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Crafting and the economy
Posted: 21 Jul 2013 07:09 AM |
There was a discussion in the "Would you like to play a game" thread about the economy.
Other thread here: http://vives.dyndns.org/vives/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PageIndex=2&PostID=65046#65130
Rather than threadjack, I thought I'd expand my thoughts out here.
The problem is that, essentially, economies in MMORPGs/PWs do not exist. With notable exceptions, such as EVE Online. This is even more true of NWN, where supply and demand are not factors, and no matter more much gold is in the money supply you can always buy a longsword for 15gp, a masterwork longsword for 315 gp, and a +1 longsword for 1315 gp.
This means that as PCs get richer, and they do get richer- especially with crafting- all that happens is that (Wait for it!)... they get richer. It requires DM events or relatively unusual circumstances to have players bidding against each other, and actually getting an economy going.
This is even more complicated with CNR style crafting where wealth is constantly respawning, waiting to be harvested by eager PCs. This would lead to demand pull inflation (Too much money chasing too few goods) in a real* economy. In NWN it leads to... nothing, except PCs getting richer.
It is natural, therefore, that solutions focus on making it hard for PCs to be rich, or making them poorer. Script-based taxes, for example. Adding weight to gold coins so that it's hard to carry your 417,936gp around with you everywhere you go. We saw some really neat ideas in the other thread about guard inspections, banking, etc. (I agree wholeheartedly with whoever said that anything which incentives carrying and trading gems rather than gold would be a good idea. I love that idea!)
This would be the first part of my suggestion. Don't get fancy. Set a hard cap on the number of GP anyone can carry. Let's say 5,000gp, which is 100 lbs of gold. That's a lot of gold to carry around, and works as a cap. Then, however players want to get around this- gems, letters of credit, etc- support that.
I'd suggest avoiding banks. The problem with a bank is that forcing people to use a bank either A) Means that you run plots involving the bank which will always seem to players punitive and unfair, because you deny them access to your money or B) Trying to avoid that, you don't do anything with the bank and you might as well just let people carry all the money around. Because a perfectly liquid letter of credit item worth 100gp and 100gp in the inventory are functionally identical, so you've invested a lot of effort into achieving quite little.
Anyway, I'm really here to muse on CNR and the economy. The rest is just window dressing. The key is to control how crafting can really throw off the economy by making players rapidly very wealthy. This occurs because of continually spawning resources, which can be farmed. Much like real life! But the value of these goods does not go down when there are lots of them and no-one needs them. So you can keep farming. And when you and your friend both have thousands of gold pieces from farming, the merchant selling you seeds doesn't charge you more because he knows you can pay. See previous comments about people just getting richer.
The solution I would suggest is a diminishing marginal gold return from CNR crafting, server wide. That is, over time, the resources become worth much less money. Not XP, to the individual crafter, just raw gold value. So eventually anyone can get only 1gp for their Yew Longbow, and they have to move on to the more dangerous regions where the Hickory Longbow can be found.
It's far from a perfect solution- but it incentives what we want- going out and exploring further! (TM)- whilst preventing CNR from becoming a guaranteed constant money supply.
I would consider- given the role gems might play- making gems and jewelry making not have this effect, but making the gem deposits actually vanish rather than respawn ad infinitum.
Anyway, musing over.
*Simplified, hypothetical. |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 21 Jul 2013 12:43 PM |
It's far from a perfect solution- but it incentives what we want- going out and exploring further! (TM)- whilst preventing CNR from becoming a guaranteed constant money supply.
I would consider- given the role gems might play- making gems and jewelry making not have this effect, but making the gem deposits actually vanish rather than respawn ad infinitum.
tie merchant setting buy/sell %'s based on the average wealth of the player base?
Static cnr placeables can no longer be static, else they will just get farmed. But can it be programmed to drop into different areas? Don't know, but worth finding out.
Supply is always a problem because as long as there is unlimited supply (like unlimited monsters), no matter how little, someone will eventually get enough and get rich.
I do kinda like the idea of gold having weight. "I am King Midas, the richest man in the world. I've been rooted to the same spot for 15 years...can't move" |
Purpose in life: finding better ways of allowing players to kill themselves. Repeatedly.
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"...Cause he mixes it with love
And makes the world taste good."
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<@James42> Lawful good isn't in your vocabulary, it's on your menu.
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 21 Jul 2013 10:10 PM |
I have to admit, it would be awesome if the merchants' prices varied with the player base's wealth/ the money supply.
"I can't sell my 150 flawless diamonds! It would be inflationary all by itself!"
You're right, though. Unlimited supply is a problem. I do wonder if it is a solvable problem, though... or at least a problem that can be made immaterial with a few manageable steps. |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 21 Jul 2013 11:44 PM |
You're right, though. Unlimited supply is a problem. I do wonder if it is a solvable problem, though... or at least a problem that can be made immaterial with a few manageable steps.
I think going down this road of thought could lead to the game not being fun for some people. It is an RP game after all, which means different people may have different goals. Some may WANT to be rich, and would/should be willing to put in the work to get there, and able to achieve that goal.
As I said tho, it IS a RP game, and in my opinion, the main, and most important thing that would really settle the economy, and even if it doesn't it would open up many opportunities for RP, is the cap on gold that a single PC can carry. Major purchases would be an adventure in and of themselves, as they should be. |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 21 Jul 2013 11:50 PM |
What makes a good currency is something that is a limited resource, or hard to get without significant work, like real world gold.
game gold is unlimited - thus the huge problem with unbalanced economies.
Unless there is a drain the size of the spigot, it'll continue to happen. So, how does one drain excessive gold out of an economy?
Other trivia, In vives, the merchants remembered their gold amounts, so unless they sold stuff, they could run out of money buying stuff from players (and did).
I wonder how much of the merchant system is hardcoded into the engine, and how much of the behaviour we could overrule. Imagine a merchant doing a trade for items in gems instead of gold. Or items in trade. |
Purpose in life: finding better ways of allowing players to kill themselves. Repeatedly.
--
"...Cause he mixes it with love
And makes the world taste good."
--
<@James42> Lawful good isn't in your vocabulary, it's on your menu.
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 21 Jul 2013 11:56 PM |
| ooooo I like where that idea is heading |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 22 Jul 2013 03:48 AM |
I think going down this road of thought could lead to the game not being fun for some people. It is an RP game after all, which means different people may have different goals. Some may WANT to be rich, and would/should be willing to put in the work to get there, and able to achieve that goal..
The very last thing I want is to make "Getting more stuff" - THE classic RP trope- less fun. I'm talking here about ways to make that more fun by making it rewarding, but relevant. It's not fun to get rich- getting 10,000 gp say- when everyone who's been playing for six months is a multimillionaire.
[Edit, a little later, to add:] Which is to say that if this all seems like a hassle, we can leave it as it is. I'm working from the assumption that a slightly more functional economy would be more fun. If it's a burden, we could leave it be. |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 22 Jul 2013 06:42 AM |
Everyone has differing opinions on what would make a living breathing economy work... but the main problem that prevents any of it from working, is that it's all just theory until put into action and the reality of the thing reveals if it works the way you think it will.
But it's never going to work the way you think it will... NEVER. look at how the government tries to "manage" the real world economy... they try all these different things to stimulate the economy.. but does it really work? no, not really. people are going to be affected by different things than what you think they will.
Now this is all just off the top of my head... I have no degree in economics or anything... so take all of this with a grain of salt as well... but I HAVE been alive for a while, and I have seen countless times throughout my relatively short time on this planet, that you can't predict the future... whether that is the weather, or the economy, or peoples political stance, or... whatEVER.
The moment you try steering the game world economy in one direction that you think will keep it relatively balanced... the players will latch on to something you never expected, and throw a wrench in the whole thing. And if you try to counter THAT with something else... they just find a different wrench.
The fact is, it is NOT a living economy... it can never be even close... so my 2 cents are to not even -try- to manage it. Just go back to trying to find creative ways to get players to throw their money away... that's really all you can do. |
"I'm not closed-minded, you're just WRONG." - Bucky Katt
My characters n portraits |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 22 Jul 2013 07:01 AM |
Very True.
I still believe that from a purely RP point of view. personal gold should be capped. I predict loads of fun to result from such a move
JJ |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 22 Jul 2013 02:04 PM |
The fact is, it is NOT a living economy... it can never be even close... so my 2 cents are to not even -try- to manage it. Just go back to trying to find creative ways to get players to throw their money away... that's really all you can do.
And that can be a lot of fun...remembering the auction to buy Malakai's body!
Was one of the funniest episodes I saw in Vives, even if it did spark a simply obscene amount of CNR'ing!
Cheers,
Sirac |
'The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other's life. Rarely do members of one family grow up under the same roof.' - Richard Bach, Illusions. |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 22 Jul 2013 07:26 PM |
The fact is, it is NOT a living economy... it can never be even close... so my 2 cents are to not even -try- to manage it. Just go back to trying to find creative ways to get players to throw their money away... that's really all you can do.
It is fun to try. :)
Getting players to throw away money in creative ways is a good way to manage it. As PDW said above you need sinks equal to your sources. I think that is the best way to start with this. If you have money flowing into the economy, look for ways to establish an equal flow out of the economy.
Lets look at some sources:
Merchant GP supply: Players would go to merchants to sell things that no one else would buy (magic flails, crafted items etc...). We accepted this because Vives' treasure system didn't dole out much gold, and so players had to liquidate crafted or found items. This resulted each reset in an inflation of the GP in player inventories. Meanwhile the merchant GP supply would reset each server reset. The merchants were a major source of GP flow into the server.
Dungeon Treasure Supply: Dungeons had a little gold, but more importantly a steady supply of unwanted magical items worth cash. Each reset the dungeons were restocked.
Compare that to the sinks. What did players spend money on? A few rations here or there. Healing kits. Rarely an equipment upgrade. Rarely a room rental. And the travel systems had a low cost as well.
So every reset you have tons of gold pouring in, and maybe a smaller amount leaving.
Solutions?
(1) Find creative ways for players to spend money.
(2) Make merchants more selective in their purchases.
Other ideas in my head:
Sliding scale costs to the following depending on pc wealth, fame and power.
Tithes: stairways to heaven and all that
Tribute: membership dues aka protection money.
Rooms, Housing, Strongholds (upkeep): Rooms in Vives had marginal fixed cost. We should remedy that by treating wealthy PCs the same as wealthy tourists are treated throughout the world. Then Housing however should be an order of magnitude more expensive to keep up. And then storngholds even more. The later two will be features we want to develop down the road, but I mention them as potential money sinks.
Retinue (upkeep): we can introduce retainers and henchmen etc... which are available on call. To maintain them however regardless of when they are used, costs gold, possibly a lot of gold. This could be a huge sink as everyone will want NPCs at their beck and call. And we can use NPCs for a variety of things beyond the typical red shirt use on a dungeon expedition: delivering messages, transport (maybe a PC owns a ship), body guards (red-shirts), a spy, and so on. This sort of feature is high on my list to implement. |
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Re: Crafting and the economy
Posted: 23 Jul 2013 02:54 AM |
A couple ideas from economies in other games:
-Item durability
-- Item repair cost
-Gold cost in crafting
-Best items are crafted (better the item higher craft cost)
-Merchants drive harder bargains -> your crafted +3 sword will sell for 100gp, but a player will pay 1000.
-Travel costs that scale to your level: a level 5 will pay 50gp to take the cart, while a level 12 would pay 120 gold.
Thing that struck me from DD:
When you stole and got arrested by guards you had the option to bribe them. Is there a DC in persuasion for that? What if different parts of a city had different DC checks. Eg, the docks in Port Royale would be a lower DC than in the Noble's Quarter. Depending how much you beat the difficulty check you pay more / less. Beat it by 1, pay 1000, beat it by 10 pay 100 for the bribe. |
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Bereil Yadashem.
Markus Mortriety, Herald of Novus Aristi. |
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