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GC Buying & Selling

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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

arrrrgh nobody is saying that PK doesn't have issues, or that any points raised weren't valid. They just aren't the issue in this thread. You can all debate what was deleted in another thread! It's not about not wanting to hear it, we just don't want it derailing this topic.

(And I'm sure after all who need to see this do see it, this stuff will be deleted too ONLY TO NOT DERAIL THE TOPIC, NOT TO SHUT YOU ALL UP OR HIDE WHAT YOU SAY)

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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.

I don't think "making the game easier" exp wise is ever suggested as a way to curb the GC trading.

 

Making in-game GC gathering easier for fighters, with fighting, is often presented as an option to reduce GC trading (the other option often presented being to make PK cheaper).

 

Hopefully this post is on-topic enough... i realise it doesn't actually list any specific pros or cons :devlish:

 

 

...actually come to think of it; of course this kind of topic ends up with PK discussion rather than just pros and cons lists; we don't need to make pros and cons list because the effects of GC trading are quite obvious. There's not going to be any revelation inducing discussion about the pros and cons of GC trading had, because everyone already knows the pros and cons.

 

Guess we should start a new thread called "What needs to be done to passively end GC buying and keep competitive PK feasible". IMO it would be a much more useful topic than this one. But of course, everything that could be said in such a topic has already been said umpteen times before, and never acted upon.

EDIT: Guess i cant know for sure if reducing gc trading is actually the goal here, perhaps it's intended to become a RL$ maker for EL, nonetheless i don't see any revelations coming from pros and cons lists.

Edited by Korrode

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its not about if gc buying is good/bad for pk but is it good/bad for EL i believe..... not who does it or why does they do it either, only is it good/bad for EL ... i believe

 

Cheers,

Whisky

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I don't post often, but here goes...

 

I think a safe and easy transaction system for player to player trades of gc/$ is a great idea.

 

Pros:

1. It will help provide money to Ent for the development of the game through the transaction fees (better word than tax imo).

 

2. It will encourage movement in the economy. Money moving around is always a good thing in any economy.

 

3. It would encourage people to harvest for gc, which in my mind is a good thing as it introduces more needed resources into this resource based game in turn allowing and encouraging more production of more items and more movement of goods and gc (money).

 

4. It allows access to shop items by those who may not otherwise be able to purchase them for whatever reason. Which would mean more purchases at the shop (and more money for Ent). This may, for example, let people participate in invasions who otherwise would not be able to because of not having rostos.

 

5. It would encourage people who would otherwise be hesitant to trade to do so because of the added safety.

 

6. It doesn't add gc to the game, only helps it move around.

 

7. It may let people spend more time doing what they want to do whether that be harvesting or mixing or fighting.

 

Cons:

 

1. There is the potential for abuse. Someone with a lot of money could pour a lot of RL $ into buying gc and then buy whatever they want in game. This mostly spoils the game for themselves in the long run.

 

2. There are technical and probably legal issues to be overcome.

Edited by Krrick

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I agree, there is going to be $ trades where there is valuables, thats mostly time in MMORPG to get to the top level asap, or to have nice and expensive items, leveled characters, anything thats worth anything to any one will be a possible $ sale.

 

Not a bad thing but a natural thing i believe, and if we can implement it into EL it would be better even because then we can keep the money in the game and its development and as suggested above, options for people to pay for stuff who don't have real money to spend become available, BOTs, rosto's etc. without having to look for gc buyers to have money to do those things.

 

 

I don't think its implementation should be a big problem:

1) Pay real money -> get x amount gc, and buy in game what you like, this adds gc to the game and $$ to the EL bank

2) Pay for shop items with gc .... pay gc to an NPC -> get the items you wanned once your order has been processed.

 

Many games have such options, I'm not sure how hard it would be to legally make this ok.....

 

 

Cheers,

Whisky

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I can't really speak to the larger pros/cons of gc selling, but I can provide some limited anecdotal evidence from personal experience.

 

I made a fair amount of gc in both the primary and secondary (salt peter) dung markets. Being mostly a supplier/producer I really didn't have anything to spend it on. So after many months of resisting, I began some limited gc sales. This had two primary benefits to me:

 

1. Providing some funds in my paypal account which I could use to by other toys (trinkets off ebay mostly).

 

2. Providing some funds with which to buy a blessed bot for the PK server (something I wouldn't have done had I not had the "free" money in paypal).

 

The benefits to others was clear as they could now buy stuff in-game that they wanted. The transaction was 100% safe to me as I required the cash up-front. I guess my in-game reputation was good enough that no one had a problem paying first. All transactions were completed without incident. Everyone went away happy.

 

So I guess the bottom line for this one particular example is that Entropy made $105 (PK char + blessing) that he would not have received had I not been able to convert gc to dollars to spend in the shop.

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Making in-game GC gathering easier for fighters, with fighting, is often presented as an option to reduce GC trading

People will still want more gcs, Korrode.

Plus, cutting into the game owner's profit is a problem alone. If Radu gets more profit, maybe he'll bring back no drop day invasions and other fun stuff.

Edited by hussam

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Making in-game GC gathering easier for fighters, with fighting, is often presented as an option to reduce GC trading

People will still want more gcs, Korrode.

Well, yeah... i mean, we suggest increasing drops 10x and they get increased ~2x... what else would you expect? :>

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its not only about gc buying, there's the other side too, the once that want to sell gc so they have $$ to buy BOTs, BOT upgrades, and $ only items from the shop, i know many of these people me included, i would never sell gc for $$ if there was an other way to get the $$ for BOTs and other stuff that can only be paid for with $$ wich i dont have allot.

 

Cheers,

Whisky

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its not only about gc buying, there's the other side too, the once that want to sell gc so they have $$ to buy BOTs, BOT upgrades, and $ only items from the shop, i know many of these people me included, i would never sell gc for $$ if there was an other way to get the $$ for BOTs and other stuff that can only be paid for with $$ wich i dont have allot.

 

Cheers,

Whisky

 

I think you are underestimating the amounts of gc and RL cash that are being transferred between players. Very frequently people are offering over 1M gc, and even up to 3Mgc for sale, in trade for cash, and at rates that the EL shop can't possibly compete with.

 

I've purchased gc from other players in the past, but usually i try to help out someone with a botblessing or a p2p payment, instead of helping a random other player to buy a new computer or waste the cash on a vacation or something. At the end of the day, Radu and Roja should be the ones making the income off EL, not just any random Joe with too much time on his hands.

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If the problems are with black market trades then make the El shop available to sell players gc and make certain item's and services buyable using in game gc's

 

Ok this would have to be monitored at first and balanced out

 

1: you will be trading directly with Ent (no worries about getting scammed)

2: If you want to power lvl you can but with Ent making the profit not other players

3: This would stop so many Char buyers (Buying up chars stripping their assets and then reselling the char for a RL$$ profit)

4: This could be good for Pker's as some shop deals could be set to help them

5: This system could also be monitored and adjusted to help the economy in EL

 

A certain amount of black market trading can be monitored. Large amounts of gc passing between chars / char buying and selling / Multiplay.

 

I know I would rather Ent make a profit out of me playing this game than other players, especial if it helps to improve the game and keeps it going

 

Just my 5 cents worth

 

Handyman

 

Edit by Aisy: Normal font please, that was a pain to read, bigger pain to edit and we have a rule about that: Rule #7 here: http://www.eternal-lands.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=13949 (next time i'll just delete the post)

Edited by Aislinn

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Even if some one was to get filthy rich from selling in-game stuff like gc...good for them, if some one buys a new computer from it, the computer seller makes money which he spends on others, etc. so it keeps money flowing only a good thing i believe.

 

This would all be ok imo IF a fair % of that $ goes to the once hosting and making the game, but since hardly any one does this out of their owns a form of control must be applied to shake it out of them, i think thats difficult to achieve, allot harder then to just block all $/gc trades...

 

What if all those millions of gc's was bought in the shop? how much gc extra would there be in-game by now?? just wondering....

 

Pro's:

1) If a form of control can be applied, there can be a x% $ for the EL Team from transactions.

2) No extra gc go's into the game.

 

Con's:

1) If its uncontrolled allot of $ go 'missing' in the EL Bank.

2) If its to be controlled allot of time and energy has to be pointed at this.

 

3) Allot of extra gc goes into the game. (Not sure how much this is a problem)

 

Cheers,

Whisky

 

EDIT:

P.S.: I don't say all games or EL should have options so others can make $ on it, personaly i'd rather see all or most $ go to the EL Team so we can all benifit from it rather then a few, but if the EL Team could benifit from players 'buisnesses' its not a bad thing perse i think.

Edited by Whisky

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GC buying/selling will always exist in all games, there is not a lot that you can do about it.. Radu will never be able to cope with the GC/etc for sale, compared to the EL shop, because there is always someone who is going to offer better, and greedy people who take it.

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Here is a crazy idea. Instead of stopping gc sales, promote it.

 

Add a #sell_gc command that will either remove X gc from your character and give you $Y credit if Entropy is buying or say "Sorry! We're at our quota for gc right now!" if he isn't. This way, nobody would have to find a buyer for their gc if they want to sell it.

 

The $Y credit could be used to buy things from the shop.

 

Entropy could sell gc on the shop page and keep 10% of the sale for himself.

 

That being said, it would make the pros and cons of gc selling a bit more extreme, but a bit re-arranged.

 

Pros:

Entropy gets more $.

People could get $ they need for themselves (this could include shop purchases and bot payments).

Cons:

A rich person could level up to a ridiculous level thanks to the gc they get from $.

The market would have a time of massive fluctuation till things settle down again.

 

On a side note, if #pay_rent bot_name $X was added, they could use their $ credit to pay their bots which could simplify things a bit in Entropy's accounting season. This way, the gc they sell to entropy could be used to get the $ to pay for the bot when Entropy sells the gc for $.

 

Please excuse me for being all over the place for a topic for this post, but I figured this different angle could affect the whole definition of the topic.

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I'm sorry, but I don't follow this:

 

Add a #sell_gc command that will either remove X gc from your character and give you $Y credit ...

The $Y credit could be used to buy things from the shop.

Entropy gets more $.

How does giving away shop-credit for "free" get Entropy more income? I can see it as a gc-sink but not as a revenue generator.

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and why would they use the command instead of keep going like it is now and be able to buy RL stuff, and shop items with sold gc? :(

 

tbh no need to discuss it, there have been multiple suggestions supported by players but nothings being done.

here a few options.

 

keep it as is

 

Pro's: everyones happy, including entropy (if not one would expect him to listen to goldbuyers motivation to buy gc and act accordingly to fix it)

 

Cons: everyone will keep complaining about the high lvl monsters training, and mini-events, and shop generates the same if not less and less income

 

or ban gc buying

pro's and cons of that..

 

pro's: there would be a handfull of players left (less criticism, good thing i guess)

 

Cons: only have a handfull of players left, less shop income.

 

or listen to the gc buyers

figure out why they buy gc and act accordingly, if the reason why is a shared problem amongst GC buyers then listen and fix it.

 

Pro's: happier playerbase, less GC sales, more shop income, less complaining, everyone happy

 

Cons: there are none, you could name something like "extra gc added" but that isnt a problem, economy always been bad (game focuses on money sinks, maybe thats why?) so a change of direction seems appropriate, it cant get worse

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Pros: I really don't see why players should answer this, after all it's safe to assume that the topic starter has a much better connection to Entropy and introducing more and more incentives for gold coin buying/selling has certainly been one of the persistent goals of the server development of the last few years, as any new "money sink" or new expensive item is most obviously a stimulus package for the gold coin trading market. So, best to ask Entropy directly why he wanted this to happen.

 

Cons: It gave an exceptionally weak excuse, which was however used anyways, to get rid of more than a fifth of the player base and pout in public, both of which may and possibly must be turned into "pros" unless they're part of a conceived trade off later on.

Since I've lost some friends and enjoyment of the game from the first and get nothing out of grown men acting the fool on their own forums and, as mentioned above, being in the dark about the official "pros" I guess I am opposed to gold coin buying/selling as it's been handled so far around here (this last being not a vote but my explanation as to why it's bad for the community).

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Its been a while since i've done this but i pretty much bought stuff from the shop for gc for quite a while.

For me personally, the pros were:

 

I could buy my Poser clothes :) It makes stuff much easier if you can afford it, thinking about it, it was a

nice income for Radu if people bought from Shop for GC

 

cons was:

i was low on money :P the people knew where your money is from, rumors go around. Which doesnt

affect the EL or Radu Economy pretty much.

 

For buying Gold from other players which they Farmed emselfs i see the problem pretty much of black marketing in it. There is no income for the Game itself, i personally would probably spend money myself every once in a while if i'd do this but i dont expect other people doing this much. I cant see any Pros for Radu or EL if own farmed ingredient get sold for $$ except the same as above, it makes stuff easier for the people who can afford it.

 

Generally i would say forbid it both as i have to say i lost alot of Fun during my Gameplay cause i didnt

need to worry much. Big Problem here is like it is with cheating, if a game gets too easy, players get bored

way faster than if they would work theirselves for it. Thats from my experience.

 

Just my oppinion,

Sincerly,

 

Fabi

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Of course save trade is a very good thing, but how much people will use it is the question if the rates are better and no transfermoney is taken on the "black marked".

 

I liked much better the idea which seem easy to implement in game that Radu selling second kind of money for dollar which can be used ingame to buy things like rosto's and other shop items from a npc. People can buy x amount of this money and use it when needed or evt sell other players for gc.

 

I dont think anything will realy work as long as it is allowed to play multiple chars at the same time. With the new events it is not possible to do anything else anymore as harvest so it is more easy to put more chars to harvest, and just watch the events and make lots of gc, and less boring as watching one char.

 

~Lan~

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It is very hard to cover such topic in a few words without writing Tirun-like essay, but I'll try to be very brief.

 

Selling / buying gc's is neither good or bad. If the game is well balanced there is no need to do that "en masse", the phenomenon of gc sale has no major inpact on player's experience and does not bring the danger of hyperinflation and ruining the economy. Some quitters sell, some newbies buy, no harm to anyone.

 

A problem arises when in order to have fun players are almost forced to buy gc's, otherwise they are stuck in grinding which is not fun in a long run. When gc's come easy you can accept grinding for exp, when exp comes easy you can grind for gc's. When you have to grind for both, you are tempted to make it easier and you buy a lot of gc's to improve "work/fun" ratio. This has nothing to do with game owner's income from the game, this is all about player's experience.

 

As to the income - comparing to other games two major factors cause it is not as high as expected - too small player base (why, see above) and quite poor offer of p2p services and shop items. I know perfectly that it is not easy to expand p2p and shop offer (and with a pretty constant player base of roughly 300-400 players it doesn't make sense), but combatting decreasing income by reducing natural gold influx is like extinguishing fire with a means of gasoline, so I doubt it will work.

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I'm sorry, but I don't follow this:

 

Add a #sell_gc command that will either remove X gc from your character and give you $Y credit ...

The $Y credit could be used to buy things from the shop.

Entropy gets more $.

How does giving away shop-credit for "free" get Entropy more income? I can see it as a gc-sink but not as a revenue generator.

 

He wouldn't be giving away the shop credit for free.

 

His idea stated that radu could then take all the gc made from shop credit sales and sell only that gc to make the rl $$ from the players that have it.

 

It would not be flooding the market with gc because it is gold coin that already exist in game.

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A problem arises when in order to have fun players are almost forced to buy gc's, otherwise they are stuck in grinding which is not fun in a long run. When gc's come easy you can accept grinding for exp, when exp comes easy you can grind for gc's. When you have to grind for both, you are tempted to make it easier and you buy a lot of gc's to improve "work/fun" ratio. This has nothing to do with game owner's income from the game, this is all about player's experience.

 

As to the income - comparing to other games two major factors cause it is not as high as expected - too small player base (why, see above) and quite poor offer of p2p services and shop items. I know perfectly that it is not easy to expand p2p and shop offer (and with a pretty constant player base of roughly 300-400 players it doesn't make sense), but combatting decreasing income by reducing natural gold influx is like extinguishing fire with a means of gasoline, so I doubt it will work.

 

true that, but i think someone thought keeping gc low would get players to buy from shop to sell in-game to get GC

and im sorry its offensive, but additions to the game get added without much thought, something gets implemented and if loads of players have (constructive or not) criticism and suggestions to improve the idea to get it used more often (speed hax and mini-events for example) then it either gets made worse, or removed.

and as other example the high level training monsters situation, it makes players play less and eventually quit, whats being done to improve it? nothing

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A premium currency (i.e., a separate currency purchased with real money) could possibly generate more money for Entropy. If I look at a rosto currently, I see $5. But if I bought $20 worth of game currency(say, 2,000 EL bucks) I've already spent the $$ so I would be more likely to pay 500 EL bucks for the same rosto. In other games, I've bought cash shop currency just to trade in-game for the equivalent of GC.

 

Of course, the cash shop items would probably need some additions that wouldn't (1) be overpowered and (2) do not wreck the manu'ers/crafters economy. Maybe things that give you a day without mini-events, 1-hour of positive astro, 10-minutes of max food, etc. Forgive me for not having items for PKers/trainers listed - I don't do it much so have no decent ideas.

 

As long as multi-playing is illegal, I think the cash for GC market could work well for the playerbase without bringing in the gold farmers.

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One problem with IRL trading is that it gives people more incentive to camp spawns/resources/etc.

 

Right now a player with nothing better to do can kill yetis or harvest silver or whatever night and day, and end up will millions of gc. Eventually they'll get board with this since they can only spend it so fast (and if they're spending it to level other skills then that is less time they can spend camping the spawn or whatever).

 

If you allow gc for $$$ then some people will just camp on lucrative resources almost 24x7 - and then contention will become an issue. You start to run into farmers and other semi-professional gamers. You could take steps to make things more inconvenient for them (depletable resourceds / etc), but this also makes the game more inconvenient for regular players. The farmers will ALWAYS have more time/incentive to get around these limits.

 

As others have pointed out, enforcement is almost impossible. You can force "balanced" trade, but what is a balanced trade? I (like many others) like to give cheap drop books to guildies to free. Somebody gave books to me which really helped me, and I pass on the favor. And "balanced" trades can only do so much - I can trade somebody 100 S2Es for 600gc and they can trade them back for 750gc, and that ends up giving me 15k gc for free - unless you fix the prices of items exactly (or very close to it), then people can transfer cash with just moderate hassle. Frankly, I hate the idea of price fixing - one of the things I really like about EL is that it is fairly close to a free economy. I think Ent feels the same way.

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I think, the main problem with gold farming is this:

 

Gold farming is done and is a business and the shop isnt in that business, but tries to make money by selling PK items, rostos.

 

Simple solution: Get into this market, sell gold coins from the shop.

 

Maybe not unlimited, maybe it could be an auction every month, where ppl can try to buy 1 million gc, in tranches of 10k gc.

 

Maybe sell only 1 million of gc per month in tranches of 10k gc for a fixed prize, and when the million is sold, ppl have to wait for the next month.

 

And there is one big advantage the EL shop has than gc sellers in game: trusfulness.

 

I highly doubt, that radu would scam his own players, and that might be the reason, why ppl might buy gold coins from the shop.

 

The next reason is, if ppl can buy gold coins from the shop, they might do it just to support the game. So the way around to buy rostos or other items from the shop and sell them in game to make money is not needed. Just sell gold coins in a limited way and ppl will buy them, i bet.

 

Some ppl mentioned to sell platinum coins from the shop, which with you can buy special stuff from NPC's who only accept platinum coins. (of course, the gc conversion into platinum coins at taverns(??) must go)

 

A nice idea to think about too, IMO.

 

Just my 2 gold coins :P

 

Piper

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