Can we get a more fundamental drive to the economy?

chrossedchemical

I know I'm not the only one, a driving factor for me as an mmo player is a thriving economy. I like to find a hard grind, or a mixture of rarity and skill to attain things I can sell. At the moment the current system goes as follows: new content comes out, prices of new items spike hard, then fluctuate to a minimal value. This fluctuation plays on the natural systems of supply and demand vs the amount of players you have effecting the market. Currently this system leaves the economy and any angle to play it very dull. The main focus to earn your keep is dungeon grinds. The vorpal shards, and certain sought after loot that spans multiple classes are the only really things of value. This was the same back in open beta, as it was on release, and even now coming up to the next module.

I see a bit of light for a cash crop with the new enchanting system, the new artifact system, and hopefully with the new companion system. I like the idea of being able to level up certain items and then being able to sell them to other players. This creates a subtle, but vital niche to social gaming communities. A sense of worth in your grind, and a cycle to fund players who work at leveling aspects of the game, and to reward players who want to advance easier.

These things excite me, sure, but I would like to see more. I would like to see companions, mounts, profession assets, and dragon eggs possible to loot in game. This is a touchy request, as these items are fundamental for the development team's funding. As a F2P game it is all about your bottom line; and without it being green, you fear a shut down from your publisher. What I recommend is a system of collecting pieces to unlock these certain items; like regents. These regents could be extremely rare, and could only be attained from certain boss monsters on certain days and even on certain hours. They could take an exorbitant amount of these reagents to craft, and take a steady amount of time to finish being crafted.

A system like this where it would be possible to earn a dragon egg, or a certain cash shop companion or mount from a long grind of regent collection, and time would spur the economy. These regents first off would be able to be sold, creating a need for AD and in response an influx of zen purchase to convert it to AD in order to pick up something new or useful. If these items took time to 'craft' or 'put together' and could be quickly completed with the use of AD; again would create a niche for the use of AD. This would also allow for a steadier fluctuation in things that could be earned this way on the AH, which is a good thing. As it stands, the AH looks very intimidating to a new player. I'm very excited to see how the next module kicks things up though.

gavinruneblade

Edit: TL/DR: replace ADs on the AH with gold, and give gold some value in-game and the economy will be as healthy as STO's. Until then, it'll lag significantly.

Long version:
The real problem is Astral Diamonds are the wrong currency to use in the auction house. As Astrals are directly linked to zen it prevents people from converting zen to in-game cash. This has removed the primary engine: people with money but no time buying things and selling to people without money but who have time.

For example, in STO people can buy keys or fleet modules or duty officer packs and sell them for energy credits which they use for improving their characters. In CO people do the same selling keys, vehicles, and become devices. But in NW, because of the AD exchange, the price of a key on the AH is basically the exact same as the current exchange price for 125z worth of AD. There's no way to turn anything into in-game cash, nor a way to use in-game cash to buy something at any savings over spending the zen.

So let's pretend I have time but no money. In STO or CO I can earn the game cash and through the AH buy a key. Some other player bought that key with zen, I didn't. My spending Energy Credits or Gold (depending on game) encourages the sales in the zen store. Here, that's not possible. I might as well just convert to zen and pretend the AH doesn't exist at all.

Crafting is another decent engine as components get consumed so there's a constant ongoing demand to be filled. But with ADs pegged to zen there's limited opportunity to profit. people might as well just buy the packs after converting via the exchange rather than buying off the AH unless they want a single specific item. But at that point, they are better off buying the item directly and not the crafting materials.

All the rest of the items on the AH, like gear etc are just placeholders bought at most once per character. So the turnover will always be lower than the direct cash items like keys. Oh there are always niches where something moves really well because you're one of a few sellers and there's lots of buyers. Niches come and go. The key is that the economy needs an engine that convinces people with money to spend it over and over. In the other cryptic games that is turning zen items into non-zen currency. In NW, gold is kind of meaningless and there's no way to sell for gold, only zen-to-protozen(astral diamonds).

Change that, and even with a small player base (CO) there's a pretty good economy to be found.

syka08

Small note that you'd want to be in the black, not green. There is also a chance to get dragon eggs from nodes during the 30 minute professions time. http://neverwinter.gamepedia.com/Dragon_Egg Nit picking aside:

I can't say I share your view on the economy, as a whole, though. There's truth in what you speak, but there are also many niches in which you can fill and to so at a profitable gain. You just have to think ahead, sometimes.

That being said, I do agree that there is always room for expansion and the creation of more niches for people to fill.

There's no way to turn anything into in-game cash, nor a way to use in-game cash to buy something at any savings over spending the zen.

Sorry, but I'd easily beg to differ your second point. Just watching the auction house on a daily basis will show that people are constantly underselling Zen items for less than the AD-to-Zen converted cost, meaning that they're in the red with a loss. This is just a snapshot, but lets look at greater bags of holding right now. The cheapest on the AH is 335332, and last I check zen to ad conversion was moving up beyond 380, but lets call it 370 even, right now. For the seller to even break even, at the 10% AH cut, they'd have to sell that same bag (which is 1000 zen) for 411,111 AD.

Keys? 49,900 cheapest right now. Keep the same constants, the seller should be charging 51,389 ad. (They're only making a profit if they bought in the 10 pack bulk)

Dyes? Typically about 1 - 2 k AD under.
Stone? This one I'll give you, as I almost always see people trying to make a profit off of it.
But in general:there is, almost always, a chance to buy things cheaper on the AH than buying it directly from the zen store. Prices will fluctuate, sometimes based on demand (sometimes for no reasons at all). Thus, the "problem" that arises is that it's not always possible to sell Zen items on the AH for a profit.

I don't really see where the need to eliminate AD comes from at all. But that's my view on things. I have a niche, I stick to it and I'm not making millions of AD in profits at once, but I am staying in the black.. And, again, I would love to see things get expanded, if at all possible.

gavinruneblade

Syka, Good points and I am talking in generalities mostly. Yes we gotta assume that people selling keys are doing it in bulk. Also, I assume quite a few of them are bad at math and/or hoping for a high buyout rather than the low bid. As I mentioned and you agreed, there's always niches to be found.

What I cannot see, is what the final moved price of those items is. Both of Cryptic's other games have fixed price auction houses so you can always tell the moving price. Best I can do here is look at lowest current bid, bids closes to expiring, and lowest buyouts and make some educated guesses.

Also, I didn't say eliminate Astrals. But right now the exchange and the auction house are competing with each other, and the zen shop is a hardline price. I've heard rumors that with some soon-ish future change gold will become more useful. If that happens, and the auction house moves off astrals onto gold, that will be a huge plus for everyone, even Cryptic's bottom line.

Because then the exchange and the auction house can support each other instead of undercut each other and hold margins low for competition. With two routes to earning items there's a way to move items between people who have one but not the other for a profit. When everything is just astrals & real cash, it's harder. You still can do it, as we both noticed, but it's less dynamic.