Extreme Rares

Discussion in 'Crafting & Gathering' started by Bowen Bloodgood, Sep 16, 2014.

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  1. Bowen Bloodgood

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    So the idea is that there are resources that are so rare that only wealthy collectors can afford them.

    Why? To ensure that wealthy players will always have something to spend their money on.

    How rare? Story time.. back in my DM days running a NWN server we had mining for crafting resources. One particular item had something like 1 in 30,000 odds of being discovered. As a player, I probably mined several hundred hours off and on over a few years and in all that time I found maybe one. Just one.

    We're talking stuff that's so rare it's an instant high value collectable item that even special NPCs would pay an arm and a leg for.

    I'm sure someone must be thinking why cater to the rich players who are hording their money like that? Because horded money is money that is stagnant. We want money to flow through the economy.

    Ok I'm talking a lot about economy why did I post in crafting? Because, some of these things could be craftable!

    Imagine you're in the Graff mines and you find yourself with a raw pink diamond the size of your fist! What are you going to do with it? Take it to a master gem cutter of course!

    Any ultra rare, harvestable item should be craftable into something.

    The catch here, is that none of this should provide any kind of skill advantage over normal materials. You might have a special variant of your jeweled sword made with your pink diamond which would greatly increase its monetary value, but there is no increase in ability.

    What I might do to limit rarity is place a soft limit on the average number of raw rare resources available per active account. Also, only master craftsmen could work with them and have extreme odds of even finding them.. (ie like 1 in 30,000)

    I remember some of the problems UO had when inflation was out of control and devs had to come up with new stuff for players to spend their money on to try to get things under control. I think it would be prudent to have high ticket collectors items from the start.

    This of course in addition to promoting player crafting items becoming rare through various scenarios.
     
  2. StaticGrazer

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    Solid idea, super rare harvested items can only be processed by very skills craftsmen ( with any level of success ).

    But I'm not really sure what you're asking other than, how can we prevent expensive in game items from being horded by the rich and famous?
     
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  3. Bowen Bloodgood

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    It's not item hording that is an issue. Resources are either renewable or near inexhaustible so it shouldn't matter if items are horded or not, there will always be more. Currency on the other hand is another issue. A healthy economy needs currency to flow. It doesn't do anyone any good if it just sits there in the bank or someone's personal storage and if too many people have nothing to spend their money on.. suddenly they no longer care and will be willing to buy at higher prices. That's where we start having problems.
     
  4. Margard

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    I'm not big on rares - but lets assume that the people that have houses - folks who backed the game probably have a good chance of attaining said wealth

    Why not have them spend their wealth on housing rares / upgrades - that can only be bought through an NPC ... and these upgrades would also cause - other social benefits

    Say - and this is just a silly example - a house buys a golden door - and what ever town possesses this door - lowers vendor prices for the entire town

    The idea of rares with no benefit to others while money is transferred to player to player will not limit inflation - inflation would only be helped if money is taken out of circulation (and hoarders of raw goods and tradeable items charge reasonable prices)

    I like the idea of giving wealthy people things to spend on / I just would like it to become city / town attractions as opposed to an adornment on someones table
     
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  5. StaticGrazer

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    Well, I'm no dev, but I'd guess they are doing their best to set up their economy to prevent this sort of thing. Hopefully they'll hit the nail on the head and won't need to adjust down the road.

    By the way, what did the UO devs wind up doing to get the money flowing again?
     
  6. Bowen Bloodgood

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    While this is indeed a good idea with a good premise, the problem with it is two fold. 1: All player housing would have to be updated with a system and content created for that system in order to have home upgrades. This would also include ships and probably all basements. Very expensive on a developer standpoint. 2: Options are limited.

    Rares don't always have to be exclusively through players and other factors could be mixed in. With the pink diamond example all you would do is say.. take the mesh for an existing diamond and alter the color. Fairly cheap.

    Imagine also, that the miner happens to be a poor player selling to a rich player. That won't hurt at all. The issue would be if money is changing hands between 2 rich players.

    So what can we do to such a little currency back into the NPC economy when there's a high level transaction between 2 players? A sales tax on items over a certain value is the first thing that comes to mind. You could (and this might be worth it's own thread) have say.. an NPC broker to guarantee secure trade and/or delivery of goods.. for a small fee (plus tax ;) ).

    These rares could also find their way into the NPC market through different scenarios.. rather than being mined one or two pink diamonds could spawn on an NPC gem dealer and float around the markets until someone spends a small fortune on them. They don't all have to be discovered for free. ;)
     
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  7. Margard

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    I like this one :] ... but the house item could be for example a one of a kind collectors - I can't imagine it would take much work or would it - scratch modifications

    But what about a statue, a bird bath etc etc ... something that can be shown off - and be one of a kind
     
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  8. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I don't know about the bird bath but I did put forth a sculpting idea early last year would allow for unique sculptures to be made.

    It goes something like this.. through whatever interface you take a "snapshot" of the subject you want to sculpt. What the game would do here is make a copy of the subject in whatever pose it is in at the time (including any and all gear if it's a person). This has actually already been done in The Sims 3 with ice sculptures. You could sculpt out of clay, stone, marble, wood etc to further diversify your work.

    A sculpting skill could be expanded to include different options like busts or small groups.

    Painting would be similar. You'd basically take a screenshot with certain dimensions matching your canvas and with some basic filter options to make it look more like a painting. (Also done in TS3).
     
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  9. Margard

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    The big issue for me - would be to buy it from Port - although - systems can be created so un-wealthy player sells to a rich one ... changes are that it would be some elses alt / only way to keep inflation away is to take money out of the system (temp or permanently)
     
  10. Bowen Bloodgood

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    If need be you could always say that some (or all) really extreme rares are only available from NPCs
     
  11. Margard

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    But I think that having players - creative one in particular - be able to get rich would be great too ... but maybe there is a submission process that someone could control as to not complicate the problem

    - posted a silly bond idea on the other thread
     
  12. redfish

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    Shiny pokemon :>>>
    Would be cool if they could figure out how to do this without taking up a lot of extra resources, just using the object models and giving it the proper texture. Also would be neat if they could be composited, like I could make a sculpture of Bowen with an owl on his shoulder, or riding a horse. Busts are needed too of course.
     
  13. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I believe the solution is one that includes a variety of options. Rares alone aren't a complete answer but I know there will be a thriving rare market. So it's something I think Portalarium can take advantage of.
     
  14. Margard

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    More than rares I really like the idea of artist creating avatar size art - or paintings ... I remember R1 and I went upstairs and I think I saw a painting of Rembrandt (at least something that reminded me of his "self portrait") ... for me personally that would be awesome to have players create paintings in game
     
  15. redfish

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    Yea, though I think it would be nice if we were able to choose the size... could be life-size, or a small figurine, or even a huge statue.
     
  16. Margard

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    Mural on a castle wall anyone?
     
  17. CaptainJackSparrow

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    Captain Jack would firstly like to say that he isn't following anyone around and constantly posting negative or dissenting comments to all of their ideas... Captain Jack feels it is necessary to proclaim this as the new forum rules are really really strict when it comes to this and even natural non-aggressive thoughts and comments can fall under attacking in the new forum rules. This is not the case with Captain Jack's post.

    With that out of the way, Captain Jack feels it is best that all players be as equal as they can in all matters. Captain Jack was brought here by PvP but has since been very interested in the early concepts which were layed out by Richard Garriot, and those would be that of the Casual Gamer and Offline Gamer getting a great experience. I consider a great experience being able to get everything in the game including non-quest items(rares or collectables or whatever) in a reasonable time frame. That being said, those early concepts seem to have been either worked on in the background without getting much exposure or dropped off the face of the planet. Captain Jack wonders if it is square...

    Captain Jack did some research though and based on his research he does think that this game is going to be very very rare heavy. Rares everywhere. The idea will probably be that the heavy gamers get the rares, loser casual gamers like Captain Jack here will get jealous of those rares but no fear! They are in the Online Store of course :p So Captain Jack will have a method of getting the rares casually for a little bit of his Eight.

    Too long didn't read? Please don't spam us with ultra rare collectables.
     
  18. Blake Blackstone

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    Im thinking a rare item could be used in a quest, that possibly grants title or stature somehow.
     
  19. Blake Blackstone

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    I like pirates a lot! Arrrghh. What is the pirate's favorite past time outside of stealing, marauding, and pillaging???

    You guessed it! Fishing. The seas can be lonely for a pirate, waiting for his next "catch", so he fishes to pass the time.

    By way of the seas you hear of a worm that a farmer dug up while planting potatoes. You head to port!

    With what might be the largest known worm to date, you set out to earn your title as Guinness Book of New Britannia's largest fish ever caught title.

    Along with your name in the book, you get a taxidermy fish(farmer gets a worm trophy). Instantly they are priceless. Both to you and the rich dude who wants it.

    This would be pretty easy for the devs to implement once they have worms, fish, and boats. Just randomize the rarity of a worm(size,overall potential of the catch) and then randomize the size of the fish caught.

    Farmer digs up 6" worm?
    It catches 1-2' fish...

    2' worm?
    ?????

    This could play out a million different ways. The best way to create a true rare is for it to mean more to the player that found/earned it, than the rich guy. This way if the player decides to sell the rare, at least he made that choice.... Happy either way.
     
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  20. redfish

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    If Captain Jack has got pieces of Eight, he can get his rares here,

    [​IMG]
     
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