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Actuarius

What are the economic sinks and faucets for Wurm?

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40 minutes ago, Ayes said:

So, what if tools never had their quality reduced from use? What if enchants on items never lost their power from use? Wouldn't this be better for those players who purchased these items for what is in effect real $$$$ and thus makes the game more expensive to play? Why should silver coins be "money sinked" out of the game? Would it not be better for players to pay less to play the game then, rather than create a system as presently where these things wear down so other players must pay someone else to re-imp or re-enchant them?

 

Now out in that other world we mostly live in there is obsolescence built into items, which then creates profits for the manufactures of them and employment for others. New and improved designs also create a demand for those products with the same result as above. This is a real world "economy" out of necessity for people to be able to live. To attempt to design a game such as Wurm on this basis only makes it more expensive for players as there is otherwise no need to have this Wurm "economy" sustain anyone's ability to live in the outside world.

 

I would much rather that in Wurm items always kept their original quality and enchants kept their power than to have the current system that benefits those who improve and enchant these items. Why should the game be setup so that they can make $$$$ from other players. Remember we are talking about a RL expense here being added into the playing of this game. In contrast, players draining Traders or pursuing the various coin drop give-backs cost myself and other players nothing since they are taken for a portion of the game's profits based upon deed upkeep percentage.

 

Remember, some player will originally still have to create or enchant these tools and they will be purchased from them if the player is not able to do this them self. After that there is no real need to have these items degrade, other than the obvious desire of these producers to make more $$$$ by providing a further service that would otherwise not be needed. A game system that rewards other's greed(?) is perhaps not the best design to attempt to justify as a positive aspect of the game?

 

=Ayes=

I suppose the definition of what is fun is defined differently.  The argument here is fairly anti-market;  which is fine to have when your enjoyment stems from building your own tools, farming your own resources, not looking to trade or sell, etc.  I think a lot of Wurm PVE players will do fine with this.  I would argue though, many other types of players enjoy robust game markets and regard it a challenge to find their niche and make a "profit".  Profit is how one keeps score, that is all; it tickles the Dopamine receptors in the brain.  Truthfully regarding Wurm, its economy is much better then many other games I've played.  Wurm and Eve truly, for me, provide the best market challenge.  My only purpose for the discussion was to understand the inherent workings in how money enters the game, exits the game, and what signals create supply and demand.  I see a lot of people wanting to sell, but not many buyers.  Its apparent there inst a money issue (too much inflation, too much deflation, monetary scarcity seems about right).  I was surprised to discover there isn't much in the way of item Sinks to pull items out of the game (spiking demand).  I may make more money foraging and trader farming then actual trade with players on a unit of time per Silver basis (Hours of work per silver).  Foraging yesterday for three hours yielded just over 2 silver.  On average, I think that's a bit high but .5 silver a day foraging for an hour seems a lot less work then building a boat and selling it.

 

Either way the low population is more of a concern, and it may not be resolved until the "jinni"  that's out of the bottle (Steam WO release) gets settled.  Why play here when the population is much bigger over there??  This is assuming interaction with other players is part of the fun.  If not, then there is always single player Wurm Unlimited.

 

I am just starting so I hope WO makes it regardless.  

 

Cheers again.

 

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5 hours ago, Ayes said:

Would it not be better for players to pay less to play the game then, rather than create a system as presently where these things wear down so other players must pay someone else to re-imp or re-enchant them?

you know you can imp and enchant your own tools right, buying tools is by no means a necessity, you don't need some 90ql rare pickaxe just to start mining or anything

 

5 hours ago, Ayes said:

Remember, some player will originally still have to create or enchant these tools and they will be purchased from them if the player is not able to do this them self. After that there is no real need to have these items degrade, other than the obvious desire of these producers to make more $$$$ by providing a further service that would otherwise not be needed. A game system that rewards other's greed(?) is perhaps not the best design to attempt to justify as a positive aspect of the game?

because tools require maintenance to stay effective, if you don't sharpen knives irl they're not going to cut anything and be dangerous to use. It also gives you an incentive to grind those skills, so you can keep your own tools at a serviceable level.

 

You seem to be confusing "necessary" with "nice to have". participating in the market is 100% optional, and the "necessity" of buying imps is only really brought upon the living by yourself mentality thats extremely common in freedom, the game was designed around living in a village with other people in a pvp environment, where you'd have lots of different people all focusing on their own crafting niches that can cover each others weaknesses. Any respectable alliance would be able to help each other out with imps and casts for their gear.

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Items are lost no matter what they are due to decay(people place them in chests then forget about said chest)
Drake sets are left behind on accounts on people who quit and dont sell and thus lost forever
Master bag of keeping is a great example of a really really rare item of which only a few are around and even fewer are in circulation because most are on inactive or banned accounts

Main drains for coins are as follows
Upkeep(percentage is given to kings coffins and a percentage is lost forever)
Trading with traders
Paying for premium with silver
Silver that people store and then stop logging in(I have a friend who sits on 2g+ in his bank and hasnt been online for a few years)

Traders if on a deed can be controlled and a tax can be set so that a certain % goes to the deed its part of(originally traders where envisioned as the village trading market)
 

I came across a chest not to long ago full of items with 80-90 damage on them so its safe to assume that all lower quality items had decayed already so i grabbed everything repaired it all bought it home and threw it into my chest for it to decay there in the odd chance i might some day use my 19th rake because i misplaced the last 18

So main money sinks are the % loss and players quitting
Main item sinks are players quitting and careless behavior

The reason wurm's market is at its point is because people who have no market understanding decided to go "herp derp im going to undercut this guy with 25c/50c/1s" and we dropped from 10s high ql high enchant tools to 90c in a few years while supply has stayed around the same(the amount of high end crafters that quit is a bit less then those who reach that point)
A lot of people seem for some reason be happy to undercut each other just to try and sell their items quicker instead of stick to established prices and have slight changes there is this weird habit that a lot of wurmians have of halving prices permanently in an "attempt" to sell quick

Eg the whole 1s for 1k actions thing that people that people decided to turn into 50c for 1k actions in hopes to sell their bricks quickly yet last time i sold bricks(2 weeks ago) i still sold 6k of bricks for 6s sure it took me more then a day to sell at a lazy rate but it sold within 2 days time and thats the thing want a quick buck sell at half price want at decent price stick to normal prices ;)

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5 hours ago, wipeout said:

The reason wurm's market is at its point is because people who have no market understanding decided to go "herp derp im going to undercut this guy with 25c/50c/1s" and we dropped from 10s high ql high enchant tools to 90c in a few years while supply has stayed around the same(the amount of high end crafters that quit is a bit less then those who reach that point)
A lot of people seem for some reason be happy to undercut each other just to try and sell their items quicker instead of stick to established prices and have slight changes there is this weird habit that a lot of wurmians have of halving prices permanently in an "attempt" to sell quick

Eg the whole 1s for 1k actions thing that people that people decided to turn into 50c for 1k actions in hopes to sell their bricks quickly yet last time i sold bricks(2 weeks ago) i still sold 6k of bricks for 6s sure it took me more then a day to sell at a lazy rate but it sold within 2 days time and thats the thing want a quick buck sell at half price want at decent price stick to normal prices ;)

 

That's how markets work though. If you don't sell fast enough to your liking, you lower your price. If enough people do that, the average price drops.

 

If you believe 50c for 1k actions is underpriced you can always buy those up and resell at 1s, and make a 50% profit. But if you try that you'll probably just find yourself stuck with a lot of stock because there isn't enough demand at 1s to cover the amount people are willing to produce at 50c.

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3 hours ago, Lisimba said:

 

That's how markets work though. If you don't sell fast enough to your liking, you lower your price. If enough people do that, the average price drops.

 

If you believe 50c for 1k actions is underpriced you can always buy those up and resell at 1s, and make a 50% profit. But if you try that you'll probably just find yourself stuck with a lot of stock because there isn't enough demand at 1s to cover the amount people are willing to produce at 50c.

not really, wurm is different for real world, you dont pay taxes or services, also if you sell raw products dont have people/organization setting low prices for them, burocrazy, permits for sell, also dont pay transport for items (mail is really cheaper compared with real work and also most server are in a 2hs travel ).
storage? you need paid it anyway (sell things or not) or get somebody paid for you, is called upkeep.

mayor problem with wurm economy are old accounts still there and people using alts, you can make 1k bricks in 3-4hs using lots of alts even if they arent prem

Edited by tamat

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17 hours ago, Ayes said:

So, what if tools never had their quality reduced from use? What if enchants on items never lost their power from use? Wouldn't this be better for those players who purchased these items for what is in effect real $$$$ and thus makes the game more expensive to play? Why should silver coins be "money sinked" out of the game? Would it not be better for players to pay less to play the game then, rather than create a system as presently where these things wear down so other players must pay someone else to re-imp or re-enchant them?

 

Now out in that other world we mostly live in there is obsolescence built into items, which then creates profits for the manufactures of them and employment for others. New and improved designs also create a demand for those products with the same result as above. This is a real world "economy" out of necessity for people to be able to live. To attempt to design a game such as Wurm on this basis only makes it more expensive for players as there is otherwise no need to have this Wurm "economy" sustain anyone's ability to live in the outside world.

 

I would much rather that in Wurm items always kept their original quality and enchants kept their power than to have the current system that benefits those who improve and enchant these items. Why should the game be setup so that they can make $$$$ from other players. Remember we are talking about a RL expense here being added into the playing of this game. In contrast, players draining Traders or pursuing the various coin drop give-backs cost myself and other players nothing since they are taken for a portion of the game's profits based upon deed upkeep percentage.

 

Remember, some player will originally still have to create or enchant these tools and they will be purchased from them if the player is not able to do this them self. After that there is no real need to have these items degrade, other than the obvious desire of these producers to make more $$$$ by providing a further service that would otherwise not be needed. A game system that rewards other's greed(?) is perhaps not the best design to attempt to justify as a positive aspect of the game?

 

=Ayes=

 

I'm with you on this.  All the arguments in favor of improving "markets" would be all well and good if it really was just for in-game fun and wasn't based on Real World Money.  Those who enjoy making profits for the "fun" would enjoy it just as much if the real cash value wasn't there.  But this is Wurm. Any measure or game feature in Wurm, designed to supposedly improve the "market," in turn merely goes to the real world Paypal accounts of those who profit, at the real world expense of others, which makes the game more expensive for those not into making "profits," and in my opinion does exactly zilch for the game itself. 

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Double post.  Stupid internet lag.  lol

Edited by Amadee

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12 minutes ago, tamat said:

not really, wurm is different for real world, you dont pay taxes or services, also if you sell raw products dont have people/organization setting low prices for them, burocrazy, permits for sell, also dont pay transport for items (mail is really cheaper compared with real work and also most server are in a 2hs travel ).
storage? you need paid it anyway (sell things or not) or get somebody paid for you, is called upkeep.

 

I'm... not really sure what you are saying here.

 

12 minutes ago, tamat said:


mayor problem with wurm economy are old accounts still there and people using alts, you can make 1k bricks in 3-4hs using lots of alts even if they arent prem

 

I don't think a game like this would ever support an economy like you'd want it to be. There are always going to be people on top of the skill-hill, and nobody sane is going to pay you anywhere near real life minimum wage for in game things.

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1 hour ago, Lisimba said:

I don't think a game like this would ever support an economy like you'd want it to be. There are always going to be people on top of the skill-hill, and nobody sane is going to pay you anywhere near real life minimum wage for in game things.

true, yet some do get good 3rd counry payroll with alts or chasing rare 'resources'

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Your assessment of traders is pretty accurate and years ago if you were to mention such things on the forums, it would garner much hate from the kings of the hill. However, there was a moment in Wurm’s history where such a post was made, exposing the mechanics of the traders, which resulted in many people attempting to exploit them for themselves. At that time a typical trader could potentially net its owner 20s per month or more. I personally knew more than one player who owned several traders and were just raking in the coin.

 

The money that goes to the traders from the kings coffers is split among all the traders, so as more traders popped into existence, each trader received less and less coin. As well, the devs made several changes to the mechanics of the kings coffers to drastically reduce the amount that goes to the traders. They added alternative ways to distribute the money such as the rare coins from foraging or that can drop from mobs. The idea was to spread the wealth among the player base more evenly. This resulted in traders getting so little coin each month that it was not worth the effort to own and pay for a trader deed as the monthly net income would be about 1-2 silvers.

 

I haven’t looked at trader payouts since that era (maybe 3 years ago) but I would suspect that trader payouts most likely have gone up since then as many people would have disbanded their trader deeds or stopped working their traders resulting in the money being split among less traders. It’s hard to say though because there is now a lower population in the game and so less money is going into the system as well.

 

I would like to add that it is nice to see new players experiencing this all for the first time. It reminds me of the excitement I experienced so many years ago trying to figure out this deep, rich game. Good luck to you

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3 hours ago, Amadee said:

 

I'm with you on this.  All the arguments in favor of improving "markets" would be all well and good if it really was just for in-game fun and wasn't based on Real World Money.  Those who enjoy making profits for the "fun" would enjoy it just as much if the real cash value wasn't there.  But this is Wurm. Any measure or game feature in Wurm, designed to supposedly improve the "market," in turn merely goes to the real world Paypal accounts of those who profit, at the real world expense of others, which makes the game more expensive for those not into making "profits," and in my opinion does exactly zilch for the game itself. 

I think we have two arguments here.  One regarding game mechanics that allow for interesting and balanced market dynamics to emerge;  Second, is the argument against RMT.    I think RMT encourages non-optimal (and not fun) game-play styles to emerge.  My 2 cents though.  Wurm's survived to this day with RMT, so not sure I have enough wisdom to argue against it.

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2 hours ago, Actuarius said:

I think we have two arguments here.  One regarding game mechanics that allow for interesting and balanced market dynamics to emerge;  Second, is the argument against RMT.    I think RMT encourages non-optimal (and not fun) game-play styles to emerge.  My 2 cents though.  Wurm's survived to this day with RMT, so not sure I have enough wisdom to argue against it.

dont worry steam wo probably will fail and will merged with old wurm, so all RMT will be banned, at least wurm let people play if are less than 10 people on server (talking about you epic), not many games allow that.
WCS, steam wo is success, will merge it with old wo because can make more profit than with RMT...

even if RMT banned they still be there like in almost every game that ban them

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The low price of things in the game is caused by inflation of higher skilled players and a lack of low skill players to buy them. Add friends doing stuff for free or village alliances and there isn't much left. In the end its probably due to lack of new players. I feel that permanent item degradation would benefit this problem. The game was intended to be somewhat of a world simulator being that everything was player generated, including the economy. A concern is that there are too many upper class citizens and not enough lower or middle class to support them. I noticed a lot of differences in the price of things since coming back after a 5 year break and it seems to be caused the skill inflation and lack of new players.

 

In the end I miss being chased by a wolf, lost in the woods at night, falling down a hill breaking my legs and being eaten. There was a time when the concept of highways were not even thought of. Wurm was real wilderness and adventure, which seemed to end in death most times. Though there is always more to learn in Wurm, ideas cant be undiscovered.

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The argument about too many royalty and not enough peasants...it's true, not much fun being a noble if you don't have any lowly peons to lord it over, but thing about that is that it's basically never fun being a peasant.  Also, historically, there's a good reason why feudal systems tend to have only a very few people on top, and a huge underclass (who live short, brutal lives) supporting them.

 

Not a perfect analogy, of course, but for all the would-be nobles advocating plenty of would-be peasants (new players) to buy their things... consider what that experience is like for the peasants, then consider why so many players set themselves up to minimise their reliance on other players.  Just getting floods of newbies isn't going to give you what you're looking for by itself.

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(snip)

 

 If not, then there is always single player Wurm Unlimited.

 

(end snip)

 

You might want to test that statement. There are WU servers that have higher populations then WO.

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Did you hear there is a Walmart opening on Inde? Its going to be so great...

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On 1/30/2020 at 6:54 PM, Nappy said:

(snip)

 

 If not, then there is always single player Wurm Unlimited.

 

(end snip)

 

You might want to test that statement. There are WU servers that have higher populations then WO.

Partially the reason for that is the 1$ 'free' copy of WU sold 2-3years ago en-masse.. plenty of people cashed in for personal and friends copies and left to no longer pay subscription fees or deal with other stuff typical for WO.

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On 1/30/2020 at 5:54 PM, Nappy said:

(snip)

 

 If not, then there is always single player Wurm Unlimited.

 

(end snip)

 

You might want to test that statement. There are WU servers that have higher populations then WO.

Which ones?

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On 10/30/2019 at 4:16 PM, tamat said:

people drain traders, public or private ones (yeap, you can buy one and have it if other/s arent around)
coffers are divided into trader ones and rare coins...
some money go out of system other not, even also people trading items, accounts, services or real money for it

Lmao

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deciding to grind cloth tailoring on plain meditation rugs in particular at a time when there is a renewed interest in their functionality due to the update, grinding blacksmithing on adamantine needles.  some rares can still pay a bit.

Edited by Johnston3

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