Well, backlog is now at 15k and still rising. If the imbalance between Zen and AD is too big, it could go on forever
The basic problem is that there is too much AD available for buying Zen.
This can be remedied two ways: * Reduce overall AD generation. * Give AD more value so it is spent as AD and not converted to Zen
My suggestion for reducing AD generation without hurting the normal player too much would be aggressively combating the bots. The bots in RQ must be generating significant amounts of AD.
To make people spend we need something that has game value, and that can be upgraded repeatedly for big AD. Exactly what is hard to say.. you would not want the game to go pay to win either. We definitely needs to have some AD drained from the game.
what do you exactly mean by botting RQ ? i mean the player still has to be behind the screen to play no ? IF yes then you can't really call them a bot since they are using thier time to generate currency so calling them a bot is more of an insult but IF NO and they are doing the HAMSTER automaticly then yes i'm with combatting this not sure what everyone's opinion is
He means bot as there is no player behind the screen.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
So it been about a years I didnt played, but what happens to the astral market. I cant see any listing for Zen? Do I just need to post like 50k astral for the maximun 500to1 and wait? Also about a simple solution will be to just drop the available amount of refine brute astral by day. It seem to have go up to 32k but if I remember it was like 8k some time ago. I think 8k by day it a good rate plus like say 15k for Vip or something like that.
So it been about a years I didnt played, but what happens to the astral market. I cant see any listing for Zen? Do I just need to post like 50k astral for the maximun 500to1 and wait? Also about a simple solution will be to just drop the available amount of refine brute astral by day. It seem to have go up to 32k but if I remember it was like 8k some time ago. I think 8k by day it a good rate plus like say 15k for Vip or something like that.
That won't change a damn. AD will indeed be more valuable but then refinement items such as SMOPs and GMOPs will be overpriced. This backlog is increasing (will get to maybe 18-21 mil) because of the Jubilee. Will go back down to 5 mil at most after it's done, or maybe after summer event. Will also go down from the zen sale they're having, as people will buy zen to get those bonus items ya can get.
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plasticbatMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 12,405Arc User
So it been about a years I didnt played, but what happens to the astral market. I cant see any listing for Zen? Do I just need to post like 50k astral for the maximun 500to1 and wait? Also about a simple solution will be to just drop the available amount of refine brute astral by day. It seem to have go up to 32k but if I remember it was like 8k some time ago. I think 8k by day it a good rate plus like say 15k for Vip or something like that.
As long as there is a backlog in 500:1 in buy Zen, there will be no listing in sell Zen. You can see listing in sell Zen only after the 500:1 in buy Zen is empty. Yes, you will have to post for 500:1 and wait. You can only have 2 active listings. So, unless you keep on cancelling and re-posting daily (and be dropped to the bottom of the queue everyday), what you said does not work well in practice.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
Ok thanks. I will give a try and post 500to1 and wait a few day.
"You can only have 2 active listings. So, unless you keep on cancelling and re-posting daily (and be dropped to the bottom of the queue everyday), what you said does not work well in practice. "@plasticbat
I think you missunderstood my 2nd paragraph. It was about a solution to help give astral diamond some value and help drop thebacklog. Refining brute diamond have a limit of 32 or 36 k rightnow. But it was not always like that and it was not like that in Sto also. It got to have a limit of like only 8k by day. It mean you was just able to have 8k refined astral diamond by day. So it was harder to have diamond.
Ok thanks. I will give a try and post 500to1 and wait a few day.
"You can only have 2 active listings. So, unless you keep on cancelling and re-posting daily (and be dropped to the bottom of the queue everyday), what you said does not work well in practice. "@plasticbat
I think you missunderstood my 2nd paragraph. It was about a solution to help give astral diamond some value and help drop thebacklog. Refining brute diamond have a limit of 32 or 36 k rightnow. But it was not always like that and it was not like that in Sto also. It got to have a limit of like only 8k by day. It mean you was just able to have 8k refined astral diamond by day. So it was harder to have diamond.
You can expect backlog of 1 million takes about 1 day. So, 15 million will take ~15 days.
8K cap was not some time ago. It was long time ago. When I joined in around mod 3, the cap was already over 20K.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
What would happen if there was an npc vendor who only traded in rough astral diamonds for the maximum amount? 1 zen for 500 rough astral diamonds
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putzboy78Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,950Arc User
The reason for a ZAX backlog is simple. The value of ZEN exceeds the value of AD. That's because of a cap on ZEN prices which artificially lowers the cost of ZEN and increases demand. This is basic economics. In theory the resolutions should come in two forms. Doing just #1 will appropriately align the cost of AD to ZEN but you will quickly find coal wards will cost over 1M AD each.
1) remove the cap on ZAX cost
2) re-balance the demand for items purchases in via ZEN vs purchases via AD. The reason you see a backlog is there is more demand to buy keys, wards, and services (ZEN) than there is for purchasing marks, enchanting stones, and RP (AD). The only real gear you can buy with AD is mastercraft which most either consider to not be BIS or not worth the high cost of production.
Each platform is different but PC does have a long history of events that allowed high rates of AD production to go unfettered for years. Couple that with once reaching BIS, you only need to spend a few million per mod to get the latest toys to return to BIS, those individuals generally acquire more AD than they spend creating a backlog in currency to be leveraged.
> @frogwalloper#6494 said: > What would happen if there was an npc vendor who only traded in rough astral diamonds for the maximum amount? > 1 zen for 500 rough astral diamonds
A large portion of people who bought zen now would not buy it with real money and Cryptics would lose a lot of money and the game quality will go to hell. Or it would become endless grind or pay to win. Imagine if a dollar would buy you a thousand zen instead of 100 (to encourage spending) and ward prices would go up 10x etc.... You would be back to square one.
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arcanjo86Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,093Arc User
protector jubillee is coming to the game aniversary(usualy they do -50% zen discount on first day and on last day, this may change) so the demanding for zen is too high to the amount of zen bought with cash by players, you just have to put the exchange and wait for it or charge your account with zen using cash.
We have more people knowing how to make AD effectively than console players. You will get your Zen.
But console players can actually play the market - buy low, sell high - short term or long. Some players make hundreds of thousands of AD in the background while they play the game. It's a shame PC players miss out on that because that aspect of the game can be fun too.
I wonder how much longer that'll last, though. When I started playing on PS4 around Christmas, Zen was selling for around 395 AD. Yesterday it passed 480, and will probably settle in somewhere between 450-460 this weekend. Looks like our AD to Zen ratio is slowly lopsiding too.
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plasticbatMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 12,405Arc User
We have more people knowing how to make AD effectively than console players. You will get your Zen.
But console players can actually play the market - buy low, sell high - short term or long. Some players make hundreds of thousands of AD in the background while they play the game. It's a shame PC players miss out on that because that aspect of the game can be fun too.
I wonder how much longer that'll last, though. When I started playing on PS4 around Christmas, Zen was selling for around 395 AD. Yesterday it passed 480, and will probably settle in somewhere between 450-460 this weekend. Looks like our AD to Zen ratio is slowly lopsiding too.
PC was like that too long time ago. Console is just following the same path. The smarter the players are, the faster it will reach to 500. It will get there. If not, it means there is a disaster.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
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kreatyveMember, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 10,545Community Moderator
We have more people knowing how to make AD effectively than console players. You will get your Zen.
But console players can actually play the market - buy low, sell high - short term or long. Some players make hundreds of thousands of AD in the background while they play the game. It's a shame PC players miss out on that because that aspect of the game can be fun too.
I wonder how much longer that'll last, though. When I started playing on PS4 around Christmas, Zen was selling for around 395 AD. Yesterday it passed 480, and will probably settle in somewhere between 450-460 this weekend. Looks like our AD to Zen ratio is slowly lopsiding too.
PC was like that too long time ago. Console is just following the same path. The smarter the players are, the faster it will reach to 500. It will get there. If not, it means there is a disaster.
A large part of the issue on PC is the bots. They completely ruin the economy. Console doesn't have these issues so they don't have the bot issue that PC has. There are a lot of other factors to take into consideration, but the bots are probably the worst issue for PC.
My opinions are my own. I do not work for PWE or Cryptic. - Forum Rules - Protector's Enclave Discord - I play on Xbox Any of my comments not posted in orange are based on my own personal opinion and not official. Any messages written in orange are official moderation messages. Signature images are now fixed!
putzboy78 had it right. Too many items on zen market that cannot be gathered with AD that are needed (or heavily desired) in the game. Rebalancing this by making items available for AD purchasing may be an answer. One way to do this is make items bought from zen unbound and those bought with AD bound. That way players can still achieve their goals without the bots ruining the market. Things like Keys require a different focus. the Zen bought enchanted key is the only way to get legendary mounts. But if lesser versions of this key were able to be bought with AD, that couldn't get legendary items, and be bound to account (so as not to ruin the market), then the pressure on ZAX may balance significantly. Just some thoughts
What the game needs are some massive AD sinks, and a lot of small AD sinks, and an increase in difficulty of making millions of AD a day from trivial effort (with no risk).
That's where I think some wriggle room would be helpful since it enable players to speculate, and they become additional AD sinks. But that's no longer possible on the PC while the exchange is stuck up against the cap.
We have more people knowing how to make AD effectively than console players. You will get your Zen.
But console players can actually play the market - buy low, sell high - short term or long. Some players make hundreds of thousands of AD in the background while they play the game. It's a shame PC players miss out on that because that aspect of the game can be fun too.
I wonder how much longer that'll last, though. When I started playing on PS4 around Christmas, Zen was selling for around 395 AD. Yesterday it passed 480, and will probably settle in somewhere between 450-460 this weekend. Looks like our AD to Zen ratio is slowly lopsiding too.
PC was like that too long time ago. Console is just following the same path. The smarter the players are, the faster it will reach to 500. It will get there. If not, it means there is a disaster.
A large part of the issue on PC is the bots. They completely ruin the economy. Console doesn't have these issues so they don't have the bot issue that PC has. There are a lot of other factors to take into consideration, but the bots are probably the worst issue for PC.
Bots used to be a problem, a prolific problem. I'm not saying they don't still exist but I'd say their population has been reduced by a considerable amount. They really only exist now in RED. I'm not saying that is ok, but blaming everything in bots is one of the reasons so many terrible and heavy handed adjustments were made in the past. Adjustments that made certain things in the game entirely useless and/or pointless.
Neverwinter Module 6: The only MMO expansion in the history of MMO's to remove more content than it added.
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plasticbatMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 12,405Arc User
What the game needs are some massive AD sinks, and a lot of small AD sinks, and an increase in difficulty of making millions of AD a day from trivial effort (with no risk).
That's where I think some wriggle room would be helpful since it enable players to speculate, and they become additional AD sinks. But that's no longer possible on the PC while the exchange is stuck up against the cap.
AD changing hand is not a AD sink. In fact, there is no AD sink in the Zen Exchange at all. AH at least vapourize 10% AD for each transaction.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
AD changing hand is not a AD sink. In fact, there is no AD sink in the Zen Exchange at all. AH at least vapourize 10% AD for each transaction.
So you have people buying zen at a low AD cost, then turning around and selling the same zen for a higher AD cost over and over again - occasionally spending the profit on high value items in the AH.
Wouldn't that be a sink?
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plasticbatMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 12,405Arc User
AD changing hand is not a AD sink. In fact, there is no AD sink in the Zen Exchange at all. AH at least vapourize 10% AD for each transaction.
So you have people buying zen at a low AD cost, then turning around and selling the same zen for a higher AD cost over and over again - occasionally spending the profit on high value items in the AH.
Wouldn't that be a sink?
No, AD sink is about removing AD from economy. You have 1 million and buy Zen. Your million is passed to the person who sell you Zen. That million is in his hand. It is not removed from the economy. Another person gives his 2 million for your Zen. You have the 2 million. The first seller has 1 million. All 3 millions still exist in the economy.
Of course, if you factor in 'spending' that 3 million through AH, yes, certain AD will drop to the AD sink but the effect has nothing to do with Zax. The 3 million can be spend without anyone buying any Zen.
If you buy GMOP from AD store (which is an AD sink), your AD will be 100% vapourized. If you buy GMOP from AH, only 10% of the AD will be vapourized.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
And how are they to differentiate a bot from a regular player?
Indeed, that is the tricky question.
There are things that can be done both to discover botting and to prevent botting.
I'll not discuss the discover part in detail here as much of it can be countered by the botters - I do not want to help them If you know what to look for it usually is fairly obvious in the 3-man dungeons that you have a bot with you.
On the prevent side there is some standard technology to catch botters, notably captcha in different variants.
I must say, though.. I am a professional programmer and I have an idea of what it takes to make these bots. There is some very heavy effort invested into making them run the 3-man dungeons as well as they do. I think they must be accessing and analyzing the data segment of the game client process to get info. It is technically possible, but definitely a nontrivial thing to do.
1
minotaur2857Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,141Arc User
Part of the reason for the cap is the exploits that generated almost unlimited ADs in the past. When it goes up to 100K zen per AD, legitimate players find it impossible to ever get hold of any zen. Capping at 500 means everybody gets it slowly.
The most valuable thing now for me in VIP is the damn travel post, and the second the mailbox.
For me, the most valuable things in VIP right from the beginning have always been travel post, bank and then mailbox. That was why I got VIP 12 (for bank) in the first week when VIP was available. Enchanted keys for me are icing.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
Another reason for the higher backlog are current AH ward prices. If you don't need the AD immediately you will get a better deal spending your Zen on wards and then selling them via AH. Double so if you have stocked up on invoking bags and buy them having a stack of 15% off all/refinement items vouchers.
10 Preservation Wards = 85 Zen = 42500 AD from Zax vs. 65000 * (1-0,1[AH fee]) = 58500 AD from AH (+37,6% compared to Zax)
Even without voucher you make 17% AD more than using Zax.
Well, backlog is now at 15k and still rising. If the imbalance between Zen and AD is too big, it could go on forever
The basic problem is that there is too much AD available for buying Zen.
This can be remedied two ways: * Reduce overall AD generation. * Give AD more value so it is spent as AD and not converted to Zen
My suggestion for reducing AD generation without hurting the normal player too much would be aggressively combating the bots. The bots in RQ must be generating significant amounts of AD.
To make people spend we need something that has game value, and that can be upgraded repeatedly for big AD. Exactly what is hard to say.. you would not want the game to go pay to win either. We definitely needs to have some AD drained from the game.
what do you exactly mean by botting RQ ? i mean the player still has to be behind the screen to play no ? IF yes then you can't really call them a bot since they are using thier time to generate currency so calling them a bot is more of an insult but IF NO and they are doing the HAMSTER automaticly then yes i'm with combatting this not sure what everyone's opinion is
No. They do not need to be behind the screen. Bot behaviour is actually very easy to spot.
Bots stop at all campfires, even when their health is full. Most players ignore campfires, even when they are not at full health.
Bot pathing will sometimes make the bots do small circles for no reason, even in perfectly straight hallways.
Bots don't tend to make smooth turns. They tend to run straight in one direction, then suddenly change heading and run straight in another direction. The angle between the two paths is pretty easy to see if you're watching closely.
Bots will also never take "shortcuts" through dungeons, such as over the toppled bookcase in Cloak Tower.
Bots do very little, if any, fighting and they will almost never defend themselves, either. They tend to run past enemies, even if that means ending up facing an overwhelming number of them.
Bots tend to start running through the dungeon considerably later than an actual player would, too.
Finally, bots have to "hit their targets" even when that's not necessary. For example, the bot will run to the trigger to start the fight with the final boss, even if the pink swirl is already going and the party is waiting for them (which the party usually is). The path in the Cloak Tower is one of the most evident, as bots tend to run down the center of the final hall and they will run just past the trigger for the final fight, and then they will make a hard left and angle back to the trigger and remain facing it until the cutscene.
I have gotten pretty good at recognizing bot behaviour and reporting them has become a side hobby for me - and one I actually enjoy quite a bit. I don't know if reporting them makes any difference or not, but it has positive psychological benefits for me. Plus, when you point out the behaviour to the other people in your group, they tend to agree to kick them - even if they have to wait to do it. So I'm helping to put a dent into the farmers' incomes, one dungeon at a time.
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plasticbatMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 12,405Arc User
Bots stop at all campfires, even when their health is full. Most players ignore campfires, even when they are not at full health.
I stop at campfire. At least, I try to if it is on my way. Campfire gives you boost (all attributes +1) and reset the timer. Most people I know stop at campfire. If you are talking about Cloak tower, it is a different story.
*** The game can read your mind. If you want it, you won't get it. If you don't expect to get it, you will. ***
I experienced that circling behavior a week ago. was in SP. I waiting for the kick and my kick suggestion got canceled. I was furious. Must have been the other player i was in with, occasionally redirecting the circling bot. Took over 15 min to do a 7 min dungeon because i couldn't kick him at 5 min like i can with skirmishes (PLEASE FIX) and my kick request got canceled.
As for zen backlog, thats an issue where the zen bought items are more lucrative than the AD bought items. a balance is needed! There needs to be a AD item that is lucrative, account bound and worth spending money on. For example, a mount profession that you can buy a legendary mount at lvl 25 for 1 million AD with other resources, and that is account bound. That would give the zen market a shift from zen to AD that would balance it, imo. Such a shift would make players who buy zen to buy AD with zen to make those mounts. Just an example.
Comments
Also about a simple solution will be to just drop the available amount of refine brute astral by day. It seem to have go up to 32k but if I remember it was like 8k some time ago. I think 8k by day it a good rate plus like say 15k for Vip or something like that.
You can see listing in sell Zen only after the 500:1 in buy Zen is empty.
Yes, you will have to post for 500:1 and wait.
You can only have 2 active listings. So, unless you keep on cancelling and re-posting daily (and be dropped to the bottom of the queue everyday), what you said does not work well in practice.
"You can only have 2 active listings. So, unless you keep on cancelling and re-posting daily (and be dropped to the bottom of the queue everyday), what you said does not work well in practice. "@plasticbat
I think you missunderstood my 2nd paragraph. It was about a solution to help give astral diamond some value and help drop thebacklog.
Refining brute diamond have a limit of 32 or 36 k rightnow. But it was not always like that and it was not like that in Sto also. It got to have a limit of like only 8k by day. It mean you was just able to have 8k refined astral diamond by day. So it was harder to have diamond.
So, 15 million will take ~15 days.
8K cap was not some time ago. It was long time ago.
When I joined in around mod 3, the cap was already over 20K.
1 zen for 500 rough astral diamonds
1) remove the cap on ZAX cost
2) re-balance the demand for items purchases in via ZEN vs purchases via AD. The reason you see a backlog is there is more demand to buy keys, wards, and services (ZEN) than there is for purchasing marks, enchanting stones, and RP (AD). The only real gear you can buy with AD is mastercraft which most either consider to not be BIS or not worth the high cost of production.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=1EzY4Vl460U
Each platform is different but PC does have a long history of events that allowed high rates of AD production to go unfettered for years. Couple that with once reaching BIS, you only need to spend a few million per mod to get the latest toys to return to BIS, those individuals generally acquire more AD than they spend creating a backlog in currency to be leveraged.
> What would happen if there was an npc vendor who only traded in rough astral diamonds for the maximum amount?
> 1 zen for 500 rough astral diamonds
A large portion of people who bought zen now would not buy it with real money and Cryptics would lose a lot of money and the game quality will go to hell. Or it would become endless grind or pay to win. Imagine if a dollar would buy you a thousand zen instead of 100 (to encourage spending) and ward prices would go up 10x etc.... You would be back to square one.
I suppose the backlog is good for Cryptic, really - up to a point - since having to wait is another incentive for players to purchase zen, isn't it.
I wonder how much longer that'll last, though. When I started playing on PS4 around Christmas, Zen was selling for around 395 AD. Yesterday it passed 480, and will probably settle in somewhere between 450-460 this weekend. Looks like our AD to Zen ratio is slowly lopsiding too.
Any of my comments not posted in orange are based on my own personal opinion and not official.
Any messages written in orange are official moderation messages. Signature images are now fixed!
Just some thoughts
Wouldn't that be a sink?
Of course, if you factor in 'spending' that 3 million through AH, yes, certain AD will drop to the AD sink but the effect has nothing to do with Zax. The 3 million can be spend without anyone buying any Zen.
If you buy GMOP from AD store (which is an AD sink), your AD will be 100% vapourized. If you buy GMOP from AH, only 10% of the AD will be vapourized.
There are things that can be done both to discover botting and to prevent botting.
I'll not discuss the discover part in detail here as much of it can be countered by the botters - I do not want to help them
If you know what to look for it usually is fairly obvious in the 3-man dungeons that you have a bot with you.
On the prevent side there is some standard technology to catch botters, notably captcha in different variants.
I must say, though.. I am a professional programmer and I have an idea of what it takes to make these bots. There is some very heavy effort invested into making them run the 3-man dungeons as well as they do. I think they must be accessing and analyzing the data segment of the game client process to get info. It is technically possible, but definitely a nontrivial thing to do.
10 Preservation Wards = 85 Zen = 42500 AD from Zax vs. 65000 * (1-0,1[AH fee]) = 58500 AD from AH (+37,6% compared to Zax)
Even without voucher you make 17% AD more than using Zax.
Bots stop at all campfires, even when their health is full. Most players ignore campfires, even when they are not at full health.
Bot pathing will sometimes make the bots do small circles for no reason, even in perfectly straight hallways.
Bots don't tend to make smooth turns. They tend to run straight in one direction, then suddenly change heading and run straight in another direction. The angle between the two paths is pretty easy to see if you're watching closely.
Bots will also never take "shortcuts" through dungeons, such as over the toppled bookcase in Cloak Tower.
Bots do very little, if any, fighting and they will almost never defend themselves, either. They tend to run past enemies, even if that means ending up facing an overwhelming number of them.
Bots tend to start running through the dungeon considerably later than an actual player would, too.
Finally, bots have to "hit their targets" even when that's not necessary. For example, the bot will run to the trigger to start the fight with the final boss, even if the pink swirl is already going and the party is waiting for them (which the party usually is). The path in the Cloak Tower is one of the most evident, as bots tend to run down the center of the final hall and they will run just past the trigger for the final fight, and then they will make a hard left and angle back to the trigger and remain facing it until the cutscene.
I have gotten pretty good at recognizing bot behaviour and reporting them has become a side hobby for me - and one I actually enjoy quite a bit. I don't know if reporting them makes any difference or not, but it has positive psychological benefits for me. Plus, when you point out the behaviour to the other people in your group, they tend to agree to kick them - even if they have to wait to do it. So I'm helping to put a dent into the farmers' incomes, one dungeon at a time.
As for zen backlog, thats an issue where the zen bought items are more lucrative than the AD bought items. a balance is needed! There needs to be a AD item that is lucrative, account bound and worth spending money on. For example, a mount profession that you can buy a legendary mount at lvl 25 for 1 million AD with other resources, and that is account bound. That would give the zen market a shift from zen to AD that would balance it, imo. Such a shift would make players who buy zen to buy AD with zen to make those mounts. Just an example.