RMT, the Economy and plans for the future

When I started playing SoTA I had no idea that RMT was allowed. Had I done I may have thought twice about supporting the game.

I have nothing against it as such. I dislike the self entitled attitude that people who play all day often have where they believe they should have everything first, better and for ever. I think giving people the opportunity to obtain something they would not otherwise be able to because they are casual is a good idea. Is RMT the right way of doing it?

I think the free housing for certain pledges combined with RMT is potentially already having a big impact on the economy. I'm sure some players came into the game with this in mind, to try to corner the market as it were. This could be off-putting for new players coming into the game. Is incentivising powergamers with the opportunity to make real money from in-game items in any way a good idea for the long term health of the game.

I also watched a video today where a Youtuber seemed to state (unless I got the wrong end of the stick) that they were the official RMTer for Portalarium and stated Portalarium are making money from their RMT transactions. Now I thought that all transactions of this kind were supposed to take place on the forums. Having watched this channels videos this person often tells people to dismiss the reviews they have read and give the game a go. Is there a conflict of interest here? You have someone making money from RMT actively encouraging people to try the game that the devs are apparently involved with.

As some who is enjoying the game at the moment but who is now questioning whether I should invest more money, I'd be interested in some dev feedback.

 

Can you Link the Vid please?
Which language is it?

 

If I have to guess, that's probably Markee Dragon.

I have nothing against RMT at this point (I probably would if I were still in highscool with plenty of free time to kill).

At this point, time is money for me. So depending on what items or services, I may or may not consider using real money to trade for it. At this point, the dev team made it pretty clear that only the market place forum is the official space where people can advertise trading with real money.

It's pleasant so far. I do not see anyone soliciting selling items with real money anymore until I go to market place forum or external websites.

 

Aye it is. This video from about 51mins. Maybe I got the wrong end of the stick but it sounded like it.

 

Wow, I did not even know there was an official certified trader besides the add-on-store. Curious, how did I miss this important announcement from Portalarium?

 

If it's Markee, he probably just said that he's an official 'reseller' of SotA stuff. I listened to a chunk of his SotA stream yesterday and he said as much. I don't ever remember him saying anything about being an official RMT person, but I don't follow his stuff all the time. Perhaps just by nature of him doing RMT to buy things from people to resell, and the fact that he's supposedly an official SotA reseller makes him an Official RMT middleman?

 

take any thing anyone says about being "official" anything with a grain of salt unless they come with a badge and gun or the entity said "official" represnts says its true

 

I know the RMT does make the game feel sleezy to me.

 

I listened again and he definitely gives the impression it is RMT. Talking about the only other place you can do it is the official market place and not getting scammed. Even suggesting you can still get scammed from the official market place (which I'm assuming it would not be the case if it was the official store). This doesn't sit well and leaves a lot of questions.

 

I know in onr of the lunch with laz and jack the mentioned markee visiting portalarium in Austin.

 

Rild is an example of RMT we don't think about often. Mostly because he handles what Port does not have time for and has done a good job at.

 

I can tell you with my 19 years of MMO experience on the top MMO of all tyme, if Port was doing what you're claiming then they're doing a terrible job lol. In other words, they aren't.

Anyways, the only thing to worry about in regards to the economy at this point in the game is inflation, and there's no need to be worried about that at all.

RMT is a good thing, it allows people who work 6 days a week to be able to do what they wanna do with their hour of SotA that they cherish so much. RMT boosts activity and player enjoyment. I'd like to see a reasonable argument against it, other than saying 'it looks bad' to the uneducated.

 

It's in the standup notes that he visited.

 

I'm sure we've all got many years of MMO experience, it's why we are here. Not sure what the relevance is.

The problems to a gaming economy RMT can create are as obvious to me as you think its not a problem is to you, education has nothing to do with it. As I said I'm not totally against it and it can allow people to do things that may not have been able to do. I'd like to see game systems and mechanics do that though as opposed to RMT.

I guess we'll see but I will be waiting to spend more money on SoTA until things pan out.

 

What questions?

That might be a good idea, but what would you be waiting for? What's the definition of pan out in this case?

I think RMT is good for the game, and have been collecting rares for sale later down the road. RMT is going to happen, and it is better to embrace it as a method of play, rather than spend resources fighting a battle you won't win.

 

If we go by the usual MMO term "Real Money Transactions" then Rild is not an example of that at all. He is doing actual, physical objects much like any other online store like Etsy. Nothing you buy there will get you ahead in the game. [Edit: To clarify, the transactions with Rild are not related to exchanging cash for objects in-game in either direction.]

 

Ah ok. Sometimes I'm crap with having the correct definition.

 

I gave you specifics as to why RMT is not a problem, but you only give me opinions as to why it's a problem. Can you give some insight for how specifically RMT is a problem for the economy and the game in general?

The relevance to my 19 years of UO experience is that I've seen it all dood, all the bugs, all the fixes, all the different staff trying to sell gold behind the scenes anywhere from blatantly to doing a good job of keeping a secret, and I can tell you that none of that exists here and there's nothing to worry about.

It's important to understand how a UO veterans opinion is valuable in these matters. 100 freeshards have 100 different economies. Whereas WoW or other games only have 1 economy. I'm not going to go into detail as to why I know Port isn't selling behind the scenes, but I can assure you that they aren't.

 

For lazier people and ease of discussion I transcribed the parts I found interesting, beginning from 53:26

"So, one of the reasons we hired somebody is because we are the official place where you can go for buying, selling and trading items that have cash value for within the game. You can do it on the player market place or you can do it with us. And both are... It's the the only two recommended ways for doing it. You can... There are other things you can do. You can go outside of it, they won't stop you, but if you get scammed or something and you complain about it they're going to turn you right back around saying <<Well you should have used Markee Dragon or you should have gone through the player market place>> but even in the player market place (they?) can't guarantee you won't get scammed , uhm so, but I can guarantee you won't get scammed with us. So, and...We're authorized, plus the purchases go back into Portalarium."

I'd like to know the truth of these statements. Are my trades with Markee Dragon really covered by Port or is this just "boasting"? A clever way to get more business?

P.S.: If they really *are* covered, where is this magic store?

 

It may be that someone is selling and then donating the money to Port, but again I see absolutely no indication that Port is generating to tap into the market.

Port hasn't officially endorsed any traders but perhaps members of Port have pointed buyers in Markee's direction under the soul pretense that he isn't a scammer.