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Dev Disco wrote:

I think that "Money Sinks" is the "O, this is great, I'll let somebody else solve my issues" option, btw. It places the burden of thinking up and implementing a solution on the DM/Dev team.

I agree that money sinks is the option that places the most burden on you, but would counter that it's also the option that's the most fun for the players. Which, if I were a developer, I'd consider to be kind of the point of my job: providing the players with fun. I know that sounds kind of blunt, but I also know that I've been the PnP version of a developer for years (a DM), and I've never resented, and have usually enjoyed, the hours I've spent prepping for sessions as long as I thought that the sessions would be fun... so I hope you'll be able to accept my blunt comment in the 100% non-critical spirit in which I intended it.

Also, there have been a bunch of suggestions in this thread on how to implement interesting money sinks. They have been sketchy, preliminary suggestions, it's true; but I think a pretty huge percentage of players would be willing to help flesh out as much detail as you'd find useful, if you solicited that sort of feedback (q.v. the response to the "Quest Suggestions" thread).

Edit: Just to note that after typing this post, I saw that there's already a decently thought out and decently plausible money sink idea (IMO, of course) from GreatPigeon in the "Improving Amia" forum. Kudos.

Dev Disco wrote:

I think that "Money Sinks" is the "O, this is great, I'll let somebody else solve my issues" option, btw. It places the burden of thinking up and implementing a solution on the DM/Dev team.

I haven't read the rest of the thread, btw. I'd just like a solution that takes the money from the people who have too much, and doesn't make life a hell for starting characters (actually, 'starting players' is more important to me).

removing gold from people who have to much are level 30, they are also the boss hunters gold is worthless to them taking thier gold will do nothing but make them mad

as for the "money skins placeing the burden of thinking up and implementing a solution on the DM/Dev team."

gold sinks are the only way to make level 30 people who hunt spend gold at 30 for more then just potions, if you want to devalue epic loot that gold can buy it I could go dupe all my items like this is diabo 1 so gold has more value then it, godly plate of the whale and archangel staff of apocalypse anyone?

corypx wrote:

removing gold from people who have to much are level 30, they are also the boss hunters gold is worthless to them taking thier gold will do nothing but make them mad

That's too bad. Because by not removing gold you will accomplish zip, nada, zero. If the devs are going to constantly worry about making someone mad, then why bother working on the module at all? Every time they do something with it, someone might get mad.

I could care less about what some boss-hunting, gold-hoarding moaner feels when their riches inexplicably vanish. If they don't want to do something selfless for a change, if they don't want to be challenged by a new economic system, then they're obviously not the sort of players we want here anymore.

If we go round this roundabout one more time, I will just stop playing (not that I play much anymore) or visiting here because it'll be evident that people just don't want to make tough choices for the good of all.

Okay so here are my thoughts:

Modify the loot drops: get rid of the auto gold drop and add it to the 5% loot bin. Also add more mondane items like a sac of random gems worth an appropriate amount based on the loot bin level.

the tax thing, but this is my spin: give gold a real wieght and have it take up room in your inventory. I have a script that does exactly this. It converts gold to sacs of coins. Then add a gold deposit to the banking system which charges "banking fees"... the fees can be whatever is deemed appropriate, but say something along the lines of 5% per month? Low level pcs who don't have much gold won't have a lot of weight to worry about, and any greety pc can opt to lug all the weight around and avoid the fees.... but if you want to be able to move at something more then a crawl when you are hunting you have to use the bank. To avoid people from meta driopping off the loot and then picking it up after a hunt charge a higher initial deposit fee... like 10% or something. Obviously the numbers can be played with here, but I think it would be cool rp to have to walk to the bank and with draw the 1,000,000 gp you need to buy said uber item from that other merchant pc.

...

if i play a Druid; or ..ranger... or whatever that's not connected to any type of city.

Why on earth should i pay tax?

I can imagine to Uncap Gold-Drops and Implement banks.

But Having a 5% Monthly fee, even if you aren't belonging to a city that's ...Lacks Foundation in RP

no no not a 5% tax.... it's a banking fee that you only pay when and if you deposit money in or have an account. So if you never put money in the bank then you don't have any fee/tax.... I mean if you want to be ubber stoogie and carry around like 2 tons of gold coins go ahead and move at a crawl... I would love to hit and run at you with and archer

... if I was evil :p

Oh and ... and.... remember that the weight is dependant on the amount fo gold you carry on your person. So if you are a ranger or druid who lives off the land then there is no reason to worry about the fees.

let me put it another way, not paying tax.

yes all the people with lots of gold are level 30 or rebuilds duh, how do you think they have so much cash? O_o log in, kill things/sell loots, win cash, no more complaints.

Glyph wrote:

let me put it another way, not paying tax.

yes all the people with lots of gold are level 30 or rebuilds duh, how do you think they have so much cash? O_o log in, kill things/sell loots, win cash, no more complaints.

I agree, no arbitrary tax, but I think it would be cool to give gold the actual physical dimensions it should have and at the same time give the rich a system so that they can keep their gold with out taking up all the room in their inventory and bogging them down and forcing strength builds.

Selmak wrote:

That's too bad. Because by not removing gold you will accomplish zip, nada, zero. If the devs are going to constantly worry about making someone mad, then why bother working on the module at all? Every time they do something with it, someone might get mad.

I could care less about what some boss-hunting, gold-hoarding moaner feels when their riches inexplicably vanish. If they don't want to do something selfless for a change, if they don't want to be challenged by a new economic system, then they're obviously not the sort of players we want here anymore.

If we go round this roundabout one more time, I will just stop playing (not that I play much anymore) or visiting here because it'll be evident that people just don't want to make tough choices for the good of all.

no one seams to want to do something about this ICly and sort out this "problem" that way.

tormak will probably agree with me for once >_> you have to fight for your bags of holding, those ioun stones, because without that you can be level 30 but that still doesn't mean you will have connections, you -really- want to see all the merchants leave amia abruptly? and have no other means of finding rare stuff than utterly ganking the abyss as much as your build will allow? I think not.

lets play a game, double your money. grand, 2, 4,8,16,32,64,128, 256, 512, million. see how easy that was? stop thinking about ganking monsters and think. dnd isn't just hack n slash, else i'd play oblivion all day and night.

Glyph wrote:

no one seams to want to do something about this ICly and sort out this "problem" that way.

This isn't an IC problem. Unless you're telling me we're supposed to regard dungeons as never ending money machines. Somehow I find it hard to believe that was the original intent while building the module.

Dramatic_Prince wrote:

Selmak wrote:

blahblahblah

Did you just quote him to make him sound elitist? Or are you agreeing with him? Either way, he's right. Why does Amia hold the opinions of selfish players at a higher value than those of non-selfish players?

Also, money sinks aren't a great idea because they rely on rich people choosing to use them.

Logicality wrote:

Also, money sinks aren't a great idea because they rely on rich people choosing to use them.

Great idea? Maybe not... but they are at least a good idea because, of all the options presented, they are the most fun. Having fun is the reason everything NWN-related and Amia-related exists, and the reason we log in at all. Money sinks won't solve the problem on their own, this is true. But they will make solving the problem more fun. That gets a thumbs-up from me, just on general principle.

I don't in principle disagree with the idea of gold having weight & needing to bank excess cash. Let's look at this in a little more detail.

Gold either has weight (it slows you down) or it has weight and volume (it takes up space in inventory).

If you opt for the former, you can't carry it around in bags, so if you're a sorceror with 8 STR then you get the full weight penalty and have to crawl from the bank to wherever you buy your potions and whatnot. I don't really think that this is practical.

A somewhat more reasonable otpion would be to give gold both weight and volume. That is, it takes up space in inventory, which means that you can hide it in bags of holding (it would be unrealistic if you couldn't). If a stack of (let's say) 1000 coins is represented by a 1-space icon in your inventory that weighs some amount (1 lb?) then how much you can carry is effectively limited only by how much space you want to take away from items in order to dedicate to your wallet and how many bags of holding you can acquire. You could fill an entire inventory page with bags of holding and carry 1764 stacks of gold - at 1000 gp/stack that would be 1.7 M gp. It will certainly make loading or unloading large amounts of gold for transport from one place to another very tedious and I doubt that most people will carry more than 100 - 200K on a regular basis - here, the penalty is not really weight but volume and how many storage bags you have. Most people who opt to pay cash for large purchases will stand in the bank, withdraw the cash (ugh, instantly paralyzed) then transfer it to the other player (ugh, instantly paralyzed) who will deposit it right back. A 10% penalty on deposits and withdrawals would then take 20% of that amount out of circulation right away. You could also assess a low negative interest rate ('service charge') for any cash in the bank itself, but that's optional.

The second option works better than the first, IMO - I leave it to others to determine if it's more hassle than it's worth.

it -is- an ICly problem, forget monsters a moment for the love of god, we are talking about economy. if a divine mythal say, would go for, 20 mill now? for one, noo npc merchant is going to have stuff like that, you, cannot, stop, icly, extortion. it is part of how society works. and the duke is from what i've read, dead and without replacement. and thats just cordor mind.

of course some merchants are not extortionate, or only trade, and the prices arn't outrageous even then, make a faction, start a business, sell those swords you make, buy mythals and make them better. be a hired guard for the merchant factions and businesses, ask for protection money? and earn your own damn gold. I know its hard its supposed to be that way. else you would just get bored.

Back in my day, a loaf of bread only cost a nickel.

Inflation is not limited to the real world.

Glyph wrote:

it -is- an ICly problem, forget monsters a moment for the love of god, we are talking about economy.

I would like you to pause a moment and think about the major factors contributing to the state the economy is in today. Then, if you still fail to see the error in what you're saying, you can continue to tell me to "forget about monsters".

Where did all that gold come from? A source that shouldn't have been able to yield so much. If today's economy is as it is for entirely out-of-character reasons (and it is), then it needs to be discussed in an out-of-character fashion.

Murex wrote:

Back in my day, a loaf of bread only cost a nickel.

Inflation is not limited to the real world.

Your day was more than five or so years ago, I'd bet. The rate at which the gold piece has been devalued on Amia is ridiculous, the primary cause being farming - a practice that should have long been considered an exploit.

Okay well, there is another idea that would strike a compromise between removing gold down to a cap and simply not removing any gold at all.

Instead of making the old gold disappear entirely, it will be deposited into a bank. The bank will then pay the character a stipend from their old gold each real-life month, so long as they have not reached the gold cap. If they are at (or somehow over) the gold cap, they don't lose any old money. If paying the stipend would put them over the cap, it is reduced for that month.

The amount of the stipend would depend on the gold cap. But obviously, it's going to be enough to live on comfortably.

What this does is phase out the old gold gradually over time, by limiting how much it can be used in a given month.

Selmak wrote:

corypx wrote:

removing gold from people who have to much are level 30, they are also the boss hunters gold is worthless to them taking thier gold will do nothing but make them mad

That's too bad. Because by not removing gold you will accomplish zip, nada, zero. If the devs are going to constantly worry about making someone mad, then why bother working on the module at all? Every time they do something with it, someone might get mad.

I could care less about what some boss-hunting, gold-hoarding moaner feels when their riches inexplicably vanish. If they don't want to do something selfless for a change, if they don't want to be challenged by a new economic system, then they're obviously not the sort of players we want here anymore.

If we go round this roundabout one more time, I will just stop playing (not that I play much anymore) or visiting here because it'll be evident that people just don't want to make tough choices for the good of all.

removing gold from people will do nothing to change its real value to players, its a fact.

that is why I see no point in removing gold from people as it does nothing but remove something from them for no reason and wasted thier time.

"new economic system" it does nothing but means people have to refarm gold and do it longer or they say screw gold, Epic loot only.

As I recall, Diablo II had a gold cap.

The gold cap did not mean that gold had more value, it just meant that no one had enough of it to buy anything of value. Gold in that game was like water. It's something you need to survive, but not something you consider exceedingly valuable. It's just something you can get so easily you take it for granted. Heh, you didn't even need it for buying potions most of the time in that game.

And what happened? Yeah, trade became epic loot only. Runes, set items, uniques. Anyone who's played Diablo or Diablo II will know what it was like. The frustration of plying the market servers to buy that one last rune for your Breath of the Dying sword, or that one last hideously expensive item to complete your set. Of course, trading for the barter items to actually buy it was another challenge entirely.

I do not like item focused economies. They are an epic pain in the ass, and do not help RP at all. If gold is going to have so little value, at least let people have enough of it to buy something useful. Right now, I fail to see the problem. People have truckloads of gold, but they -can- buy most things for enough of it.

Weylyn_SotW wrote:

I do not like item focused economies. They are an epic pain in the ass, and do not help RP at all. If gold is going to have so little value, at least let people have enough of it to buy something useful. Right now, I fail to see the problem. People have truckloads of gold, but they -can- buy most things for enough of it.

all players can get gold to buy gear off NPCs with no problem.

if you are talking about wanting to buy epic loot for gold it wont happen changes or not, you are trading the best gear in the game that makes you stronger in NWN and has value to players and gold has value if used on NPCs to buy heal potions....

Xaviera wrote:

I don't in principle disagree with the idea of gold having weight & needing to bank excess cash. Let's look at this in a little more detail.

Gold either has weight (it slows you down) or it has weight and volume (it takes up space in inventory).

If you opt for the former, you can't carry it around in bags, so if you're a sorceror with 8 STR then you get the full weight penalty and have to crawl from the bank to wherever you buy your potions and whatnot. I don't really think that this is practical.

A somewhat more reasonable otpion would be to give gold both weight and volume. That is, it takes up space in inventory, which means that you can hide it in bags of holding (it would be unrealistic if you couldn't). If a stack of (let's say) 1000 coins is represented by a 1-space icon in your inventory that weighs some amount (1 lb?) then how much you can carry is effectively limited only by how much space you want to take away from items in order to dedicate to your wallet and how many bags of holding you can acquire. You could fill an entire inventory page with bags of holding and carry 1764 stacks of gold - at 1000 gp/stack that would be 1.7 M gp. It will certainly make loading or unloading large amounts of gold for transport from one place to another very tedious and I doubt that most people will carry more than 100 - 200K on a regular basis - here, the penalty is not really weight but volume and how many storage bags you have. Most people who opt to pay cash for large purchases will stand in the bank, withdraw the cash (ugh, instantly paralyzed) then transfer it to the other player (ugh, instantly paralyzed) who will deposit it right back. A 10% penalty on deposits and withdrawals would then take 20% of that amount out of circulation right away. You could also assess a low negative interest rate ('service charge') for any cash in the bank itself, but that's optional.

The second option works better than the first, IMO - I leave it to others to determine if it's more hassle than it's worth.

Okay its been a long while since I played with the script I have but here is haw I remember it: It grabs how much gold you have and then for every x amount of gold (I think it was set to 5,000) it created a pouch (what looked like the campers stool icon) that weighed 5lbs. So, if you had say 50,000 gold you would have 10 of these in your inventory. Are these the right numbers for amia or the right icon? That is open to discussion since the numbes are entirely malliable and can be made to however the DM's see fit and balancing. They could say 100,000 per bag and 10lbs of weight, or 10,000 per bag and 100 lbs... they could even go strictly by PnP if they wanted to.

So what if this was implemented in amia, what would a player who has 4 or 7 million do? Well, there inventory would be full of little sacks of gold crammed into Bags and boxes. Now, what opptions can we give them to fix this? This is where the "Bank" or "Vault" come into the picture. This "Bank" or "Vault" would do a couple of things:

Give evey play a way to keep all (or almost all) or their gold and not have to fill up their inventory, but at some cost.
Give the server another way to take some gold out of the economy by charging "vault" fees. What the exact amounts were is also entirely flexible and once again up to the DM's I would suppose and what they felt was fair and balancing.

What does this do for the new players? Well, from what I can see they would be for the most part unaffected from this because they do not have the massive amounts of gold. What about the people who are rich? Well it creates a "feel" for all of that gold. I can not count the number of times I went to a store and bought something and had to RP in what seemed a rather lame attempt at *counts out coins and passes them to xxxxx*. Really, how long does it take to count out 150,000 gold coins, and are your pockets really that big??? Okay so you have a Bago of holdingn or 20.... still this system gives the gold a "presence" that it has always lacked other then the arbitrary number in a box on your character sheet.

What are some possible side effects? Players have a choice... well you could hang onto allthe gold you had work withteh weight and space as best you can, or you can use the "vault" to store your gold though at some type of fee to help guard you coins. There is also another choice... find some sor tof other trading medium. Maybe you start dealing in emeralds and diamonds. I think it would be cool RP to barter with another PC merchant in gems and jewels rahter the "numbers on a sheet".

Does this in and of itself fix the ecconomy? Nope, but it helps some, and can add some cool RP. *The heavily ladden dwarf plods slowly down the street with large sacks of coins*... *The master thief studies the vaults building attempting to discover a way in*... *two people argue about the value of a sack of gems in comparison to the value of magical shield*

I hope that this give you a better picture of my thoughts on this...

Xaviera wrote:

1000 coins is represented by a 1-space icon in your inventory that weighs some amount (1 lb?) then how much you can carry is effectively limited only by how much space you want to take away from items in order to dedicate to your wallet and how many bags of holding you can acquire. You could fill an entire inventory page with bags of holding and carry 1764 stacks of gold - at 1000 gp/stack that would be 1.7 M gp. It will certainly make loading or unloading large amounts of gold for transport from one place to another very tedious and I doubt that most people will carry more than 100 - 200K on a regular basis - here, the penalty is not really weight but volume and how many storage bags you have.

Can you imagine the lag of everyone carrying around a thousand items in their inventories?

Or, just take away the NPC buy mode so that they can only sell. Or make them buy things at the base item value - a longsword +10 would sell for the same amound as a mundane longsword for instance. The main source of 'income' for players would be;

A) The Job system.
B) Monster kills (GP per kill remains the same).
C&D) DC burning and DM events.
E) Scripted Quests.

It would probably cound of as near a 100% as you're going to get it of the general incoming GP of EVERY player from top to bottom. As a result of doing this the economy would simply crash, the price of everything would fall very rapidly.

The downside - good 'gear' would become difficult and expensive to acquire for new characters. You would rely almost entirely on dropped loot drops for 'upgrades', and it might take a while for the crashed economy to start functioning again with suitable prices. Characters who've been around for a while will still have their 'millions'*.

The upside - gold would once again have it's value, characters would think twice about spending 75k on a new sword or ring. Asking 2mil for a mythal would be an act of lunacy. Merchant characters could do their buying/selling monopoly game without losing out to Hil'Rash or whatever his name is.

*Characters who've been around for a while will still have their millions - but they would have nothing to spend it on, and nothing to make them consider parting with that coin. So to realistically and dramatically reduce the amount of coin 'most' players have without nabbing it with OOC Big Brother paws would be to impliment various money-sink ideas, and simply oblige players to have their characters pay out.

Goblin wrote:

Asking 2mil for a mythal would be an act of lunacy.

yes, it will be epic loot trade only after that.

Logicality wrote:

Why does Amia hold the opinions of selfish players at a higher value than those of non-selfish players

Because they may very well form the majority. Just because they aren't as vocal as what you call "non-selfish" doesn't mean they don't exist. I must say I'm quite amused by how strongly some of the people in your "non-selfish" category, act.
We've all been here long enough to know the vocal part of Amia isn't made up of selfless people. :lol:

Yes, and your vocal minority stalemates changes that need to be done, to benefit themselves.

TormakSaber wrote:

Yes, and your vocal minority stalemates changes that need to be done, to benefit themselves.

So nice to hear an honest answer. I wish everyone was as forthcoming as you.
If this really has to be done, then we don't need to debate on the Nth time.
Let your people settle what's best.
If there's poop to mop up later, I trust you have your mops and buckets ready.

I've only been saying this the entire topic re: the top 1% controlling the economy and forcing their hand so as to prevent any change to the contrary, you know. This isn't any amazing revelation on the part of my opinion. I do think you're doing the wrong thing by contributing to it, and bragging about it, instead of attempting to be partof a solution that would let everyone on the server establish a more balanced player economy that doesn't exist only for +5, as well as allowing DMs and devs to use gold as a reasonable tool in the IC world again instead of having to charge something like 50 million for a bedroom only because we know the gold exists to bleed out. It is a bit of a catch 22. You have the gold, so we will charge it. You complain that th prices are too high, but unless we charge what we do, the price has no meaning like it should. If gold is not bled out, it cannot be reasonably made useful again.

TormakSaber wrote:

I've only been saying this the entire topic re: the top 1% controlling the economy and forcing their hand so as to prevent any change to the contrary, you know. This isn't any amazing revelation on the part of my opinion. I do think you're doing the wrong thing by contributing to it, and bragging about it, instead of attempting to be partof a solution that would let everyone on the server establish a more balanced player economy that doesn't exist only for +5, as well as allowing DMs and devs to use gold as a reasonable tool in the IC world again instead of having to charge something like 50 million for a bedroom only because we know the gold exists to bleed out. It is a bit of a catch 22. You have the gold, so we will charge it. You complain that th prices are too high, but unless we charge what we do, the price has no meaning like it should. If gold is not bled out, it cannot be reasonably made useful again.

My stance is now neutral.
Any further debate out here is a pointless exercise.
If you have a way to fix the said economy, I encourage you to get the powers at be to work on it.

It is pointless. It was pointless the last half dozen times as well, but I don't get tired of trying to fix a problem that's existed on Amia for a long time now and will only get worse.

TormakSaber wrote:

It is pointless. It was pointless the last half dozen times as well, but I don't get tired of trying to fix a problem that's existed on Amia for a long time now and will only get worse.

And you shouldn't. This topic does not need to be brought up again.
I agree it's pointless and perhaps should be locked.
Your team has to agree on what needs to be done and do it.

Let's get back to the basics. There's no need for stigmas like gold hoarders, pack rats, boss hunters, etc. to be brought up here. This is a systemic problem and I'd argue that their existence is the effect; not the cause.

The Amian Economy

Gold In
This is everything our characters earn from the module: killing, selling, quests, jobs, gambling, dreamcoins, and DM rewards. Our characters need to interact with the module to get more gold. We have an infinite supply of gold but it takes time and effort to extract it.

Gold Out
This is everything our characters lose to the module: respawning, purchasing, mythal forging, crafting, gambling, and DM/NPC trades. Our characters need to interact with the module to lose gold. The module has an infinite demand for our gold but it needs our consent.

Gold Left
This is everything that's left on our characters; and by extension, the Amian economy. The gold left is ever increasing. It gets circulated and concentrated to characters with more to trade (usually the active ones). The module is unable to react. Inflation & the widening rich-poor gap are the effects.

There's no one permanent fix to this. This, to me, is a managerial problem. The Dev & DM team needs to make the economy controllable. We need to attach a faucet in the Gold Left pile so the Dev & DM team can manage how big the Gold Left pile is.

Feedback
The first thing that the Dev & DM team needs to do, besides having the political will, is to agree on their ideal amount of gold per character or the ideal economy. Next is to apply negative feedback to help keep characters and the economy in their ideal state of wealth.

Proportional Control
Upkeep costs, in my opinion, would be the best tool for the job. It can be made proportional to a character's networth so it won't affect the lowbies as much. It will be flexible so that the Dev & DM team can it use to steer the economy. They can continually change the upkeep costs as aggressive or as laid back as they need it to be. It needs to be a constant periodic drain on all characters too (even ancient ones in archives) - no need for player consent.

My Example

Networth = Gold + Inventory
[Edit: The line should be curving upwards but my MS Paint skill is pitiful.]

In my example, I've settled on 10 million as the ideal networth for a character (3M inventory; 7M GP). He'll need to pay a weekly 8% upkeep cost. That's 800,000 GP he needs to earn weekly if he wants to maintain his GP. That's a about 2 hours worth of work per week. He could get that from interacting with the module or with the players. Increasing hunting activity and encouraging exchange of good between characters.

To get ahead of the curve, you'll need to work much harder. For maintaining a 20 million networth (5M inventory; 15M GP), you'll be paying 10% weekly - 2 million or about 5 hours worth of work. If you have 2 characters worth 20 million, you'll be working in overtime to maintain their wealth.

Worth only 5 million? 5% weekly. A Cloak of Fortification +4 will be enough to cover your upkeep for three weeks.

With the occasional Dev/DM induced gold sinks (8M worth for example), only those who work harder than the rest will be able to afford/participate in them. But it's not terribly out of reach from the rest of the non rich characters. Treasures will still be a smart way to store wealth but thanks to Dev/DM gold sinks, it'll encourage players to part with their treasures for GP if they want to purchase/participate in the gold sinks. These gold sinks would become more of a reward to active players instead of a simple tool to suck gold from the economy.

TLDR: Acquiring gold is limited by time & effort. Losing gold is limited due to player consent. You can keep limiting the acquisition of gold or increase the ways to lose gold but these aren't permanent and won't change the already wide rich-poor gap. The economy needs to be controllable by the Devs & DMs. Give them the tool to take gold from players and to control the economy for the good of all. Periodical upkeep cost proportional to the networth of a character.

It seems dramatic to say the debate is a waste of time; more brains means more ideas.

Could the 'gold has weight' idea be implemented using a simple 'cannot be thrown away' widget in everyones inventory? The widgets weight could vary depending on the amount of gold carried by a character.

This way banks and vaults would be really useful and gold could not be hoarded in bags of holding. Before you yell 'stupid OOC' consider that if there were banks and vaults about it would be considered safer and more convienient to store gold in them as opposed to lugging around the worlds supply of magic bags everywhere you go.

Also worth considering that vaults don't all have to go in the middle of a big city... they may just be safer there.

realpohlice wrote:

-snip-

I like this idea. Simple, realistic, and flexible. The only thing about which I'd wonder is what would happen if a character is worth, say, 10m in items and nothing in gold (as an extreme example). The system would expect them to pay 800k, but what happens when they can't?

Logicality wrote:

realpohlice wrote:

-snip-

I like this idea. Simple, realistic, and flexible. The only thing about which I'd wonder is what would happen if a character is worth, say, 10m in items and nothing in gold (as an extreme example). The system would expect them to pay 800k, but what happens when they can't?

I second the idea... perhaps add a debt function?(is negative gold possible). If someone goes into debt then they cannot rest until they are able to pay for the food, etc needed to rest?

Realpohlice has said (and proposed) essentially what I did with my 'tax' system. The need is for a continuous and proportional drain on all player's gold hoards, because the system by itself cannot and will not accomplish that - no matter how many 'gold sinks' you institute, they will all be voluntary. In other words, people will only throw away money if they want to.

As realpohlice said (and I said earlier), characters under a tax system who want to keep their cash levels up will hunt - just as they do today. You must must MUST substantially reduce the inflow, by a) eliminating cash drops and b) instituting merchant buy caps. BUT trashing everyone's gold reserves will only slow their regrowth. Farmers will still accumulate more that anyone else and the situation will recreate itself without continuous drains on all characters. If you have a continuous inflow, you must have a continuous outflow or you get an overflow!

What realpohlice did say that was new here (at least explicitly) is that the DM/Dev team has to have the will to implement a change. This is why I put up a poll, to see which of several different ideas might be most palatable to the players. However, something must be done and it is up to the team to decide exactly what. Do 'the top 1%' really have any more say than the bottom 99%? Prescia and others have gotten rich under the system as it exists, in part because there is no drain on their wealth. They can still get rich, but they'll just have to work a little harder at it if gold is draining out the bottom of the barrel. But whatever the change(s), it has to be something that permanently fixes the problem - deleting everyone's gold will not accomplish that. Some people will be miffed - just as those who like their entry raises and chugging heal potions in combat will be if/when changes to those occur. Some people will leave in a huff. But at least if the penalties are applied to everyone proportionally (ie. fairly), the pill might be easier to swallow.

The suggestion about gold having volume doesn't limit gold. It only limits the amount you have on you at any one time. This forces characters with lots of money to bank it, where it can be drained away ('taxed'). It is less satisfactory in some ways than a straight 'tax' system because it affects rich characters disproportionately, physically weak characters more than strong ones, and those without lots of storage bags. Taxing affects everyone proportionately. However, gold with volume and a bank tax would at least be a step in the right direction.

Oh, and billytheid...? That smacks of Arelith!

Logicality wrote:

The only thing about which I'd wonder is what would happen if a character is worth, say, 10m in items and nothing in gold (as an extreme example). The system would expect them to pay 800k, but what happens when they can't?

They'll only pay what they have in GP; and if they have none, then they won't pay. I think of it as the character living off of scraps and living in the woods for that week. The character needs to put in more work if he wants to leave his financial rut though (if for example his upkeep cost is 10M). Or he can start parting with some of his treasures to keep his upkeep cost to a minimum.

We might even have extreme cases where a character's inventory is worth 100M and have no cash. He'll do anything to stop the upkeep system from "stealing" his wealth. In between the weekly upkeep collection, he'll work for gold and convert them to items before the system could take it away. It's hell of a way to play but possible.

He'll be living outside the system. A couple of problems that he'll have is a limited inventory space and working in a barter economy. And if ever he decides he wants to have fun with the occasional Dev & DM gold sinks, he'll need to earn gold or part with some of his treasures.

I see this system causing a problem with certain DM plot items, that have special properties, however, these same special properties also spike the GP value of the item extremely high. Nevertheless, they are not sold or to be calculated into "standard wealth".

I think your system is nice but again, I think a tax system is probably one of the most unfun things you could implement. A player has to groan at losing their work every single time they log in. They begin to need to adhere to a schedule of "I need to grin X hours" just to maintain. My projected solution of Wipe It All means you suffer once, and since every other fix was introduced simultaneously, you suffer never again.

Last edited by Dwagin on Sun, Aug 15 2010, 6:57 AM, edited 1 time in total.

This is great for 'Boss farmers'.

Sucks for -real- merchant pc's. Yep I said it.

Xaviera wrote:

They can still get rich, but they'll just have to work a little harder at it if gold is draining out the bottom of the barrel.

Work harder still? Spending more of my real time for artificial wealth?
I'd rather sit in Cordor and join you in the poke and giggle game or participate in Amia Forest's Daily PVP Show.
That's more constructive at the very least.

Tormak wrote:

My projected solution of Wipe It All means you suffer once, and since every other fix was introduced simultaneously, you suffer never again.

Complete wipe. No DCs, no DC items, no legacy items, go gold, no epic loot, nothing left.
No matter which way you chosen have chosen to play and work towards, wiped, to be fair to everyone.

If a wipe happened, DC Items would either be refunded or transferred. No DC Loss.

Really simple reasoning, too;

You earn DCs by Roleplaying.
You earn Gold or Loot by Hunting.

Additionally; the DC Economy isn't broken in the same manner as the Gold/Loot system.

I know, it's scary, but while we won't enforce RP; encouragement is certainly an understatement.

Trying to fix it will just cause more problems and anger than keeping it already..

Plentyful stuff = little value
Rare stuff = high value

It works.. The only issue people take is that gold is one of the plentyful things.. But make gold Rare and you royally shaft AA's. I work my arse off just to break even on arrow+potion costs VS loot drop rates and gold sold. While some other chars of mine make money trough the roof..

it sucks, but that's life.. Keep it as is, and stop complaining, I say.. Some builds struggle right now, some don't.

People want to work on gaining stuff trough Epic loot, let them.. I'd rather get DCs and spend my DCs on epic items made JUST FOR MY CHAR, and make him more unique, rather than geared up with epic loot.

Just for the love of god.. just keep it as is and stop the madness now.

TormakSaber wrote:

I think your system is nice but again, I think a tax system is probably one of the most unfun things you could implement. A player has to groan at losing their work every single time they log in. They begin to need to adhere to a schedule of "I need to grin X hours" just to maintain. My projected solution of Wipe It All means you suffer once, and since every other fix was introduced simultaneously, you suffer never again.

I'd rather have a choice to pick on the upkeep cost that I can maintain than to have everything I worked for wiped out. I reiterate my point that the economy is to be managed not fixed. With proportional control, you'd have a tool that can mold the economy in any way you can!

Reduce rich-poor gap? Slowly push the curve to the left.
Manage inflation? Slowly raise or lower the curve.

"I need to grind X hours just to maintain," complaints? If he's within the ideal wealth the Devs & DMs have agreed upon, then it's up to you guys to decide how much hours these people need to do to maintain it. You decide. You find the balance that works.

Example: If you want the population to generally settle at around 30M, you can lower their upkeep rate to a measly 0.5% weekly. Earning 150,000GP in a week's time, for an epic with a networth of 30M? They can do that in a heartbeat. But at 50M? Oh, they'd have to pay 7% for that.

You'd have a tool. You talk it out amongst yourselves on what you guys would like to see in Amian economy and slowly use your tool to make it happen. Maybe over a 6 month course or even a year. There's no need for drastic changes. You won't even need to disclose the changes to the players, make it feel more organic & natural.

well, there it is, DM says you earn loot by hunting. there goes the economy.

do I get refunds on my +4 1d6 crit 1d6 elemental lightning mithril sword aswell? (not DC item but took 3 days to make. yes I have screenies.)

also i'd like my lute harp and tambourine back. the rest is pretty much standard junk, need about 500k currently to get it all again I reckon.

once again, disappointed, all you, yadda yadda, should do it icly, rant rant...etc...

You want an IC solution?

"Shockwaves go trough Amia as Cordor and Kholingen abandons their common currency, stating that they are forced to do so because the massing of wealth among the adventuring class has made prices skyrocket among the common people. Disgruntled peasents and merchants have been muttering for a long time, but were now on the brink of violent revolt against the adventuring class who not only cause massive inflation but also bring many dangers to their homes. The ministries of finance announce that a new currency will be implented and controlled in a better manner, and that while honest, common folk will be reimbursed, the adventuring class will be left with only a fixed sum, the rest of their wealth now dust"

There you go.

Last edited by Glyph on Sun, Aug 15 2010, 9:18 AM, edited 2 times in total.

thank you, finally, someone...

now explain the math >_>

ed: by this I mean, mythal crafting cost, house prices, regular stuff, rez scrolls still cost bare for newbies? i'm hearing wipe but i'm not hearing how this will not happen again in a few years, not to mention what to do with stuff that might in dnd terms end up costing less than 1.

gotta remember the 3.5 is the base for the cost of things somewhat. thats how I came up with how much to sell job system made swords for without undercutting myself on expences, because if you follow the job system matrix you -will- lose money.

ie. what stops me extorting the gold if i'm level 30 already, naked after wipe but can gank enough monsters for some cash? where does that leave mc noob? where does that leave mc halfway there?

rampant inflation + civil unrest / soverign power = economic reform

If the problem lies in epic boss farmers, why not just make epic loot easier to get? It would be balanced if everyone has the same chance at epic loot, so even a party of L20s can have a good chance too. It would be a bit unfair to epic characters who have allready aquired a lot of epic loot, but they are the ones who get kicked in the nuts.

Easier to get epic loot = Less boss farming, less chance for L20s to aquire lots of gold, more rp, and more areas without L30s running around soloing.

BAM! The economy will slowly fix itself.

Best fix for the Amian economy?

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