Nothing to worry about. It is an economy, just like any other. Eventually, people will stop paying cash for Zen because they will see it easier to trade dilithium for it. When enough people do that, the supply will shrink, demand will outnumber supply and the price will change to a new, higher, equilibrium point. This should happen in less than two months, tops.
Except that would only be true if people stopped wanting to acquire dilithium. There are people who are willing to plop down $1000 US and convert it all to dilithium, for whatever reason. Until those people stop doing that, dilithium could continue holding a high value even if most players are trading it for zen.
There is absolutely nothing available right now that I want to buy so desperately I can't wait for it, including grinding up Zen, EC, Dil, Marks or any other frakkin' thing. I am contributing to my starbase and embassy, and working on rep projects at what I consider to be a reasonable clip. I flat out refuse to do the lockbox gambit (I'm boring in Vegas too ). In short, PW doesn't really want me as a customer, but since I'm a lifer, sux to be you!
"Susse-thrai" had been the name bestowed upon her, half in anger, half in affection, by her old crew on Bloodwing; the keen-nosed, cranky, wily old she-beast, never less dangerous than when you thought her defenseless, and always growing new teeth far back in her throat to replace the old ones broken in biting out the last foe's heart. Romulans: left one homeworld, lost another, third time's the charm?
Except that would only be true if people stopped wanting to acquire dilithium. There are people who are willing to plop down $1000 US and convert it all to dilithium, for whatever reason. Until those people stop doing that, dilithium could continue holding a high value even if most players are trading it for zen.
Think the guy or gal thats spending $15,000 dollars or more still flowing out there. If so, they must be really committed to this game. Is STO that good that its worth spending 15 thousand dollars or more on it?
Truth be told, Cryptic needs to make a Zen sink of some sort, and make it worthwhile for players, to balance the economy.
Think the guy or gal thats spending $15,000 dollars or more still flowing out there. If so, they must be really committed to this game. Is STO that good that its worth spending 15 thousand dollars or more on it?
I hate to say it, but truthfully, if I had so much money that I could throw away 15,000 dollars and not feel the pinch in the slightest, I probably would spend it on STO. Why not? If you enjoyed the game and all.
But if anyone is doing that and doesn't have that kind of money, kind of like just running up their CC because they have a gambling problem, that's bad. Very bad. I couldn't imagine being the person who now owes a bank somewhere thousands and thousands of dollars because they couldn't stop themselves from opening lockboxes or buying dilithium. I feel regret when I spend just a hundred and come away with nothing. Imagine 10 or 20 or 50,000 even. Surely no one has done that, I hope. For just 10% of us paying them a dime of our money, assuming true, we sure are spending big on a F2P game.
In microeconomics, supply and demand is an economic model of price determination in a market. It concludes that in a competitive market, the unit price for a particular good will vary until it settles at a point where the quantity demanded by consumers (at current price) will equal the quantity supplied by producers (at current price), resulting in an economic equilibrium for price and quantity.
The four basic laws of supply and demand are:
1.If demand increases and supply remains unchanged, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
2.If demand decreases and supply remains unchanged, a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
3.If demand remains unchanged and supply increases, a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
4.If demand remains unchanged and supply decreases, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
- wiki
However; thats assuming we're in a competitive market. Is it a controlled market? Though influenced by the playerbase to some degree.
Supply has not remained unchanged, but changed. So we have a huge demand for Dilithium with no change in the amount we can refine per day, yet a change in acquisition.
I believe option #3 is what the market is experiencing at the moment - with the strange exception that the Demand is pretty high for it, in theory. There is plenty of surplus out there from the playerbase.
So if demand is high, than the acquisition of it is not going through the means of the exchange, since ZEN is apparently worthless for many to invest in, unless you are still acquiring CStore goods.
Great. Only NOW do I get it. This is another way for Cryptic/PWE to earn our money. Right now lots of things require lots of dilithium. More than we can refine. We can be patient and refine 8k per day, but the only way I know of to go past the refine limit is to buy dilithium... with Zen. And since there are people who are willing to buy Zen using cash, then use it to buy Dilithium which can be used on various projects, well...
Very clever, Cryptic/PWE. Well done...
*sings* "I like Gammera! He's so neat!!! He is full of turtle meat!!!"
"Hah! You are doomed! You're only armed with that pathetic excuse for a musical instrument!!!" *the Savage Beast moments before Lonnehart the Bard used music to soothe him... then beat him to death with his Fat Lute*
I'll revoke your quotation license if you ever quote something again without understanding it yourself first. :P
The dilithium exchange is a fairly isolated free market - free enough for market theory to apply for the most part - you just have to calculate in (the possibility of) divine (developer) intervention [exactly what caused this crisis].
(1) is what is happening:
The supply of dilithium remains unchanged (at least the per person maximum apart from the veteran refinement bonus) while demand has increased dramatically - at least temporarily - aggravated by the fact that now there's not just demand for individuals but also for fleet projects. Force majeure (the developers plan) has caused increased demand, causing a shortage, which leads to a higher price/value (of dilithium) - with the price/value measured in Zen points (or any arbitrary unit).
Realmarket results are:
> people farm dilithium more intensely, both because of need and because it is "better now" (more valuable): this increases supply and helps to satisfy the increased demand but might never completely saturate the increase in demand - speculation allowed
> more "people are born" to take advantage of their refining capabilities (SO IT'S ALL JUST A TRICK TO SELL CHARACTER SLOTS DANGIT, caps for emphasis, lol)
> Zen price (in dilithium) falls to the lowest rate people are comfortable with exchanging at (which is the free part about the dilithium exchange market)
This is assuming it is PWE/Cryptic selling that Dilithium for Zen on the exchange.
This isn't the case; and while it is possible it would obviously do Cryptic no good because their customers would also become competitors.
What boggles my mind is the massive amount of Zen being sold on the maket - people are farming Dilthium like mad now and exchanging it for Zen in the Vain hope that the price of Zen will rise later - But that begs the question : who is spending all the real world cash to convert at only 88 dilthium per zen? Or about 1/2 what it was 6 weeks ago?
The conspiracy theorist in me says Cryptic is being like the Federal Reserve and "printing" more Zen and tossing it in the market - the only possible reason that I can think of for them to do this is to add another "hidden" dilthium sink to soak up all that extra dilthium being generated. As Stoleviathan99 hinted at there may be certain book keeping/tax advantages to do this - writeoffs etc. The other thing is to soak up excess dilthium created as people have already started finishing off the Rep system. (remember since it is a private currency they don't have to inform players of any manipulation of the market if they choose to do so)
The four basic laws of supply and demand are:
1.If demand increases and supply remains unchanged, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
2.If demand decreases and supply remains unchanged, a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
3.If demand remains unchanged and supply increases, a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
4.If demand remains unchanged and supply decreases, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
wow...that was my whole college econ-2 class (a 4-5 month long course) in 4 sentences XD and its true
I find this line of replies sadly hilarious. We put a lot of work into the massive list of fixes/changes above, and ya'll are hung up on the ability to skip our content. =p
I'll revoke your quotation license if you ever quote something again without understanding it yourself first. :P
The dilithium exchange is a fairly isolated free market - free enough for market theory to apply for the most part - you just have to calculate in (the possibility of) divine (developer) intervention [exactly what caused this crisis].
(1) is what is happening:
The supply of dilithium remains unchanged (at least the per person maximum apart from the veteran refinement bonus) while demand has increased dramatically - at least temporarily - aggravated by the fact that now there's not just demand for individuals but also for fleet projects. Force majeure (the developers plan) has caused increased demand, causing a shortage, which leads to a higher price/value (of dilithium) - with the price/value measured in Zen points (or any arbitrary unit).
Realmarket results are:
> people farm dilithium more intensely, both because of need and because it is "better now" (more valuable): this increases supply and helps to satisfy the increased demand but might never completely saturate the increase in demand - speculation allowed
> more "people are born" to take advantage of their refining capabilities (SO IT'S ALL JUST A TRICK TO SELL CHARACTER SLOTS DANGIT, caps for emphasis, lol)
> Zen price (in dilithium) falls to the lowest rate people are comfortable with exchanging at (which is the free part about the dilithium exchange market)
This is assuming it is PWE/Cryptic selling that Dilithium for Zen on the exchange.
This isn't the case; and while it is possible it would obviously do Cryptic no good because their customers would also become competitors.
On the contrary, I fully understand it, the thing is the economy of STO is somewhat of a paradox.
You stated that the supply remains unchange due to the refinement cap - quoting option #1:
1.If demand increases and supply remains unchanged, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
If thats the case Dilithium should be at a higher price.
But here is the thing, there is:
A) Huge Demand for it Restriction in its distrubution per cap
C) Ironically (We may or may not agree on this one) - At the same time there is an enormous amount of it in the hands of the players.
The supply part is what baffles me - If we go by refinement cap, then you are correct / Option one is the most logical choice. Assuming we're applying real market economics in a free market.
Here is the paradox, there is an enormous amount of refined Dilithium flowing though the playerbase, at least in theory.
The real question is, has the supply really remained unchanged?
Cryptic states that there are now more ways to obtain more Dilithium, the playerbse challenges that notion by stating that they made it harder to obtain it, a notion that I somewhat have held in the past but is now I am rethinking my position.
After the Winter Event I will begin to do Dilithium farming on overdrive with all my alts, though with the new changes to the Officer Daily Report I may only need one - unless I am farming via ISE cycling through alts every 12minutes, since that is the amount of time that will take me to cycle thru each alt doing ISE.
What boggles my mind is the massive amount of Zen being sold on the maket - people are farming Dilthium like mad now and exchanging it for Zen in the Vain hope that the price of Zen will rise later - But that begs the question : who is spending all the real world cash to convert at only 88 dilthium per zen? Or about 1/2 what it was 6 weeks ago?
The conspiracy theorist in me says Cryptic is being like the Federal Reserve and "printing" more Zen and tossing it in the market - the only possible reason that I can think of for them to do this is to add another "hidden" dilthium sink to soak up all that extra dilthium being generated. As Stoleviathan99 hinted at there may be certain book keeping/tax advantages to do this - writeoffs etc. The other thing is to soak up excess dilthium created as people have already started finishing off the Rep system. (remember since it is a private currency they don't have to inform players of any manipulation of the market if they choose to do so)
I think the conspiracy theories are silly. Cryptic benefits when people buy zen with cash. If the value of zen is too high relative to dilithium then a lot of people give up on trying to convert dilithium to zen and simply outright buy the zen (after all, who wants to farm 10 hours a day for six months or a year to buy a ship?) . If the value is too low, then it discourages people from buying zen to convert to dilithium.
Either way, it is bad for Cryptic. Cryptic benefits the most at a certain ratio.
Cryptic already basically "prints" money in the form of the monthly stipend for lifetime members. The last thing it wants to do is inject a huge amount of more "printed" zen into the economy, because whatever zen is put in is potentially a missed real-money sale.
Furthermore, even if Cryptic decided it was in its best interests to inject zen into the economy, there are smart ways to do it. They are not just going to put a huge glob of it on the market. They would inject it in undetectable ways, such as small, random sales moving the market downward to the point they wanted it at.
But more likely, they would simply increase the zen stipend, either with a one-time bonus or on a permanent basis. That would have the effect of increasing real-world sales of subscriptions and making their customers happy.
So no, the conspiracy theories are just like most conspiracy theories, absolute nonsense.
Cryptic is unlikely to be influencing the price and even if they were, they would not just put 500,000 zen points onto the market in one sale. Some people or some group is spending a lot of money on this game. I would be interested to know who they are and what their motivations are.
... Some people or some group is spending a lot of money on this game. I would be interested to know who they are and what their motivations are.
logicalspock, those are some pretty powerful people if you ask me, that is to manipulate the market in such a way.
Either that or they have a ton of free time and rich beyond measure or not even that, pretty wealthy if you ask me.
I heard a rumor once that there were a few players that want to manipulate the market, yet what baffles me is that STO is not that indepth of a game to warrant such manipulations.
And this is only good if the volume of transactions are high. Preferably as high or higher. Though they could still be a bit lower volume. But if the volume is dramatically lower, it means the game is about to burn through its players.
Economic efficiency can be a measure of happiness (and high dilithium values are a way to measure that) but if the price fails to reflect ACTUAL happiness, people will leave your market.
My thing was always that it should take more ZEN to buy dilithium (and dilithium should buy more ZEN) but only at the rate that people experience and express heightened satisfaction. It should be a slow boil, not a flash fry.
Sometimes, I think they crowdsource for insight on this kind of thing. And if they're crowdsourcing me (and sometimes I think they are), it might be wise to consider that:
- What I post is off the cuff.
- It isn't fully explained.
- The important details of my analysis often go beyond what I share.
- I have ideas that I don't post because devs have warned me off on sharing certain things, less they become Cryptic property per forum EULA.
- Anything I say is based off what I see and know. Which makes it guesses. And that's true for all of us on the forums. I can't say anything about T5 Omega Rep projects that is accurate because I can't run them and S7 wasn't on Tribble long enough for anyone to test them. And if somebody on the team takes an idea we're discussing here and takes a detour with it, we can't correct for it until it hits the live server.
I suspect this is true for many of us. I have a feeling this economic planning came in response to some forum analysis that some of us have been making for awhile on how the market could work. Or at least it's parallel to what I and some other have said.
And if it's working for them, fine. But if it's not (and I have my doubts), maybe they should actually talk to a few of us.
Maybe it's paranoid. I think a lot of their planning at this point is based on forum lurking, though. And if they're going to do that routinely, job offer or no, they ought to fly 10 of us out to San Jose for a weekend strategy session under NDA rather than ferret our forum feedback, put their own spin on it, and send it live.
It's probably just paranoia on my part. But we'll see.
I'm curious to see the posts over the next few days, whether this is working as intended. In which case, great! I was sitting on a bundle of dilithium, planning on a market crash; I think the ZEN sale was an excitent here but was expecting a drop over a couple of weeks down to around 50 dil per ZEN.
Or maybe this was unintended and it prompts sweeping changes.....
QFT
I find the comments from stoleviathan99 very interesting. I dare say that its not happening in a flash fry but in an out right instant inferno.
That's a valid point. Allow me to draw a comparison:
Why doesn't everyone sell their gold (that is pretty useless by itself)?
There's a lot of gold in the hands of people and only a certain amount that is mined/recycled, hence the price has been rising - always - yet these people keep their gold.
They might keep it when the value begins to fall, too, for that matter.
How can this be?
> Investment/Greed/Hoarding
> It sunk to the seafloor (the player is inactive)
> it is used (as capital in margin trading for example - so it multiplies itself)
These apply to both, real-life gold and STO dilithium and they make sure that "standing capital" has little impact on the market.
There is some impact, like the margin trader earning 3% of his revenue, but the impact is far less than the amount that is drained.
The same is true for gold, again.
Cryptic states that there are now more ways to obtain more Dilithium, the playerbse challenges that notion by stating that they made it harder to obtain it, a notion that I somewhat have held in the past but is now I am rethinking my position.
Yes, but there are also many new ways to spend it. Once everyone gets the toys from reputation and shipyards things might turn. That is if we don't get new toys:D
I forgot to mention: Many will not sell even is the price is good because increased supply (their sale) drives the price down and keeping it gives them the option to have it work for them, spend it and/or wait for even more favorable rates.
Not exactly an untenable situation.
For those of you out to get rich on the current dilithium issue, thinking that driving the prices down is a good thing, I really need you to consider this.
The economic principles of the exchange are no different to that of any real world economy.
So while you may be getting a quick fix on your zen now, in the long term it is stopping any revenue coming into STO as people are just not prepared to buy zen to trade for dilithium.
Nobody buys, the well drys up. And there you have it. People see the prices going up as a mystery third party tries to stabilize the market (similar to what Richard Whitney tried to do), and BOOM you have your panic selling and inevitable crash....
I'm looking forward to seeing it happen as I have not been hoarding.
What boggles my mind is the massive amount of Zen being sold on the maket - people are farming Dilthium like mad now and exchanging it for Zen in the Vain hope that the price of Zen will rise later
Can only really speak for myself. Me? I'm farming Dil like mad now and exchanging it for Zen..... to buy stuff.
As a relatively new player (under 2 months), even having dumped ~50-60 into the game, there's still piles of things I want from the zen market. So the opportunity to farm up several thousand zen this past month is great.
Only reason I've not spent it all just yet is that I'm waiting for two things - 1. my sub to run out, and 2. the end of the winter event. At that point, I will take stock of what best to spend my zen on. (not to say I haven't bought some things, like increased Duty Officer capacity and a couple character slots.)
Given the constant supply of people asking "why can't I mine during the mining event? What, you mean I also need the daily quest" and "why is my mining game screwed up?", there's plenty of other new players. Not everyone has worn the c-Store out to the point of speculating because they've got nothing to buy.
For those of you out to get rich on the current dilithium issue, thinking that driving the prices down is a good thing, I really need you to consider this.
The economic principles of the exchange are no different to that of any real world economy.
So while you may be getting a quick fix on your zen now, in the long term it is stopping any revenue coming into STO as people are just not prepared to buy zen to trade for dilithium.
Nobody buys, the well drys up. And there you have it. People see the prices going up as a mystery third party tries to stabilize the market (similar to what Richard Whitney tried to do), and BOOM you have your panic selling and inevitable crash....
I'm looking forward to seeing it happen as I have not been hoarding.
No it's not likely to happen because:
- There's no problem with the current dilithium rate. I've told this before, but Cryptic's "evil plan" musn't be to make money with the dilithium exchange, but making people playing the game, even paying customers, and playing it longer/harder so that they want to buy some lockbox stuff, ships, vanity items, etc. They will be more exposed to the cash store if they keep playing. Want dil? play more. That's cryptic's answer.
- A panic is unlikely to happen because dilithium has a fixed value, ie the price of the items you can buy will not change. Thus, dilithium can't be devaluated, whatever the market changes are. Zens can't be devaluated either, since you'll always be able to buy the same ship for the same price.
- Those who can make the market crash have no interest in making it crash. A new very compelling addition to the store could make this happen but it's unlikely to happen, as long as there are fleet projects and fleet vanity projects. The only store addition which could change dramatically the balance would be a 3rd playable faction added to the store, and Cryptic told us they would provide such a new content for free.
Anyway, there are always the same ~20 people complaining in such threads, so I'm not worried at all about the game's health at all, and anyway, worrying about it isn't our job. :rolleyes:
Most people are focusing their thoughts on why dilithium is so expensive, while that may be true because of the dozen reasons listed, we need to look at the other side. So why is zen so under valued? I haven't bought anything from the c-store in a while, I have zen sitting there, but there has been almost nothing released besides the occasional ship. So while dilithium might be expensive, there really is only demand for zen becaue the c-store is basically empty and not being evolved like it should be.
Most people are focusing their thoughts on why dilithium is so expensive, while that may be true because of the dozen reasons listed, we need to look at the other side. So why is zen so under valued? I haven't bought anything from the c-store in a while, I have zen sitting there, but there has been almost nothing released besides the occasional ship. So while dilithium might be expensive, there really is only demand for zen becaue the c-store is basically empty and not being evolved like it should be.
The bright side of this is that if everything was in the store it would be a complete pay to win game. And keys are a major component in the store. I wouldn't be surprised if master key sales were what really keeps the lights (and servers) on.
I think that is where it is, when F2P launched how many sales were there? Now many are there now? Lots of zen sales, lot of master key sales, the lock boxes (despite not opening any myself) bring in crazy money because gambling pays. So the analysis of dilithium to zen people make is.. well, wrong. Zen changes to EC and dilithium, and from what I see in game there are more people buying zen to make EC then for dilithium. There is only minor interactions between EC and dilithium.
My guess is if we see Cryptic put desired items into the c-store soon, people won't be so willing to give up their zen and the market will drop pretty hard.
He's asking why people are bothering to sell Zen for 88 Dil each.
THAT is the real question.
I'll admit, I was a Dil buyer (or Zen seller) because I saw more value for Dilithium stuff/projects than what was on the C-Store. But once the Price hit 100:1 I stopped selling Zen. Maybe I just like that ratio because it's eaier to calculate. Now I'm holding onto Zen for ... something in the future. Maybe I'll give Champions a try?
If several people are simply selling Zen to get Dilithium regardless of exchange rate (as long as they get more Dilithium quicker than getting it themselves) ... then they are not helping anyone other than themselves (and that's a stretch). Which is greedy.
Then again ... for someone who sells Zen not caring for value - Dilithium is just code.
Anyway, there are always the same ~20 people complaining in such threads, so I'm not worried at all about the game's health at all, and anyway, worrying about it isn't our job. :rolleyes:
And behind every single one of those there's the die-hard culprit defending every unsavory, uncouth and "me-me-me" behavior. This extend into every single facet of the game. :cool:
there is little need to accumulate zen. Once you buy everything in the cstore or you are kdf, zen is useless. Except if you are a lockbox guy and if that is the case......hahahahha.
Cryptic is going to make a new lockbox and new cstore stuff in the next few months. That may increase zens value.
If cryptic implements a dilithium mine fleet thing to increase daily refining amounts, it may change things. Depends on how they do it.
Also the zen you acquire in sto isn't transferable to other games.
If several people are simply selling Zen to get Dilithium regardless of exchange rate (as long as they get more Dilithium quicker than getting it themselves) ... then they are not helping anyone other than themselves (and that's a stretch). Which is greedy.
Huh? So if I need dilithium, and am willing to pay the current exchange rate to get it, I am 'greedy' and 'not helping anyone other than myself'? OF COURSE I am out to help myself. No one is selling/buying Zen with the primary goal of helping someone else. If you see something that you want go on sale, would you not take advantage of it?
I really don't see the mindset of why Zen sellers are 'bad'. Just because YOU think a rate below 100 is bad, doesn't mean that someone else sees it the same way.
_____________________
Come join the 44th Fleet.
startrek.44thfleet.com[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
I really don't see the mindset of why Zen sellers are 'bad'. Just because YOU think a rate below 100 is bad, doesn't mean that someone else sees it the same way.
Yeah, that was a personal opinion I should have held in check. I apologize for that.
But I am attempting to address the question why people are buying Dilithium at the lower rates, especially when they keep going lower.
I have the impression (and maybe I'm wrong), based on the most recent discussion, the Dilithium price keeps lowering because players are continuously *willing* to buy at lower and lowering prices.
It's that will to buy something that is slowly becoming less valuable that is at the heart of the matter. I contend the issue is less with Cryptic and more with player attitudes about the situation presented in this thread.
Comments
Except that would only be true if people stopped wanting to acquire dilithium. There are people who are willing to plop down $1000 US and convert it all to dilithium, for whatever reason. Until those people stop doing that, dilithium could continue holding a high value even if most players are trading it for zen.
Romulans: left one homeworld, lost another, third time's the charm?
Think the guy or gal thats spending $15,000 dollars or more still flowing out there. If so, they must be really committed to this game. Is STO that good that its worth spending 15 thousand dollars or more on it?
Truth be told, Cryptic needs to make a Zen sink of some sort, and make it worthwhile for players, to balance the economy.
But if anyone is doing that and doesn't have that kind of money, kind of like just running up their CC because they have a gambling problem, that's bad. Very bad. I couldn't imagine being the person who now owes a bank somewhere thousands and thousands of dollars because they couldn't stop themselves from opening lockboxes or buying dilithium. I feel regret when I spend just a hundred and come away with nothing. Imagine 10 or 20 or 50,000 even. Surely no one has done that, I hope. For just 10% of us paying them a dime of our money, assuming true, we sure are spending big on a F2P game.
And the billboard top song of 1988:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lu3VTngm1F0
yikes!
I gets worse for each point down until 81 where we avoid Michael Jackson
In microeconomics, supply and demand is an economic model of price determination in a market. It concludes that in a competitive market, the unit price for a particular good will vary until it settles at a point where the quantity demanded by consumers (at current price) will equal the quantity supplied by producers (at current price), resulting in an economic equilibrium for price and quantity.
The four basic laws of supply and demand are:
1.If demand increases and supply remains unchanged, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
2.If demand decreases and supply remains unchanged, a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
3.If demand remains unchanged and supply increases, a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
4.If demand remains unchanged and supply decreases, a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
- wiki
However; thats assuming we're in a competitive market. Is it a controlled market? Though influenced by the playerbase to some degree.
Supply has not remained unchanged, but changed. So we have a huge demand for Dilithium with no change in the amount we can refine per day, yet a change in acquisition.
I believe option #3 is what the market is experiencing at the moment - with the strange exception that the Demand is pretty high for it, in theory. There is plenty of surplus out there from the playerbase.
So if demand is high, than the acquisition of it is not going through the means of the exchange, since ZEN is apparently worthless for many to invest in, unless you are still acquiring CStore goods.
Very clever, Cryptic/PWE. Well done...
"Hah! You are doomed! You're only armed with that pathetic excuse for a musical instrument!!!" *the Savage Beast moments before Lonnehart the Bard used music to soothe him... then beat him to death with his Fat Lute*
I'll revoke your quotation license if you ever quote something again without understanding it yourself first. :P
The dilithium exchange is a fairly isolated free market - free enough for market theory to apply for the most part - you just have to calculate in (the possibility of) divine (developer) intervention [exactly what caused this crisis].
(1) is what is happening:
The supply of dilithium remains unchanged (at least the per person maximum apart from the veteran refinement bonus) while demand has increased dramatically - at least temporarily - aggravated by the fact that now there's not just demand for individuals but also for fleet projects.
Force majeure (the developers plan) has caused increased demand, causing a shortage, which leads to a higher price/value (of dilithium) - with the price/value measured in Zen points (or any arbitrary unit).
Realmarket results are:
> people farm dilithium more intensely, both because of need and because it is "better now" (more valuable): this increases supply and helps to satisfy the increased demand but might never completely saturate the increase in demand - speculation allowed
> more "people are born" to take advantage of their refining capabilities (SO IT'S ALL JUST A TRICK TO SELL CHARACTER SLOTS DANGIT, caps for emphasis, lol)
> Zen price (in dilithium) falls to the lowest rate people are comfortable with exchanging at (which is the free part about the dilithium exchange market)
This is assuming it is PWE/Cryptic selling that Dilithium for Zen on the exchange.
This isn't the case; and while it is possible it would obviously do Cryptic no good because their customers would also become competitors.
He's dead, Jim.
The conspiracy theorist in me says Cryptic is being like the Federal Reserve and "printing" more Zen and tossing it in the market - the only possible reason that I can think of for them to do this is to add another "hidden" dilthium sink to soak up all that extra dilthium being generated. As Stoleviathan99 hinted at there may be certain book keeping/tax advantages to do this - writeoffs etc. The other thing is to soak up excess dilthium created as people have already started finishing off the Rep system. (remember since it is a private currency they don't have to inform players of any manipulation of the market if they choose to do so)
wow...that was my whole college econ-2 class (a 4-5 month long course) in 4 sentences XD and its true
On the contrary, I fully understand it, the thing is the economy of STO is somewhat of a paradox.
You stated that the supply remains unchange due to the refinement cap - quoting option #1:
If thats the case Dilithium should be at a higher price.
But here is the thing, there is:
A) Huge Demand for it
C) Ironically (We may or may not agree on this one) - At the same time there is an enormous amount of it in the hands of the players.
The supply part is what baffles me - If we go by refinement cap, then you are correct / Option one is the most logical choice. Assuming we're applying real market economics in a free market.
Here is the paradox, there is an enormous amount of refined Dilithium flowing though the playerbase, at least in theory.
The real question is, has the supply really remained unchanged?
Cryptic states that there are now more ways to obtain more Dilithium, the playerbse challenges that notion by stating that they made it harder to obtain it, a notion that I somewhat have held in the past but is now I am rethinking my position.
After the Winter Event I will begin to do Dilithium farming on overdrive with all my alts, though with the new changes to the Officer Daily Report I may only need one - unless I am farming via ISE cycling through alts every 12minutes, since that is the amount of time that will take me to cycle thru each alt doing ISE.
I think the conspiracy theories are silly. Cryptic benefits when people buy zen with cash. If the value of zen is too high relative to dilithium then a lot of people give up on trying to convert dilithium to zen and simply outright buy the zen (after all, who wants to farm 10 hours a day for six months or a year to buy a ship?) . If the value is too low, then it discourages people from buying zen to convert to dilithium.
Either way, it is bad for Cryptic. Cryptic benefits the most at a certain ratio.
Cryptic already basically "prints" money in the form of the monthly stipend for lifetime members. The last thing it wants to do is inject a huge amount of more "printed" zen into the economy, because whatever zen is put in is potentially a missed real-money sale.
Furthermore, even if Cryptic decided it was in its best interests to inject zen into the economy, there are smart ways to do it. They are not just going to put a huge glob of it on the market. They would inject it in undetectable ways, such as small, random sales moving the market downward to the point they wanted it at.
But more likely, they would simply increase the zen stipend, either with a one-time bonus or on a permanent basis. That would have the effect of increasing real-world sales of subscriptions and making their customers happy.
So no, the conspiracy theories are just like most conspiracy theories, absolute nonsense.
Cryptic is unlikely to be influencing the price and even if they were, they would not just put 500,000 zen points onto the market in one sale. Some people or some group is spending a lot of money on this game. I would be interested to know who they are and what their motivations are.
logicalspock, those are some pretty powerful people if you ask me, that is to manipulate the market in such a way.
Either that or they have a ton of free time and rich beyond measure or not even that, pretty wealthy if you ask me.
I heard a rumor once that there were a few players that want to manipulate the market, yet what baffles me is that STO is not that indepth of a game to warrant such manipulations.
Baffling indeed.
QFT
I find the comments from stoleviathan99 very interesting. I dare say that its not happening in a flash fry but in an out right instant inferno.
but the first week after S7 launched was the breaking point where it has really been a problem.
for the prize to get where it has been before or at least go up a little it will need something BIG.
That's a valid point. Allow me to draw a comparison:
Why doesn't everyone sell their gold (that is pretty useless by itself)?
There's a lot of gold in the hands of people and only a certain amount that is mined/recycled, hence the price has been rising - always - yet these people keep their gold.
They might keep it when the value begins to fall, too, for that matter.
How can this be?
> Investment/Greed/Hoarding
> It sunk to the seafloor (the player is inactive)
> it is used (as capital in margin trading for example - so it multiplies itself)
These apply to both, real-life gold and STO dilithium and they make sure that "standing capital" has little impact on the market.
There is some impact, like the margin trader earning 3% of his revenue, but the impact is far less than the amount that is drained.
The same is true for gold, again.
He's dead, Jim.
Yes, but there are also many new ways to spend it. Once everyone gets the toys from reputation and shipyards things might turn. That is if we don't get new toys:D
I forgot to mention: Many will not sell even is the price is good because increased supply (their sale) drives the price down and keeping it gives them the option to have it work for them, spend it and/or wait for even more favorable rates.
Not exactly an untenable situation.
He's dead, Jim.
The economic principles of the exchange are no different to that of any real world economy.
So while you may be getting a quick fix on your zen now, in the long term it is stopping any revenue coming into STO as people are just not prepared to buy zen to trade for dilithium.
Nobody buys, the well drys up. And there you have it. People see the prices going up as a mystery third party tries to stabilize the market (similar to what Richard Whitney tried to do), and BOOM you have your panic selling and inevitable crash....
I'm looking forward to seeing it happen as I have not been hoarding.
Can only really speak for myself. Me? I'm farming Dil like mad now and exchanging it for Zen..... to buy stuff.
As a relatively new player (under 2 months), even having dumped ~50-60 into the game, there's still piles of things I want from the zen market. So the opportunity to farm up several thousand zen this past month is great.
Only reason I've not spent it all just yet is that I'm waiting for two things - 1. my sub to run out, and 2. the end of the winter event. At that point, I will take stock of what best to spend my zen on. (not to say I haven't bought some things, like increased Duty Officer capacity and a couple character slots.)
Given the constant supply of people asking "why can't I mine during the mining event? What, you mean I also need the daily quest" and "why is my mining game screwed up?", there's plenty of other new players. Not everyone has worn the c-Store out to the point of speculating because they've got nothing to buy.
No it's not likely to happen because:
- There's no problem with the current dilithium rate. I've told this before, but Cryptic's "evil plan" musn't be to make money with the dilithium exchange, but making people playing the game, even paying customers, and playing it longer/harder so that they want to buy some lockbox stuff, ships, vanity items, etc. They will be more exposed to the cash store if they keep playing. Want dil? play more. That's cryptic's answer.
- A panic is unlikely to happen because dilithium has a fixed value, ie the price of the items you can buy will not change. Thus, dilithium can't be devaluated, whatever the market changes are. Zens can't be devaluated either, since you'll always be able to buy the same ship for the same price.
- Those who can make the market crash have no interest in making it crash. A new very compelling addition to the store could make this happen but it's unlikely to happen, as long as there are fleet projects and fleet vanity projects. The only store addition which could change dramatically the balance would be a 3rd playable faction added to the store, and Cryptic told us they would provide such a new content for free.
Anyway, there are always the same ~20 people complaining in such threads, so I'm not worried at all about the game's health at all, and anyway, worrying about it isn't our job. :rolleyes:
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
Completed Starbase, Embassy, Mine, Spire and No Win Scenario
Nothing to do anymore.
http://dtfleet.com/
Visit our Youtube channel
The bright side of this is that if everything was in the store it would be a complete pay to win game. And keys are a major component in the store. I wouldn't be surprised if master key sales were what really keeps the lights (and servers) on.
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
My guess is if we see Cryptic put desired items into the c-store soon, people won't be so willing to give up their zen and the market will drop pretty hard.
Completed Starbase, Embassy, Mine, Spire and No Win Scenario
Nothing to do anymore.
http://dtfleet.com/
Visit our Youtube channel
It used to cost about 0.0067 Zen per Dil. (1/150)
Now it costs 0.01136 Zen per Dil. (1/88)
That's a 69.6% increase in price since S5. The value of Dil keeps rising as they add more things requiring it.
You misunderstood the post you quoted.
He's asking why people are bothering to sell Zen for 88 Dil each. There's so much Zen put onto the market that selling Zen won't get you much.
THAT is the real question.
I'll admit, I was a Dil buyer (or Zen seller) because I saw more value for Dilithium stuff/projects than what was on the C-Store. But once the Price hit 100:1 I stopped selling Zen. Maybe I just like that ratio because it's eaier to calculate.
If several people are simply selling Zen to get Dilithium regardless of exchange rate (as long as they get more Dilithium quicker than getting it themselves) ... then they are not helping anyone other than themselves (and that's a stretch). Which is greedy.
Then again ... for someone who sells Zen not caring for value - Dilithium is just code.
And behind every single one of those there's the die-hard culprit defending every unsavory, uncouth and "me-me-me" behavior. This extend into every single facet of the game. :cool:
Cryptic is going to make a new lockbox and new cstore stuff in the next few months. That may increase zens value.
If cryptic implements a dilithium mine fleet thing to increase daily refining amounts, it may change things. Depends on how they do it.
Also the zen you acquire in sto isn't transferable to other games.
Huh? So if I need dilithium, and am willing to pay the current exchange rate to get it, I am 'greedy' and 'not helping anyone other than myself'? OF COURSE I am out to help myself. No one is selling/buying Zen with the primary goal of helping someone else. If you see something that you want go on sale, would you not take advantage of it?
I really don't see the mindset of why Zen sellers are 'bad'. Just because YOU think a rate below 100 is bad, doesn't mean that someone else sees it the same way.
Come join the 44th Fleet.
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Yeah, that was a personal opinion I should have held in check. I apologize for that.
But I am attempting to address the question why people are buying Dilithium at the lower rates, especially when they keep going lower.
I have the impression (and maybe I'm wrong), based on the most recent discussion, the Dilithium price keeps lowering because players are continuously *willing* to buy at lower and lowering prices.
It's that will to buy something that is slowly becoming less valuable that is at the heart of the matter. I contend the issue is less with Cryptic and more with player attitudes about the situation presented in this thread.