On Fairness

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Bayard, Nov 2, 2016.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. Ashlynn [Pax]

    Ashlynn [Pax] Avatar

    Messages:
    995
    Likes Received:
    2,242
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Gender:
    Female
    The "many" probably being those selling stuff on the blight that is the Player Marketplace sub-forum.
     
  2. Canterbury

    Canterbury Avatar

    Messages:
    1,458
    Likes Received:
    3,874
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Avery, your most recent question was on how things are done here, so my answer -- that you are replying to, was about what I think of RMT in SotA, not Star Citizen, just FYI.
     
  3. Earl Atogrim von Draken

    Earl Atogrim von Draken Avatar

    Messages:
    6,331
    Likes Received:
    12,109
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    Ah, a crusader?
     
  4. Gideon Thrax

    Gideon Thrax Avatar

    Messages:
    2,497
    Likes Received:
    6,771
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    Ahhh - but what you're missing is that buyers set the prices. There are speculators that are throwing the baby out with bathwater if they think their investments will turn into anything more than what they are now. The in game economy will stabilize and the market will take a turn that favors in game currency trades (COTO, gold, commodities) over real dollars. The days of pledge sales are over and the rares market will sort itself out between traders.

    I think SotA is going to be around for a long long time - and so long as Portalarium doesn't cut their nose off to spite their face (player market) they're setting the stage for a long game.
     
  5. Insinious FizzleThorpe

    Insinious FizzleThorpe Avatar

    Messages:
    212
    Likes Received:
    484
    Trophy Points:
    18
    Meaning that vital testing that needed to be done, would not have occurred. 3 month cycles between wipes was good at that time, now that more of the core features are in place, there is no reason there should not be a wipe 2 weeks out from Official launch. They should use all the data they can gather between now and then make tweaks and without the thought of , omg Don't lawyer me, bro we said we wouldn't but.. were going to final wipe again.. Nuke it.. early backers still get "early access" of 2 weeks to get established.
     
    Alexander and Weins201 like this.
  6. Earl Atogrim von Draken

    Earl Atogrim von Draken Avatar

    Messages:
    6,331
    Likes Received:
    12,109
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    Not going to happen but under the most dire circumstances and even than it's likely that they will do everything to only reset parts of the game like skills and experience.
     
    Last edited: Nov 4, 2016
    Duke Avery, Alexander and Weins201 like this.
  7. Alexander

    Alexander Avatar

    Messages:
    1,835
    Likes Received:
    5,523
    Trophy Points:
    125
    Never really cared for the term 'Don't lawyer me'. But aside from that, it is ultimately Ports decision as to what they wish to do at final release. People in this thread are just simply expressing their feelings on this, good or bad.
     
  8. Kirran

    Kirran Avatar

    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    255
    Trophy Points:
    18
    Shroud is a Single-player game with multi-player elements. It isn't an MMO like WoW, as much as people seem to feel that it is. I and almost all of my guild will play in Friends-only mode. You and I will not compete for resources. I will never see your toon, nor you mine. We won't compete for Silver in Verdantis, we won't compete for Patriarch Bears in Ulfheim because I'll play in different instances than you do. You and I will have no contact whatsoever, because this is the dynamics of the game Port has architected. What exactly is it that makes you think I'm competing with you for anything? What makes you think you're competing with me? Why do you even think you HAVE to compete with me?

    Pledge backers invested a significant amount of money and financial risk to fund a developmental game that may have never launched, nor still may be a commercial success. I play with the same mechanics that you do. Did you start playing WoW 5 years after it launched and feel slighted because thise who played before you had an unfair head start? Grind it out like the rest of us had to.
     
  9. Gideon Thrax

    Gideon Thrax Avatar

    Messages:
    2,497
    Likes Received:
    6,771
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    But this isn't how the game is marketed. The game is marketed as a sandbox MMO with a single player narrative and where it advertises a player driven economy people read that to mean sandbox MMO economy. What's happening with the player market is exactly what was surely anticipated when this project started calling itself a sandbox MMO. The way the economy has been introduced, and its multiple online modes sharing a single online economy is foreign to just about all of us; and it's that newness to the gaming industry that makes it appealing. It's hard to speculate how things will look at launch but some things people are still expecting are hinged on regional economies. I believe the genius behind this game's economic settings will cater to speed-to-market commodities - and it'll be on the entire playerbase to establish market value. Of course, we're going to need a larger playerbase before the real genius of this economic puzzle can be realized - but when it finally all comes together - region specific buffs and the regional economies created because of those buffs will be (should be) meaningful.

    [​IMG]
     
  10. Kirran

    Kirran Avatar

    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    255
    Trophy Points:
    18
    I have yet to see a road map for any details of what these cool regional economies are supposed to look like. I'm not seeing any basis in a core design to support it to this point. Don't you think that something that fundamental to the game should have been part of the original mechanics? At the end of the day, it's still going to be supply-vs-demand economics. Where's the genius here?

    You have more fundamental aspects of the game already designed and implemented that don't jibe with a thriving player economy. Like lack of skill caps. For the most part, people are going to make whatever they want, because their access to skill points is unlimited. Does 'Regional' economy mean I'm not going to go to Owl's Head anymore because I have to go through Nightshade Pass and run away from an annoying Skeleton and a Bandit encounter to get there? No, I'm still going to do that because I'm looking for the best price on something, period. The extra travel time is merely an added annoyance.

    How does the idea of a regional economy relate to 'fairness'?
     
  11. Gideon Thrax

    Gideon Thrax Avatar

    Messages:
    2,497
    Likes Received:
    6,771
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    I haven't seen any roadmap to regional economies either - what I have seen are pieces of the puzzle. Movement inhibitors on the overworld map. Checkpoints. Regional buffs. Botting and macro exploit bans. Town sieges. Airships, pack animals, mounts... all of which still need to be implemented at some point. And all of it becomes moot and fluff if regional buffs aren't implemented properly.

    A guild will never be able to control a node. However, the guild that has freedom of movement within a specific region due to implemented constraints and trade barriers should be able to discover advantages that no one else outside of that region has. That's why I suggested that speed-to-market traders will see the biggest advantage when bringing commodities to market - and in turn, those commodities and advantages should feed everything else in the crafting world. Ultimately it's on the players to play the game and find ways to cooperate and compete - and the foundation for the economy as I see it looks like it could support a massive amount of players in search of economic competition. But it does hinge on regional buffs and how they're implemented. If SotA launches as a deco collection game, well, that's not a sandbox MMO.

    How the economy is ultimately implemented will define fairness. Everyone shouldn't have the same opportunities, regional buffs must be explicit... sure, everyone can still have access to everything - but it should be hard to get to and not cost effective. Only then will the economy really thrive and then the game can really get started. Fairness I guess is on the individual player at that point.
     
    Last edited: Nov 4, 2016
  12. Kirran

    Kirran Avatar

    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    255
    Trophy Points:
    18
    At the end of the day, I guess it depends on whether this type of regional economic model (in whatever schtick they come up with) is an attractive feature to the community as a whole, or is it going to be considered an unwelcome impediment to enjoyable gameplay.

    IMO, if the individual feels like there are too many obstacles in their way, they're going to bail. Too many other games to play, and people have limited attention spans. Making a player submit to a 10-second progress bar wait to complete tanning a hide is a cheap way of simulating the time it takes to craft. Multiply that by 100, or 1000, and add up all the other grindy mechanics, prohibitions on movement, control points, etc. Is the sum of all those minor annoyances really fun?
     
    Kaisa and Duke Avery like this.
  13. Earl Atogrim von Draken

    Earl Atogrim von Draken Avatar

    Messages:
    6,331
    Likes Received:
    12,109
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    That's the question, isn't it?
    But you have to remember, even if this gets old, that the system isn't finished. At the moment we mainly deal with the 'downsides' of the concept. The upsides like regional bonuses aren't implemented yet. That's part of the ongoing development we are still in and I know and understand that it can be extremely frustrating for people. Still I recommend everybody to spare judgment on this topic untill we finally see at least a few of the upsides.
    Will they manage to make it fun? Hell I don't know. But I will give it a try.
     
    Duke Avery likes this.
  14. LiquidSky

    LiquidSky Avatar

    Messages:
    263
    Likes Received:
    509
    Trophy Points:
    28
    The problem with all these little timesinks on activities is they dont really allow you to do anything else while they are going on.

    There are plenty of games that use timesinks to represent activities. RTS games. Online 'free' building games.... People are used to the idea that it should take time to do an activity. But what those other games will usually allow you to do is to continue on doing stuff instead of actually sitting there staring at your monitor.

    For example...when the undead in Ecteter did not respawn when not looted...I could mine for hours while watching a movie on my other monitor. So it didnt matter that it would take several seconds per node....I was doing something else at the same time.

    Now they respawn. Despite being trivial for me to kill them....it means I now have to pay attention to the timesink..thus making the game boring. Crafting has a similar problem...the batch size of 20 allows me to do other things, but is too short to allow me to say...do my laundry, or clean the kitchen. Thus increasing the boredom of the game.

    So they can keep the timesinks...but they have to allow us to play the game. Or as others have said, I will move on to one that will.
     
    Vagabond Sam and Xandra7 like this.
  15. Ashlynn [Pax]

    Ashlynn [Pax] Avatar

    Messages:
    995
    Likes Received:
    2,242
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Gender:
    Female
    That you think that is pretty amusing given I haven't been particularly vocal about it (I mean why bother, Portalarium has already fully endorsed it).

    Our viewpoints are pretty obvious though, just don't complain about the broken economy when most of the commodities are being sold on the player marketplace. At this point they may as well just implement an ingame paypal button on vendors.
     
    Kaisa, Xandra7, Putzaroo and 2 others like this.
  16. Earl Atogrim von Draken

    Earl Atogrim von Draken Avatar

    Messages:
    6,331
    Likes Received:
    12,109
    Trophy Points:
    165
    Gender:
    Male
    You jumped into this topic two times with relative absolute statements. That's cool.
    All I tried was to goat you into a longer response. Because I would like to know why you think that way.
    I am still indifferent about that topic. Yes I sold the stuff I don't need. Part for gold, part for CotOs part for hard cash. I roughly gifted away as much as I sold. And what I sold I probably sold too cheap.
    So I am far from beeing a real RMT.
    But than again I think it's going to happen anyway and then I prefer RMT in a regulated form. Well , as far as you can regulate stuff like that.
     
  17. Dwalin Bombardin

    Dwalin Bombardin Avatar

    Messages:
    78
    Likes Received:
    232
    Trophy Points:
    8
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Las Vegas, NV
    People hoping for a wipe: there have been probably on the order of millions of US dollars exchanged for deeds and lot placement deals. If a complete wipe does occur without adequate compensation, which is difficult to define, you can bet many of the early backers will leave.

    The decision to integrate profitability in the form of microtransactions is necessary because port has to fund its operations. It takes money to maintain a game and to make a game better. Consider this: there is no monthly subscription fee!
     
    Last edited: Nov 5, 2016
  18. mass

    mass Avatar

    Messages:
    1,223
    Likes Received:
    2,513
    Trophy Points:
    113
    You, my friend, have a bright future in the games industry :)
     
  19. Canterbury

    Canterbury Avatar

    Messages:
    1,458
    Likes Received:
    3,874
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    And that's what will kill the game. Already has to some degree. People believe this to be an MMO, whatever your interpretation is. They log in... everyone's in private instances... they don't see anyone... they think the game's dead.

    People who think the game's dead don't have fun... they tell other people... the reputation spreads. Again, it already has done, to some degree already. You see it in comments here, other forums, Steam, and so on and do forth.
     
  20. Kirran

    Kirran Avatar

    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    255
    Trophy Points:
    18
    And if they did all log in to the same instances the screen hiccuping and client crashes wouldn't be pretty.
     
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.