam

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A comment to those of you complaining that the PK posts are being deleted:

What is right or wrong about PK is NOT the topic of this thread. Stating that it helps PK is one thing, but to then debate PK is taking this off-topic. If you want to discuss PK's pros and cons, you can start another topic. Nobody is telling you all that PKers are not the majority of gc buyers, or even saying you can't say that. We just are not looking for PK analysis here, that was not what the question asked is about.

 

This is the question that was asked, this is what Learner is looking for answers to.

<snip>

What do you think are the pro's and con's of people being able to buy & sell gc in EL?

<snip>

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A comment to those of you complaining that the PK posts are being deleted:

What is right or wrong about PK is NOT the topic of this thread. Stating that it helps PK is one thing, but to then debate PK is taking this off-topic. If you want to discuss PK's pros and cons, you can start another topic. Nobody is telling you all that PKers are not the majority of gc buyers, or even saying you can't say that. We just are not looking for PK analysis here, that was not what the question asked is about.

 

This is the question that was asked, this is what Learner is looking for answers to.

<snip>

What do you think are the pro's and con's of people being able to buy & sell gc in EL?

<snip>

 

 

They key words there are "WHAT DO YOU THINK"

 

How are they to tell you what they think about their experiences buying/selling gold coin is when from their end it comes strictly from a PK aspect?

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A comment to those of you complaining that the PK posts are being deleted:

What is right or wrong about PK is NOT the topic of this thread. Stating that it helps PK is one thing, but to then debate PK is taking this off-topic. If you want to discuss PK's pros and cons, you can start another topic. Nobody is telling you all that PKers are not the majority of gc buyers, or even saying you can't say that. We just are not looking for PK analysis here, that was not what the question asked is about.

 

This is the question that was asked, this is what Learner is looking for answers to.

<snip>

What do you think are the pro's and con's of people being able to buy & sell gc in EL?

<snip>

 

 

They key words there are "WHAT DO YOU THINK"

 

How are they to tell you what they think about their experiences buying/selling gold coin is when from their end it comes strictly from a PK aspect?

Yes, what do you think about buying and selling gc, not what do you think about PK and it's pros and cons?

An "appropriate" answer would be something like "A pro is for PKers to be able to devote more time to pking and less time to having to earn their gc in a skill they do not like". The inappropriate part is to then state what is wrong with PK and how you want to change it. That belongs in another topic.

Look, this is learner's thread, and he wants answers to his specific question, not about pk. Again, if you want to start a new topic, feel free.

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With all due respect I have seen more input from the deleted post than you have had in any of yours here.

 

If this is learner's thread and he is making the decision as to what he feels is on or off topic then why are you posting and not him?

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With all due respect I have seen more input from the deleted post than you have had in any of yours here.

 

If this is learner's thread and he is making the decision as to what he feels is on or off topic then why are you posting and not him?

It's not for you to decide what information Learner is looking for, or what is valuable and what isn't. You have acquired quite the habit of moderating these forums. Please stop or you will lose your posting permissions again.

And I am posting for him because he is not here right now. We have discussed this topic, discussed what he is looking for, and what he considers off-topic. Not only has he asked me to keep an eye on this thread and remove whatever is not specifically related to his question, I would anyway as a co-admin.

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A comment to those of you complaining that the PK posts are being deleted:

What is right or wrong about PK is NOT the topic of this thread. Stating that it helps PK is one thing, but to then debate PK is taking this off-topic. If you want to discuss PK's pros and cons, you can start another topic. Nobody is telling you all that PKers are not the majority of gc buyers, or even saying you can't say that. We just are not looking for PK analysis here, that was not what the question asked is about.

 

This is the question that was asked, this is what Learner is looking for answers to.

<snip>

What do you think are the pro's and con's of people being able to buy & sell gc in EL?

<snip>

 

 

They key words there are "WHAT DO YOU THINK"

 

How are they to tell you what they think about their experiences buying/selling gold coin is when from their end it comes strictly from a PK aspect?

Yes, what do you think about buying and selling gc, not what do you think about PK and it's pros and cons?

An "appropriate" answer would be something like "A pro is for PKers to be able to devote more time to pking and less time to having to earn their gc in a skill they do not like". The inappropriate part is to then state what is wrong with PK and how you want to change it. That belongs in another topic.

Look, this is learner's thread, and he wants answers to his specific question, not about pk. Again, if you want to start a new topic, feel free.

 

I dont want to dig into deep over this,

 

But just out of curiosity How many non pkers buy gc's from other players?

 

I would guess close to zero? Not sure really.

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wel the truth hurts but no reson to delete it no now it looks like a thread where u only can post the things u wanna hear and else it et deleted so makes this kinda a useless thread but still <3 u ais

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