Commision free vendor: possible economy unbalance?

I am one of the last people that would require any form of pay to win advantage, this is about getting what we payed for.

 

I've been AWOL for some time and love the addition of a public vendor! I have a vendor also but my house is off the beaten track and thats life, it will will be my challenge to generate sales between the two. I also don't balk at the lucky guys who has prime real estate/vendors in major towns.

 

Requiring a P2W advantage and enjoying one are not the same thing. No player requires such a BS advantage. Some just have mushy morals and will happily take one. Back to my question: what did you "pay for," exactly?

Mrs. Dragon quoted it already and I think it disposes of your concern fairly completely. You'll get what you "paid for" regardless of whether it gives you a permanent advantage over new players.

 

You are completely ignoring the fact that when we asked if these would be available outside of the pledges, the answer was "yes, but they will incur a fee".

 

A fee that could be the in game gold you pay for it. A very vague answer that covers lots of interpretations, a lawyers dream.

 

FWIW - sure I have a vendor and may actually use it. I really can't see it impacting the economy in any way though.

I see the public vendors as the equivalent of large, centrally located supermarkets. Easy to find and probably have a good range of goods. The private vendors (especially mine) are like small corner stores. They MAY give you a better deal, but:
a) You have to find one that has what you want
b) You probably have to travel to the other end of the earth to even find the vendor, and see what he has.
c) When you get there he may not have anything useful.

For these and other reasons (control points, regional economy) the private vendors may become known and used by the LOCAL community - the guild and POT occupants. But it would take a really long time for a particular vendor to become famous enough to stimulate people to make the journey to shop there rather than somewhere more convenient. And I think that would only occur if there was a dedicated crafter at work, determined to sell high quality goods at a really competitive price.

 

I read that as while our upstanding pledgers here have some thin veil of logic, your solution is to allow still more people to buy into the same faulty logic? Hmm....yes, its called the pledge store!

Anyway, that commission-free vendors earn more margin than a commissioned-vendor is a given where prices are required to be equal across all vendors for a given item. However, that is true only in a static system. If price is dynamic, if players can establish their own prices, then all bets are off. As with a real economy, margins then will vary widely based other factors such as urgency of supply and demand for a given location and item. It is not all about the macro. Hopefully the game will allow players to establish their own prices for any item they wish to sell, yes?

If so, I'm really happy to hear that many players assume that a commission-free vendor player will sell at the same price point as a neighboring commissioned-vendor to earn the same price but a higher margin. Why? Because while you keep price high to compete with my perceived margin advantage, I will simply focus on selling the same product at a higher volume at a lower price and lower margin to attract the lion's share of business with a lower price point, corner the available cash flow from passing players, and get gold into my pocket while your vendor continues to have unsold inventory. Margin is important. But profit is not all about margin.

I agree with Asclepius above, I don't think the vendor commission fee will prove to be any big deal. I played other games where people play economic metagames with auction houses. At best I have seen short term issues from that. Things like that ebb and flow and rarely are maintained as constant. And honestly, I don't pay much attention and it does not affect my gaming fun. If something seems outrageous in price, I move on and typically can find it more reasonably in a short time. I don't expect SOTA to be different. So I too think it is premature to preach economic doom and gloom in SOTA for this small thing. We will see.

 

Pay to win a few extra coins is not pay to win in other aspects of the game that hopefully will matter more than money and people being the first to be able to corrupt the mayor of their town

You'd be surprised tho how fast people map all the vendors and you run out of stock if some players really have too much money and are a bit selfish, people do "stockpile" like in real life. The devs have mentioned many times for justifying other things...

That is a big problem for games like ours with lots of really rare ressources and not alot of "full time" players. I say that because we seem to be an older demographic, and many of us live busy lives and won't be protected from this.

This is one reason I want a siege perilous, but thats besides the point now is it

 

I appreciate your reference to my posts, I do try to be helpful and relevant.
But please, my name is Miracle Dragon, not Mrs. Dragon.

*shakes his head* "Gosh, I only wore that dress the one time!! They told me what happens in Novia, stays in Novia!"

 

And, if they follow a similar model to what was made available when they introduced the Prosperity tools, then there is a distinct possibility that the negligible advantage provided by the pledge reward will be outclassed by options available in the game for IG currency.

For instance, you have artisan and prosperity tools that are available as pledge and add-on store items, both of which provide a slight advantage in terms of skill benefit and a larger advantage in terms of invulnerability. In game, you will be able to craft items that are far superior to either class of tool, but will also need to be repaired from time to time.

I expect there will be a similar set of circumstances surrounding the personal, fee-free vendors.

 

The lack of an item sink is going to affect gameplay muuuuch more...

 

Which item are you referring to, specifically?

 

I'm thinking all of those players use regularly... tools, weapons, armor specifically. Since you can effectively repair items to full durability, and when they have no more durability they are not destroyed, but merely broken until repaired, then no item is ever really lost, and so never needs to be replaced.

 

Exactly... Dread lord Dr.Evil cannot stockpile millions of sets of armors from his fallen prey and thus stimulate the crafter economy.

 

hmmm... I didn't know this one, I thought they were destroyed when not repaired.
I agree, this is a problem.

 

There is also going to be a point when it is no longer worth repairing an item - or something along that line. Was in one of the releases or those videos that they do. Which one is lost to me - details.

So, you'd keep it but more for sentimental value, I think it was?

 

Yes it was an idea at first but it sure evolved in the total opposite direction... that mechanic was replaced... at least the items I use seem to lose no overall durability. The repair kits transform me into a blacksmith anywhere (which I also think is not encouraging wannabe blacksmiths)

 

Not entirely... each time you use a repair kit in the field, the max durability drops, sometimes drastically. Only by bringing the item to the appropriate crafting station and using a repair kit there will the max durability be restored.

I haven't noticed yet if that max durability slowly deteriorates after multiple station repairs, however.

 

Well, with the crafting still not fully in yet. Yes, you can be a blacksmith on the go, but as you still need the table for full repair, currently.

And yes, you can repair to the max - currently. Still haven't heard they changed their minds about it yet so, maybe one of these days, your trusted so-and-so will no longer be your chosen companion to go adventuring with into the battlefields? They still haven't tinkered with the recipes either so...... best carry a spare, just in case.

 

It doesnt seem to at this point