Guys, I think that maybe this is one of those things that looks good on paper, but turns out to be ugly later on. I know you're seeing "higher values of AD for your zen = good for zen buyers" but there's a big messy downside that plays out when you can't control the amount of AD that gets pumped into the economy, and there's no throttle on its "real" value. We can debate whether or not 500:1 is the right number, and a good case can be made that it's not, but there has to be a throttle somewhere to keep it reined in somehow.
Think of it this way: what happens if they suddenly raise the cap from 500 to 600? Wouldn't everyone just repost their zen buy orders for 600? Congratulations, you just lowered the value of all goods on sale at the AH by 20%. That 100k you have saved up for a rainy day is now "90k" in actuality. Your buying power with AD just took a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>. Now substitute 1000:1 as a theoretical ratio and do the math... everyone's AD just lost 50% of its former value!
Removing the cap entirely and letting it ride could make things a lot, lot worse. You think the prices on the AH are crazy now?
But hey, maybe I'm wrong about all this. It wouldn't be the first time I was wrong about something.
Having all the items be bought my gold sellers and exploiters sure hurt the economy, but doesnt hurt cryptic, since they still have the extremely expensive items to sell.
on a mid to long term of course even paying customers will understand how its absurd and give up, so I hope they fix stuff before they lose EVEN more good players (like, literally EVERYONE on my guild.) and a lot more of game friends, great people who made the dreadful grind and overall awful social "community" experience on this game at least bearable.
Guys, I think that maybe this is one of those things that looks good on paper, but turns out to be ugly later on. I know you're seeing "higher values of AD for your zen = good for zen buyers" but there's a big messy downside that plays out when you can't control the amount of AD that gets pumped into the economy, and there's no throttle on its "real" value. We can debate whether or not 500:1 is the right number, and a good case can be made that it's not, but there has to be a throttle somewhere to keep it reined in somehow.
Think of it this way: what happens if they suddenly raise the cap from 500 to 600? Wouldn't everyone just repost their zen buy orders for 600? Congratulations, you just lowered the value of all goods on sale at the AH by 20%. That 100k you have saved up for a rainy day is now "90k" in actuality. Your buying power with AD just took a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>. Now substitute 1000:1 as a theoretical ratio and do the math... everyone's AD just lost 50% of its former value!
Removing the cap entirely and letting it ride could make things a lot, lot worse. You think the prices on the AH are crazy now?
But hey, maybe I'm wrong about all this. It wouldn't be the first time I was wrong about something.
Actually, I think you are correct in your assessment.
myles08807 said, "Back in my day, we didn't have any of this fancy Mulhorand gear while we were leveling . . . we walked uphill both ways while dying once every five seconds while leveling, and we liked it fine!" . . . Now, get off my lawn, you kids!" pointsman said, "I don't rue the game. In fact I don't feel any regret for the game at all." looomis said, "I don't like people changing to alts and then bragging about their mains like schizophrenic role players."
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baylen76Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 0Arc User
Prices are coming down after the exploit closure so this would be my guess too, although I personally would think it woudl be towards the lower end of the band you suggested.
Aye, it's really hard to estimate where an uncapped price would move to. Lower than 700 AD is entirely possible - I'm thinking the major share of the current backlog is from people hoping to (safely) resell, meaning Zen backlog is largely being caused by the current 'free lunch' margin of roughly 300AD/Zen.
Without a cap, the free lunch would be gone, and speculation would contain risk again.
Initially, Zen price will be high(er than the current 500) for sure, but we don't know how much Zen has been hoarded. It may even make sense to sell Zen into the initial high Zen demand if the cap were lifted in hope of buying back later at a cheaper rate. Also I'm not sure how much "interest" is contained in today's prices (how much is avoiding a 14-day delay worth?); and lastly, there's that recently fixed exploit which hopefully helps stabilizing prices mid-term.
However, if you scroll down to the backlog chart on http://nwzen.biz/ , there's so far hardly a trend change since the emergency patch was applied. Maybe there will be; but maybe there are either more serious issues out there or the actual impact of resonatorgate wasn't as big as it initially seemed.
I think the crazy thing about changing the Zen to AD ratio cap on the exchange is not where the market will settle out to in the long run (500 is really not that different than 700 or even 1000), but the transients on the way there. As soon as the cap is shifted, people holding zen may post a few sales at the new cap to see if there are any takers. Some with AD will incrementally increase their ratio amount (based off of how other are changing their listings), while a few who really don't want to wait will take the zen sales at the new cap. Prices I would imagine would almost certainly hit the cap at some point in time, and then settle to a new level. That level may well fluctuate for some time, while Zen and AD holders will try to speculate how best to make a return.
It will be a crazy few weeks until a new baseline settles out. Maybe in the end it's the right thing to do, but I certainly wouldn't advocate it while trying to launch a new mod.
Oh, and if the solution is to remove the cap as opposed to just shifting the cap, the above holds true except there will be some additional crazy speculative AD orders (from Zen holders), while trying to feel out the market. I imagine that would only prolong the process.
But, dammit Jim, I'm an engineer, not an economist
Been noticing lately all the price increases, especially on refinement stuff.
When you can buy coalescent wards and pretty much everything else you need for refining cheaper on the cash shop than in the AH...
Does that mean prices are where Cryptic would like them to be?
Does that mean bots/gold sellers/whales are taking advantage of the recent 'bacon' fiasco?
When do you think prices will settle down? Mod4? A month later?
Really, you have to ask yourself first "why would the prices go back down?"
1. ADs somehow gain value.
2. Zen somehow loses value.
I think that about covers the two possibilities. Both are unlikely, given the current climate. Zen is a LOT more rare than AD, therefore the only thing keeping the market even slightly in check is the backlog! LOL That huge slowdown is the reason things aren't worse.
But I would say that something needs to change with regards to the zen skipping the ZAX and going straight to the AH in the form of coal wards, etc. The backlog, while useful for now, is a ticking time bomb -- just like the US housing bubble back in 2008. Only a matter of time unless it's addressed, IMO.
The main issue you have with an economy in games is the same problem you have with real life economy.
The people in both worlds are generating more wealth while the system is created to a constant level of wealth. This means your money or in our case the astral diamonds are getting more in mass which means they get more and more worthless.
Some actions of Cryptic/PWE only advanced that process (bound to account the Trade Bar coalscent; similar as the USA decoupled the dollar from the gold price) which lead to a fast inflation of the astral diamond price.
Now we find our self in the situation of a stuck ZAX because it’s not like a real free market like in real life, because the limit is 500 AD to 1 Zen.
A short solution could be to kill the 500 AD limit and set it free, which would cause a hyper inflation and a massive pay wall for new players and the death to the game in about 1-3 month.
Another solution could be making a setback of bound coalscent (no account bound coalscent anymore). Personally I think this would not help much, because the economy has reached the point of no return (the inflation can only increase now).
The other way and better way is to implement Zen Items in the Woundrous Basar for the equivalent of 500 AD to 1 Zen. This would decrease the stucked amont of AD in the ZAX but will not clean it (sometimes later it will increase anyway); because we are at the point where 1 Zen is much more then 500 AD worth (I personally would assume we are at 750 to 1.000 AD)
Generally this is a problem every currency in a normal capitalistic system will face (even in games). There are two proper solutions:
1. Intervention: Cryptic/PWE close the ZAX for one entire week. All bids are getting back to their owners. In the next step Cryptic/PWE make their own offers via the auction house for several items at the lowest bid. With this action Cryptic/PWE will take a huge amount AD out of the system. Should it be not enough to push the AD-Rate below 500 it must be repeated.
2. Change the System: The actual system doesn’t work properly, so it must be changed. We need a system that values the astral diamonds by itself. The best way is it to keep a constant limit of astral diamonds in the system. Best way is if astral diamonds would vanish/voided at some point in the process.
One way could be that you earn your astral diamonds like always (24.000 refining per day) and in the end of the month you automatically lose 24.000 per day you was online + 100.000 astral diamonds. There will a natural cap of 1 million astral diamonds per player that can’t be voided. This mean the players will be in a hurry at the end of the month and trade a huge mass astral diamonds for some goods.
These are our/Cryptics options for the future.
Platypus wielding a giant hammer, your argument is invalild!
... implement Zen Items in the Woundrous Basar for the equivalent of 500 AD to 1 Zen. This would decrease the stucked amont of AD in the ZAX but will not clean it (sometimes later it will increase anyway); because we are at the point where 1 Zen is much more then 500 AD worth (I personally would assume we are at 750 to 1.000 AD)
This is what we came up with in the other thread last night. Put coal wards and respecs into the wondrous bazaar for the correct 500:1 ratio and let the market correct itself. Also, you can set a price control on the AH so that you can't post coal wards and other zen items for more than they're supposed to be worth. This eliminates the "skipping" of the ZAX that's been driving the backlog to grow.
Really, you have to ask yourself first "why would the prices go back down?"
1. ADs somehow gain value.
2. Zen somehow loses value.
I think that about covers the two possibilities. Both are unlikely, given the current climate. Zen is a LOT more rare than AD, therefore the only thing keeping the market even slightly in check is the backlog! LOL That huge slowdown is the reason things aren't worse.
But I would say that something needs to change with regards to the zen skipping the ZAX and going straight to the AH in the form of coal wards, etc. The backlog, while useful for now, is a ticking time bomb -- just like the US housing bubble back in 2008. Only a matter of time unless it's addressed, IMO.
Like the housing bubble, prices will plummet when the bubble bursts. That's good for the average player.
If the backlog wasn't 'keeping the market in check,' then a lot more Zen would get into the hands of average players. If that happens, then a lot more players are buying things from the cash shop rather than the AH. If that happens, the demand in the AH is greatly reduced.
When supply doesn't change (the whales and gold sellers are supplying the vast majority of everything on the AH) and demand is reduced, guess what happens to prices?
How do you get the backlog to disappear? Make AD more desirable than Zen. How?
Give players more options/incentives for purchasing items with AD. More refining items introduced to the Wondrous Bazaar.
First thing to note is that the in-game economy is much, much different from RL economies. For one thing, "money creation", while it does technically exist in real life, is really complicated (and involves the banking system, so it's irrelevant to Neverwinter). AD generation is more like printing money, which no RL country that wants a stable currency does (for good reason!). And don't mention the end of the gold standard.
Also, I think it's not fair to immediately pronounce the lifting of the ZAX market cap will cause the death of the game. If the cap would raise to, say, 700-1000 I think there might be overall positive effects (might, I don't know). There's no reason to think it would go higher than that.
I still firmly believe that the best, and fastest, way to solve the ZAX problem is introduce things to spend AD on. New dyes, cosmetics, and things like that in the Wondrous Bazaar would really solve the big problems. The problem is that everybody wants Zen, not too many people want AD. There aren't a whole lot of uses for AD after a certain point, especially for the casual player. Introduce some things we can get with AD, and people withdraw requests from the ZAX to spend their AD and (at least hypothetically) more people sell Zen.
How do you get the backlog to disappear? Make AD more desirable than Zen. How?
Give players more options/incentives for purchasing items with AD. More refining items introduced to the Wondrous Bazaar.
It makes sense. You can save this economy without the "backlog bubble" we are talking about "bursting" due to players leaving the game in droves. Take some steps to keep the players we have still playing by making some strategic changes here and there. Making the keys BOP was a necessary first step IMO.
From where I sit, the #1 problem I see that is causing the backlog and other currency woes is the fact that a player is VERY VERY limited in how he/she obtains a lesser enchantment for the armor/weapon slots.
1. Spend money on Zen to purchase coalescent wards for refining those shards.
2. Grind dailies/leadership/etc. to refine the maximum 24,000 RAD per day, for at least 42 days in order to obtain 1,000,000 AD and trade for 2,000 Zen so you can buy 2 coal. wards from the cash shop. That will net you 2 lesser enchants.
Anything more than 2 lesser enchants, and you'll have to multiply the 42-day grind by how many upgrades you want.
So, spend $20 dollars U.S., or spend 42 days grind for AD - it's that setup (and others that follow the same grind or pay logic) that has caused the majority of currency woes, imo.
By simply reducing/tweaking some prices (and where said items are sold), the ZAX would see a huge shift.
I can get behind that theory. Coalescents are a major sticking point in progression unless you fork over zen. I wonder if the devs are counting on that to drive zen sales with dollars?
EDIT: If this is the case, I wonder if they'll make the coals BOP soon, like the keys. It's gotta be pointless to keep allowing the goldspammers to circumvent their pay structure by offering ultra-cheap millions of AD to buy coals off of the AH.
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baylen76Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 0Arc User
Really, you have to ask yourself first "why would the prices go back down?"
1. ADs somehow gain value.
2. Zen somehow loses value.
I think that about covers the two possibilities.
Yes, it's just the "somehow" that's rather elusive:
Generally:
a) If something attractive gets added to the game that costs AD, AD gets more desirable and rises in demand -> 'true' AD/Zen shifts down.
b) If something attractive gets added to the game that costs Zen, Zen gets more desirable and 'true' AD/Zen goes up.
Then you have to factor in the current speculator situation which led to timing issues due to backlog, total AD in circulation, relation of AD added to the game (influx) to AD leaving the game (drains), same for Zen and the ratio of those numbers, plus where (on what type of player accounts) those currencies are located volume-wise (AD on saturated accounts isn't as harmful as it's not so much participating in circulation; also newer accounts spend for different things than old ones), whom the new additions appeal to, adjust for retired and returning accounts etc etc. It's quite complicated as currency holders have different interests, too, so universal solutions are rather unlikely unless you added something appealing to a broad population like uh, housing. And yes, I know some won't care about that, either, which is actually the point having led to this example.
A high AD/Zen rate is partially self-correcting over time as AD leaves the game via the percentage-based sales tax of the AH (unless it's spent directly on the Bazaar), thus players trading items over the AH *helps* drain AD / bring the exchange rate down.
Good drains would be events stimulating trade between players (AH burns AD, could raise sales tax, too) and new things added by Cryptic, generally speaking. The Gond event was quite ok from that perspective as Doohickey sales burned some AD, too. Cryptic is unlikely to either move or add Zen-Items to the Bazaar (even though that'd work as it would shift the associated demand) as that'd mean giving up some of their income. Wouldn't either if I were them.
I can get behind that theory. Coalescents are a major sticking point in progression unless you fork over zen. I wonder if the devs are counting on that to drive zen sales with dollars?
EDIT: If this is the case, I wonder if they'll make the coals BOP soon, like the keys. It's gotta be pointless to keep allowing the goldspammers to circumvent their pay structure by offering ultra-cheap millions of AD to buy coals off of the AH.
I believe Cryptic is counting on it. I just hope they realize that their is a threshold they don't want to cross. I don't know exactly what the magic number would be, but I'd venture to guess that after x-months the vast majority of players will become so frustrated by the currency problems preventing their character from advancing that they will move on to other games.
It's fine to make short-term profit, but you have to give your players a substantial reprieve if you don't want to lose them.
Anyone checked prices on coal ward? Some as low as 575k AD. That's not too far above the 500:1 ratio. Maybe things are slowly getting better.
Unfortunately, I suspect this is a by-product of the massive AD-laundering going on after last week's 'bacon' fiasco, combined with a backlog of coal wards and p.vorpals than now need to be liquidated for various reasons.
Good drains would be events stimulating trade between players (AH burns AD, could raise sales tax, too) and new things added by Cryptic, generally speaking. The Gond event was quite ok from that perspective as Doohickey sales burned some AD, too. Cryptic is unlikely to either move or add Zen-Items to the Bazaar (even though that'd work as it would shift the associated demand) as that'd mean giving up some of their income. Wouldn't either if I were them.
Agreed. But you have to wonder if they aren't already losing to the endless spammers plaguing PE with rotating accounts advertising 1 million AD for less than 5 dollars. People must be using them, or else these A-holes wouldn't be so dang ubiquitous.
EDIT: in re to the coal pricing... i saw one for 540k earlier. it sold immediately. the ones for 560 went shortly afterwards. I noticed that the ones staying listed for more than an hour are around 600 or so, so maybe the "reasonably sellable rate" is somewhere just under 600 -- today, anyway.
The main issue you have with an economy in games is the same problem you have with real life economy.
The people in both worlds are generating more wealth while the system is created to a constant level of wealth. This means your money or in our case the astral diamonds are getting more in mass which means they get more and more worthless.
Some actions of Cryptic/PWE only advanced that process (bound to account the Trade Bar coalscent; similar as the USA decoupled the dollar from the gold price) which lead to a fast inflation of the astral diamond price.
Now we find our self in the situation of a stuck ZAX because it’s not like a real free market like in real life, because the limit is 500 AD to 1 Zen.
A short solution could be to kill the 500 AD limit and set it free, which would cause a hyper inflation and a massive pay wall for new players and the death to the game in about 1-3 month.
Another solution could be making a setback of bound coalscent (no account bound coalscent anymore). Personally I think this would not help much, because the economy has reached the point of no return (the inflation can only increase now).
The other way and better way is to implement Zen Items in the Woundrous Basar for the equivalent of 500 AD to 1 Zen. This would decrease the stucked amont of AD in the ZAX but will not clean it (sometimes later it will increase anyway); because we are at the point where 1 Zen is much more then 500 AD worth (I personally would assume we are at 750 to 1.000 AD)
Generally this is a problem every currency in a normal capitalistic system will face (even in games). There are two proper solutions:
1. Intervention: Cryptic/PWE close the ZAX for one entire week. All bids are getting back to their owners. In the next step Cryptic/PWE make their own offers via the auction house for several items at the lowest bid. With this action Cryptic/PWE will take a huge amount AD out of the system. Should it be not enough to push the AD-Rate below 500 it must be repeated.
2. Change the System: The actual system doesn’t work properly, so it must be changed. We need a system that values the astral diamonds by itself. The best way is it to keep a constant limit of astral diamonds in the system. Best way is if astral diamonds would vanish/voided at some point in the process.
One way could be that you earn your astral diamonds like always (24.000 refining per day) and in the end of the month you automatically lose 24.000 per day you was online + 100.000 astral diamonds. There will a natural cap of 1 million astral diamonds per player that can’t be voided. This mean the players will be in a hurry at the end of the month and trade a huge mass astral diamonds for some goods.
These are our/Cryptics options for the future.
I think I have an issue or two with your proposals:
-Institute a 1 million AD hard cap? Really? How many long-term players do you suppose that's going to <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> off? How many whales?
-Close the Zax and royally <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> off the people who have been in line for a week-10 days and make them all start over at some point when it re-opens...cutting new players off from converting cash to AD conpletely in the interim? How does that help?
-Have Cryptic place bids on all the low-priced items on the AH? Surely you can't be serious? How is driving prices on the AH UP a good thing? It's possible I simply don't understand this suggestion, but I can't see any reading of that where the game company entering the player market is a good thing except in cases of rampant deflation...which we most assuredly do not have.
-People keep on about how $20/million AD is a fine number to stick with. It's not. Two reasons; first is that 1 million AD buys a helluva lot less than it did when that cap was created...so people keep spending more to get less (the net purchasing power of theur $20 in AD on the AH has plummeted compared to even a couple of months ago), second is that it continues to fuel an apparently robust 3rd party currency market.
If that market can't be controlled by spotting/banning bots, filtering chat so spammers don't get to advertise (not hard so don't say it is), etc then the only way left (and as far as I'm concerned, the best possible way) is to make it unprofitable. 1 million AD @$20 makes their $5/million look very attractive to some people. 1 million at $10 (1000:1) less so, and 1 million at $7.50 (1500:1) a lot less so.
Ok guys, even though i am a F2P gamer, i don't waste my time on free games that get lousy reviews from other players online. Just because I'm F2P doesn't mean I'll get whatever comes my way,i appreciate my time and wish to be well spent. Also I'm a potential paying customer, but for me to pay i have to feel that the game welcomes me a F2P player first. Do you know that i was seriously considering paying for Zen,in order to support the company, when these "Force Buy Zen or wait forever" changes hit the game?
Ok guys, even though i am a F2P gamer, i don't waste my time on free games that get lousy reviews from other players online. Just because I'm F2P doesn't mean I'll get whatever comes my way,i appreciate my time and wish to be well spent. Also I'm a potential paying customer, but for me to pay i have to feel that the game welcomes me a F2P player first. Do you know that i was seriously considering paying for Zen,in order to support the company, when these "Force Buy Zen or wait forever" changes hit the game?
Sadly I've been trying to explain that you exist and are the norm and no one buys it. They all seem to think that there are only whales and people that should leave.
Ok guys, even though i am a F2P gamer, i don't waste my time on free games that get lousy reviews from other players online. Just because I'm F2P doesn't mean I'll get whatever comes my way,i appreciate my time and wish to be well spent. Also I'm a potential paying customer, but for me to pay i have to feel that the game welcomes me a F2P player first. Do you know that i was seriously considering paying for Zen,in order to support the company, when these "Force Buy Zen or wait forever" changes hit the game?
Well, realistically where would you go from this game? This is the 2nd best MMO in the west, with the first being full money only. NW has changed its monetization technique to mirror this advancement. That's all.
Well, realistically where would you go from this game? This is the 2nd best MMO in the west, with the first being full money only. NW has changed its monetization technique to mirror this advancement. That's all.
Rift
Lotro
DDO
TSW
GW2
Defiance
are all f2p or buy 2 play options from the top of my head with comparable quality.
Also I'm a potential paying customer, but for me to pay i have to feel that the game welcomes me a F2P player first. Do you know that i was seriously considering paying for Zen,in order to support the company, when these "Force Buy Zen or wait forever" changes hit the game?
I was always under the impression that a F2P game model was based on a pretty simple assumption:
You can play the majority of the game for free so that you can decide if you like the game enough to start spending money on it.
You are only "forced" to buy Zen when your character reaches endgame, tbh.
You were probably considering purchasing Zen because you have nearly reached endgame, right?
If the ZAX bothers you, it's only because you want to use it rather than giving actual money to Cryptic/PW.
On the other hand, what bother's me is that some key items that are needed to progress your character at endgame are only sold in the cash shop, and at a pretty high price. Personally, I'd spend a WHOLE LOT MORE $$$ on the cash shop if I could get more value for my zen. These sorts of things are impulse buys, most of the time, and impulse buys require low prices.
Rift
Lotro
DDO
TSW
GW2
Defiance
are all f2p or buy 2 play options from the top of my head with comparable quality.
I personally have high hopes for EQ Next when it comes out. Landmark seemed like a nice environment and all it takes is a well made game to put all of the flaws neverwinter has to shame. Mod 4 might be better than the other modules and provide more, we'll have to see. They need to put some work in to keep me interested in this game after all of the negative changes recently to this game, and once I'm gone, I'm not going to came back to any game they come out with in future. It's a shame when a lot of people have already got fed up and left though.
I was always under the impression that a F2P game model was based on a pretty simple assumption:
You can play the majority of the game for free so that you can decide if you like the game enough to start spending money on it.
You are only "forced" to buy Zen when your character reaches endgame, tbh.
You were probably considering purchasing Zen because you have nearly reached endgame, right?
If the ZAX bothers you, it's only because you want to use it rather than giving actual money to Cryptic/PW.
On the other hand, what bother's me is that some key items that are needed to progress your character at endgame are only sold in the cash shop, and at a pretty high price. Personally, I'd spend a WHOLE LOT MORE $$$ on the cash shop if I could get more value for my zen. These sorts of things are impulse buys, most of the time, and impulse buys require low prices.
It's not just that. The ZAX problems are indicative of fundamental problems in the game. You don't put money into something you think will likely fail no matter if you like it or not. I like this game and put money into it at first, and still would except that no matter how much I like this game, I think it has too many issues to last very long and because of this I can't justify spending my money anymore.
Comments
Think of it this way: what happens if they suddenly raise the cap from 500 to 600? Wouldn't everyone just repost their zen buy orders for 600? Congratulations, you just lowered the value of all goods on sale at the AH by 20%. That 100k you have saved up for a rainy day is now "90k" in actuality. Your buying power with AD just took a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>. Now substitute 1000:1 as a theoretical ratio and do the math... everyone's AD just lost 50% of its former value!
Removing the cap entirely and letting it ride could make things a lot, lot worse. You think the prices on the AH are crazy now?
But hey, maybe I'm wrong about all this. It wouldn't be the first time I was wrong about something.
Test grade = C+
Post was successful, but reduction in overall grade due to lack of capitalization of the initial "T" in the post.
on a mid to long term of course even paying customers will understand how its absurd and give up, so I hope they fix stuff before they lose EVEN more good players (like, literally EVERYONE on my guild.) and a lot more of game friends, great people who made the dreadful grind and overall awful social "community" experience on this game at least bearable.
Actually, I think you are correct in your assessment.
myles08807 said, "Back in my day, we didn't have any of this fancy Mulhorand gear while we were leveling . . . we walked uphill both ways while dying once every five seconds while leveling, and we liked it fine!" . . . Now, get off my lawn, you kids!"
pointsman said, "I don't rue the game. In fact I don't feel any regret for the game at all."
looomis said, "I don't like people changing to alts and then bragging about their mains like schizophrenic role players."
Aye, it's really hard to estimate where an uncapped price would move to. Lower than 700 AD is entirely possible - I'm thinking the major share of the current backlog is from people hoping to (safely) resell, meaning Zen backlog is largely being caused by the current 'free lunch' margin of roughly 300AD/Zen.
Without a cap, the free lunch would be gone, and speculation would contain risk again.
Initially, Zen price will be high(er than the current 500) for sure, but we don't know how much Zen has been hoarded. It may even make sense to sell Zen into the initial high Zen demand if the cap were lifted in hope of buying back later at a cheaper rate. Also I'm not sure how much "interest" is contained in today's prices (how much is avoiding a 14-day delay worth?); and lastly, there's that recently fixed exploit which hopefully helps stabilizing prices mid-term.
However, if you scroll down to the backlog chart on http://nwzen.biz/ , there's so far hardly a trend change since the emergency patch was applied. Maybe there will be; but maybe there are either more serious issues out there or the actual impact of resonatorgate wasn't as big as it initially seemed.
Prob'ly too early to tell.
It will be a crazy few weeks until a new baseline settles out. Maybe in the end it's the right thing to do, but I certainly wouldn't advocate it while trying to launch a new mod.
Oh, and if the solution is to remove the cap as opposed to just shifting the cap, the above holds true except there will be some additional crazy speculative AD orders (from Zen holders), while trying to feel out the market. I imagine that would only prolong the process.
But, dammit Jim, I'm an engineer, not an economist
Because if they want to fix it, and they are not capable to do so, it's even worse.
When you can buy coalescent wards and pretty much everything else you need for refining cheaper on the cash shop than in the AH...
Does that mean prices are where Cryptic would like them to be?
Does that mean bots/gold sellers/whales are taking advantage of the recent 'bacon' fiasco?
When do you think prices will settle down? Mod4? A month later?
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1. ADs somehow gain value.
2. Zen somehow loses value.
I think that about covers the two possibilities. Both are unlikely, given the current climate. Zen is a LOT more rare than AD, therefore the only thing keeping the market even slightly in check is the backlog! LOL That huge slowdown is the reason things aren't worse.
But I would say that something needs to change with regards to the zen skipping the ZAX and going straight to the AH in the form of coal wards, etc. The backlog, while useful for now, is a ticking time bomb -- just like the US housing bubble back in 2008. Only a matter of time unless it's addressed, IMO.
The main issue you have with an economy in games is the same problem you have with real life economy.
The people in both worlds are generating more wealth while the system is created to a constant level of wealth. This means your money or in our case the astral diamonds are getting more in mass which means they get more and more worthless.
Some actions of Cryptic/PWE only advanced that process (bound to account the Trade Bar coalscent; similar as the USA decoupled the dollar from the gold price) which lead to a fast inflation of the astral diamond price.
Now we find our self in the situation of a stuck ZAX because it’s not like a real free market like in real life, because the limit is 500 AD to 1 Zen.
A short solution could be to kill the 500 AD limit and set it free, which would cause a hyper inflation and a massive pay wall for new players and the death to the game in about 1-3 month.
Another solution could be making a setback of bound coalscent (no account bound coalscent anymore). Personally I think this would not help much, because the economy has reached the point of no return (the inflation can only increase now).
The other way and better way is to implement Zen Items in the Woundrous Basar for the equivalent of 500 AD to 1 Zen. This would decrease the stucked amont of AD in the ZAX but will not clean it (sometimes later it will increase anyway); because we are at the point where 1 Zen is much more then 500 AD worth (I personally would assume we are at 750 to 1.000 AD)
Generally this is a problem every currency in a normal capitalistic system will face (even in games). There are two proper solutions:
1. Intervention: Cryptic/PWE close the ZAX for one entire week. All bids are getting back to their owners. In the next step Cryptic/PWE make their own offers via the auction house for several items at the lowest bid. With this action Cryptic/PWE will take a huge amount AD out of the system. Should it be not enough to push the AD-Rate below 500 it must be repeated.
2. Change the System: The actual system doesn’t work properly, so it must be changed. We need a system that values the astral diamonds by itself. The best way is it to keep a constant limit of astral diamonds in the system. Best way is if astral diamonds would vanish/voided at some point in the process.
One way could be that you earn your astral diamonds like always (24.000 refining per day) and in the end of the month you automatically lose 24.000 per day you was online + 100.000 astral diamonds. There will a natural cap of 1 million astral diamonds per player that can’t be voided. This mean the players will be in a hurry at the end of the month and trade a huge mass astral diamonds for some goods.
These are our/Cryptics options for the future.
This is what we came up with in the other thread last night. Put coal wards and respecs into the wondrous bazaar for the correct 500:1 ratio and let the market correct itself. Also, you can set a price control on the AH so that you can't post coal wards and other zen items for more than they're supposed to be worth. This eliminates the "skipping" of the ZAX that's been driving the backlog to grow.
Like the housing bubble, prices will plummet when the bubble bursts. That's good for the average player.
If the backlog wasn't 'keeping the market in check,' then a lot more Zen would get into the hands of average players. If that happens, then a lot more players are buying things from the cash shop rather than the AH. If that happens, the demand in the AH is greatly reduced.
When supply doesn't change (the whales and gold sellers are supplying the vast majority of everything on the AH) and demand is reduced, guess what happens to prices?
How do you get the backlog to disappear? Make AD more desirable than Zen. How?
Give players more options/incentives for purchasing items with AD. More refining items introduced to the Wondrous Bazaar.
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Also, I think it's not fair to immediately pronounce the lifting of the ZAX market cap will cause the death of the game. If the cap would raise to, say, 700-1000 I think there might be overall positive effects (might, I don't know). There's no reason to think it would go higher than that.
I still firmly believe that the best, and fastest, way to solve the ZAX problem is introduce things to spend AD on. New dyes, cosmetics, and things like that in the Wondrous Bazaar would really solve the big problems. The problem is that everybody wants Zen, not too many people want AD. There aren't a whole lot of uses for AD after a certain point, especially for the casual player. Introduce some things we can get with AD, and people withdraw requests from the ZAX to spend their AD and (at least hypothetically) more people sell Zen.
EDIT: Kinda ninja'd by above poster.
It makes sense. You can save this economy without the "backlog bubble" we are talking about "bursting" due to players leaving the game in droves. Take some steps to keep the players we have still playing by making some strategic changes here and there. Making the keys BOP was a necessary first step IMO.
EDIT: anharmon said it better than me. LOL
Happens to me all the time.
From where I sit, the #1 problem I see that is causing the backlog and other currency woes is the fact that a player is VERY VERY limited in how he/she obtains a lesser enchantment for the armor/weapon slots.
1. Spend money on Zen to purchase coalescent wards for refining those shards.
2. Grind dailies/leadership/etc. to refine the maximum 24,000 RAD per day, for at least 42 days in order to obtain 1,000,000 AD and trade for 2,000 Zen so you can buy 2 coal. wards from the cash shop. That will net you 2 lesser enchants.
Anything more than 2 lesser enchants, and you'll have to multiply the 42-day grind by how many upgrades you want.
So, spend $20 dollars U.S., or spend 42 days grind for AD - it's that setup (and others that follow the same grind or pay logic) that has caused the majority of currency woes, imo.
By simply reducing/tweaking some prices (and where said items are sold), the ZAX would see a huge shift.
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EDIT: If this is the case, I wonder if they'll make the coals BOP soon, like the keys. It's gotta be pointless to keep allowing the goldspammers to circumvent their pay structure by offering ultra-cheap millions of AD to buy coals off of the AH.
Yes, it's just the "somehow" that's rather elusive:
Generally:
a) If something attractive gets added to the game that costs AD, AD gets more desirable and rises in demand -> 'true' AD/Zen shifts down.
b) If something attractive gets added to the game that costs Zen, Zen gets more desirable and 'true' AD/Zen goes up.
Then you have to factor in the current speculator situation which led to timing issues due to backlog, total AD in circulation, relation of AD added to the game (influx) to AD leaving the game (drains), same for Zen and the ratio of those numbers, plus where (on what type of player accounts) those currencies are located volume-wise (AD on saturated accounts isn't as harmful as it's not so much participating in circulation; also newer accounts spend for different things than old ones), whom the new additions appeal to, adjust for retired and returning accounts etc etc. It's quite complicated as currency holders have different interests, too, so universal solutions are rather unlikely unless you added something appealing to a broad population like uh, housing. And yes, I know some won't care about that, either, which is actually the point having led to this example.
A high AD/Zen rate is partially self-correcting over time as AD leaves the game via the percentage-based sales tax of the AH (unless it's spent directly on the Bazaar), thus players trading items over the AH *helps* drain AD / bring the exchange rate down.
Good drains would be events stimulating trade between players (AH burns AD, could raise sales tax, too) and new things added by Cryptic, generally speaking. The Gond event was quite ok from that perspective as Doohickey sales burned some AD, too. Cryptic is unlikely to either move or add Zen-Items to the Bazaar (even though that'd work as it would shift the associated demand) as that'd mean giving up some of their income. Wouldn't either if I were them.
I believe Cryptic is counting on it. I just hope they realize that their is a threshold they don't want to cross. I don't know exactly what the magic number would be, but I'd venture to guess that after x-months the vast majority of players will become so frustrated by the currency problems preventing their character from advancing that they will move on to other games.
It's fine to make short-term profit, but you have to give your players a substantial reprieve if you don't want to lose them.
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Agreed. But you have to wonder if they aren't already losing to the endless spammers plaguing PE with rotating accounts advertising 1 million AD for less than 5 dollars. People must be using them, or else these A-holes wouldn't be so dang ubiquitous.
EDIT: in re to the coal pricing... i saw one for 540k earlier. it sold immediately. the ones for 560 went shortly afterwards. I noticed that the ones staying listed for more than an hour are around 600 or so, so maybe the "reasonably sellable rate" is somewhere just under 600 -- today, anyway.
I think I have an issue or two with your proposals:
-Institute a 1 million AD hard cap? Really? How many long-term players do you suppose that's going to <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> off? How many whales?
-Close the Zax and royally <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> off the people who have been in line for a week-10 days and make them all start over at some point when it re-opens...cutting new players off from converting cash to AD conpletely in the interim? How does that help?
-Have Cryptic place bids on all the low-priced items on the AH? Surely you can't be serious? How is driving prices on the AH UP a good thing? It's possible I simply don't understand this suggestion, but I can't see any reading of that where the game company entering the player market is a good thing except in cases of rampant deflation...which we most assuredly do not have.
-People keep on about how $20/million AD is a fine number to stick with. It's not. Two reasons; first is that 1 million AD buys a helluva lot less than it did when that cap was created...so people keep spending more to get less (the net purchasing power of theur $20 in AD on the AH has plummeted compared to even a couple of months ago), second is that it continues to fuel an apparently robust 3rd party currency market.
If that market can't be controlled by spotting/banning bots, filtering chat so spammers don't get to advertise (not hard so don't say it is), etc then the only way left (and as far as I'm concerned, the best possible way) is to make it unprofitable. 1 million AD @$20 makes their $5/million look very attractive to some people. 1 million at $10 (1000:1) less so, and 1 million at $7.50 (1500:1) a lot less so.
Well, realistically where would you go from this game? This is the 2nd best MMO in the west, with the first being full money only. NW has changed its monetization technique to mirror this advancement. That's all.
Rift
Lotro
DDO
TSW
GW2
Defiance
are all f2p or buy 2 play options from the top of my head with comparable quality.
I was always under the impression that a F2P game model was based on a pretty simple assumption:
You can play the majority of the game for free so that you can decide if you like the game enough to start spending money on it.
You are only "forced" to buy Zen when your character reaches endgame, tbh.
You were probably considering purchasing Zen because you have nearly reached endgame, right?
If the ZAX bothers you, it's only because you want to use it rather than giving actual money to Cryptic/PW.
On the other hand, what bother's me is that some key items that are needed to progress your character at endgame are only sold in the cash shop, and at a pretty high price. Personally, I'd spend a WHOLE LOT MORE $$$ on the cash shop if I could get more value for my zen. These sorts of things are impulse buys, most of the time, and impulse buys require low prices.
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I personally have high hopes for EQ Next when it comes out. Landmark seemed like a nice environment and all it takes is a well made game to put all of the flaws neverwinter has to shame. Mod 4 might be better than the other modules and provide more, we'll have to see. They need to put some work in to keep me interested in this game after all of the negative changes recently to this game, and once I'm gone, I'm not going to came back to any game they come out with in future. It's a shame when a lot of people have already got fed up and left though.
None of them better than this game. Also, TSW, GW2 is money only.
It's not just that. The ZAX problems are indicative of fundamental problems in the game. You don't put money into something you think will likely fail no matter if you like it or not. I like this game and put money into it at first, and still would except that no matter how much I like this game, I think it has too many issues to last very long and because of this I can't justify spending my money anymore.