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What is the reason for having 3 major currencies`?
maho4200
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 526 Bounty Hunter
So we have Gold, Astral Diamonds and ZEN.
Why couldn't we just have Gold and ZEN?
Is it because it would look bad if you could directly buy gold with real money?
To me it just seems that way.
Why couldn't we just have Gold and ZEN?
Is it because it would look bad if you could directly buy gold with real money?
To me it just seems that way.
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That or they were trying to be innovative.
I know what it is for, I don't need an explanation I'm asking what is the actual reason.
Gold is used for small purchases and consumables. Very typical and standard.
Astral Diamonds is Cryptic's way of preventing inflation of a currency, by only allowing 24000 diamonds to be made on a single day. This greatly slows down itemization in the late game.
Zen is the currency you can buy with real money. By making items only purchasable with Zen, they create their income for the game.
(Admittedly, the AD part is completely destroyed by the instant influx of AD by the founder packs and is now completely broken due to exploiting and ninja-looting. Very poorly planned by Cryptic. They instead should have given Zen, which at launch wouldnt be tradable for AD because there were no ADs to trade for! A lot of Zen wouldve also be spend on zen items isntead of AD.)
About AD you have a slight point that it might help a bit to help slow inflation but I don't really see it as being very effective since you can buy it or trade it.
Exactly.
10char
But I guess it does curb inflation a bit, I still don't see how they couldn't just do the same with gold as well.
I frankly don't see the point in AD being in the game at all.
* real life currency
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, Life is but a dream.
If you ever play path of exile, they have a freaking list of 15 different kinds of orbs as currencies( no gold at all). And it seems to be really effective to keep botters away from the game.
Psychological factors. If you have two conversion we human (in average) seems to rapidly lose the psychological barrier to spend something.
For example if you get a message "to finish this quicker pay 360 Astral diamond", you will first have to convert to Zen, then back to Dollars/Euro. So 360 AD might be 1 Zen which might be 1 cent.
If you see "this cost 1 cent" , the psychological barrier is greater "this cost 1 Zen" which you know is one cent after conversion, and then the lowest barrier is when you have to do two conversion. Above that , three conversion is too burdensome.
Using "fake" money lower the barrier, the more conversion you have the easier the people spend. Which is why you ahve so many store using "points" to lower the barrier to spend.
because the other two currencies - ad and zen - can not be traded between characters outside of posting things of absurd amounts on the auction house (in which case you eat a huge listing fee and a huge auction fee) it helps to make it harder for gold farmers to sell and i'm guessing easier for cryptic to track unauthorized RMT.
The further away they can get you from thinking about real money, the easier it is to convince you to spend it.
To me, the AD currency is there with it's vast numbers to make us feel like we're rich, or at least have the ability to earn vast amounts of it (we talk in terms of hundreds of thousands, and millions). It is able to fluctuate with ZEN without PWE having to make changes to their prices all the time.
Zen works in a number of ways;
Firstly, the ratio is tiny, so buy only 500 zen but that can convert to many thousands of AD
Secondly, it creates an illusion that you are spending real money (although a 100 zen to 1 dollar ratio quickly dispells this)
Thirdly, it exists across all of their games, so you feel that you can buy it even if you don't use it all. Odds are that you may be able to play another of their games and use it up that way.
Stop being dense.
Indeed, my guess is that it allows PWE to have more control of the player economy. Gold is still neded for kits and consumables and people actually trade with it as well.
AD requires active gathering and can be easily capped, which helps a lot fighting against botfarmers.
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Ok, so what? How has this negatively impacted you? Can your feeble brain not keep track of 3 types of currency?
The actual reason is to disconnect you from realizing you are paying real money so that you will spend more easily on impulse purchases. It's just zen...not cash. It doesnt work on everyone, but it doesnt have to, just enough suckers to make a profit and theres one born every minute. Then the AD to Zen is a trick just to give out there as it is free to play and you can get everything in game for free
This.
2 conversions = more watering down so the RL$ amount isnt always on the consumer's mind as they spend.
Sure, active gathering...
Yep. That's the theory of how it's supposed to work (does just fine in Star Trek), but yeah - giving out a pile of AD with the founder packs didn't help the situation any. And having AD used in the Auction is a twist that I'm not sure about yet...
Like we said - the sale of it in the Founder packs messed up the system a bit, but if it weren't for that it would work fine. The only real source of AD would be the daily refining, and it would act as a break on the system. Remember, buying Zen and exchanging it doesn't create any AD.... every AD in the exchange comes from another player. (Of course, the massive AD sinks that they have on vendors is going to drain it from the economy at a furious rate, if anyone uses them. I'm guessing they'll have to evaluate & tweak the system in a few months.)
AD is a time-gated currency that is resistant to inflation. PW has more control over how much is handed out compared to Gold, which people can grind as much as they want. AD's value is more stable than Gold, so it's a good currency to trade for Zen as well as control the rate that people hit end game itemization.
Gold is used mostly for basic consumables people use while playing. The more you play, the more you need the types of things Gold buys. Of course, Gold can't buy all consumables or even the good or best ones, which means the more you play, the more you want to buy things with AD ... but you can't, because it's hard to get. So if you play a lot, you're encouraged to buy Zen and trade it for AD.
Although people think that the massive amounts of AD people got with the packs broke the economy ... it didn't, because it was a one time event. When the game launched, a bunch of people had no Zen and no AD, while anyone who bought a pack had no Zen and a bunch of AD. The people with all that AD can buy anything they want, and if they run out of things to buy, they can either hoard their AD or transfer it to Zen. So, the experience for the people who paid is great.
The people who didn't pay have very little AD right now, and almost no purchasing power. They are strongly encouraged to buy a small amount of Zen and trade it for the AD from the people who bought the packs and are out of things to buy. A relatively small amount of Zen gets a lot of AD right now. So, if the people who haven't paid decide to pay a little, they get a good experience.
The people who didn't pay and don't want to pay have to wait until things settle down. The price of Zen in AD should keep dropping for a while as the initial AD stockpile leaves the market. Of course, with all that AD out there, this has also been a great time for people who find the best gear right now, as the people with the initial AD can pay a premium for anything they want.
Oh, and there are 4 main currencies, not 3: Gold, Glory, AD, and Zen. Glory will be an interesting currency to watch, because there isn't much to buy with it ... but it can quickly outfit someone with decent gear for not much work. So, a modest amount is valuable to a new 60, but after that, it's worthless. It's also difficult to trade between players, just like Gold.