The Gods Must be Crazy!

[Eyoro]

either way i think that something needs to be done about the lack of Tria
this is just my opinion

[Karyuu]

Eyoro, you'll notice that I'm not disagreeing with you. I have said multiple times that this is only step one of balancing out the economy, and not the only change that will come. We just can't fix everything in one sitting, so some things will appear skewed at first.

[Draklar]

either way i think that something needs to be done about the lack of Tria
this is just my opinion

Personally, I think the Trias should be made even more scarce than they are now.
According to setting farmer is meant to earn a Circle in what? A month? Can someone tell me how much time it takes for a miner to earn as much after this foul change done by the gods?

I really, really wonder how Planeshift is supposed to turn into a roleplaying game, when people scream whenever the hack&slash features are taken away from them. I mean, take into account reality in most any dark setting. People have problems with earning money for food, let alone paying for training that will make them capable of defeating a creature of size doubling their own, while using nothing, but a wooden fork.
As a thief you rob a house, on the black market get tricked into selling the robbed goods for ridiculously low amount of money; yet enough to pay for some decent week-lasting food. A week. Enough to plan out another illegal activity and do so on and on until caught by the city guards. You don't earn enough money to buy yourself kickass everything, but that's exactly why people leave their past lives and become adventurers. To buy themselves kickass everything and train in fork-fighting so that they can challenge a creature of size doubling their own.

If mining gives you enough money to buy impressive sword, plate mail, pterosaur and anything else you want, then the game won't resemble the good ol' roleplaying games in the tiniest. It will, however, do excellent at following the good ol' hack&slash formula. But apparently in the internet the most important thing in a "roleplaying" game is to be able to buy anything you want and get enough experience to beat most everything without needing assistance from any other unlikely adventurer.

[Roderyck Slywolfe]

either way i think that something needs to be done about the lack of Tria
this is just my opinion

Personally, I think the Trias should be made even more scarce than they are now.
According to setting farmer is meant to earn a Circle in what? A month? Can someone tell me how much time it takes for a miner to earn as much after this foul change done by the gods?

I really, really wonder how Planeshift is supposed to turn into a roleplaying game, when people scream whenever the hack&slash features are taken away from them. I mean, take into account reality in most any dark setting. People have problems with earning money for food, let alone paying for training that will make them capable of defeating a creature of size doubling their own, while using nothing, but a wooden fork.

That's where you're wrong, my friend. In almost EVERY medieval RP setting, adventurers make up 1% of the entire populous. Now, there aren't many NPC's, but in reality, the plaza should be crawling with them. There should be farms all over the countryside, and NPC's should outnumber the players 99 to 1, but that's just not possible or practical.

Adventurers are the exception to the rule, and as such, make more money. Not to mention, the ONLY class of character that seeks out monsters to kill FOR THE SPORT OF IT.

Everyone enjoys something different. Some crafting, some battling, some just the RP. That's how a community develops. You need special interests and diversity. If we all just hung out in the plaza and RP'ed, it would merely be a beautifully laid out chat room.

[Donari Tyndale]

Adventurers? In a medieval times? There were rarely any, except those POOR beggars that travelled through the country in order to gain a living, not to mention that many died while doing so. And hunting monsters? I do not think a beggar ("Adventurer") could kill any monster. Oh, and those that did were hunting in groups, otherwise they risked their lives. Do you think it is realistic if everyone measures his strength in how MANY Ulbernauts he can kill in a certain period of time? And I don't see how that promotes a community. Don't you think an attack of a group of people in order to protect themselves would promote a community in a better way?
In medieval times only few people actually had any money, those were mostly merchants and powerful people. The other ones, even the miners, were hired and had to mine for a small wage.

[Roderyck Slywolfe]

We are discussing medieval fantasy, are we not?

Besides, we have gotten off topic. I believe this is supposed to be a discussion about the economic state of PS.

Can anyone tell me when we'll see new trades? As a chef, in RL, I'd like to see how cooking is implemented. 
I'm hoping food will add to Stamina(green) and men. stamina(gray), not HP. Leave that to Crystal Way and potions.

I think the new trades will aid in the economic balance of things.

[Draklar]

@Roderyck: Awesome. So go on being an average member of the population and earn 250 Trias a (in-game) month. You don't need to be an adventurer, but then you don't need all the combat training (besides the basics) and fine swords and plate mail and whatever else.
Right now most any "casual" crafter gets special combat training, uses magic that overthrows giants and walks around in finest armour. Ergo, most characters are adventurers. So please tell me again, where exactly I am wrong.

@Donari: In medieval times there was no monsters. And here we have a fantasy setting. Update yourself on fantasy roleplaying games, first taking a look at some of the oldest systems... like D&D or WFRP (especially this one if you look for "beggar" type of adventurers). Additionally compare need for adventurers in settings like Yliakum and the real world. Danger factor is quite different.

[Roderyck Slywolfe]

@Roderyck: Awesome. So go on being an average member of the population and earn 250 Trias a (in-game) month. You don't need to be an adventurer, but then you don't need all the combat training (besides the basics) and fine swords and plate mail and whatever else.
Right now most any "casual" crafter gets special combat training, uses magic that overthrows giants and walks around in finest armour. Ergo, most characters are adventurers. So please tell me again, where exactly I am wrong.

The only characters that could be considered common artisans and not adventurers are those that have never ventured out and killed monsters for tria or experience.

I would bet not a player amongst us can say they haven't. 

[Draklar]

Exactly. And as long as there will be gnashing of teeth whenever dev team makes death more risky (thus making adventurer a very lethal profession) and gnashing of teeth whenever dev team tries to make the economy more realistic, Planeshift will remain a hack&slash game where everyone are hunting monsters and not, say, earn money for food and basic life luxuries (or do you need maxed stats and best fighting equipment to roleplay a crafter?).

I really think most people would be happy if there was one fancy command in Planeshift:
/get money 'n'
/get experience 'n'
That would probably solve all problems.

[Roderyck Slywolfe]

For the record...

I have done NO whining or "gnashing of teeth" about the current state of the economy.

I have NO problem with the DEV team tweaking what they feel is necessary to balance the game.

I DO NOT see PS as a hack 'n' slash game, nor do I make my tria solely on it.

I am currently learning crafting, but it's a long road. I wish there were more crafts to learn, so I wouldn't be WAY behind in a saturated craft.

If it weren't for players that enjoy combat, why would crafters even make weapons or even have a market for their craft?

I LOVE to RP and have been playing D&D for 29 years, so I encourage it. For me, this is not about defending the HnS ways of PS, but PS as a whole.

The purpose of this topic was to offer suggestions on balancing the economy, at least for me. I feel I have a lot to offer, since I have designed a few games in my day.

[bilbous]

1. combat training is required of all citizens, perhaps not enough to fight ulbernauts but certainly enough to handle an infestation of aggressive rats.

2. Part of the problems occurring in PS are due to coddling the players. There has never been a full wipe in my couple years playing but there have been several partial wipes, some equipment and/or money. The fact someone came on the forum whining about being over encumbered because they had a zillion glyphs as a hedge against a new wipe and they suddenly had weight is evidence of this fact. The game is long overdue for a full wipe because you have no idea what the system is actually doing when you have remnants of ancient bugs and their work-arounds infesting the older characters. If this was my game and I was serious about it being pre-alpha I would wipe it at least once a year to start fresh. You can be fairly certain a new account will not have any hangovers from previous issues but you cannot be certain with a new character on an old account.

[Jeraphon]

My current thinking is that perhaps the training costs need to be decreased. I'm not sure how Xillix feels about this, but you do run into absolutely outrageous costs at the higher levels.

He's on board with it. So am I. We'll keep you posted about this too.

For the record, in case anyone is wondering if I was serious or not about reducing spawn rates: we HAVE discussed it - ask the other settings devs, and we have chat logs to prove it. You want realism, we'll give it to you. Just be careful what you wish for.

[Roderyck Slywolfe]

2. Part of the problems occurring in PS are due to coddling the players. There has never been a full wipe in my couple years playing but there have been several partial wipes, some equipment and/or money. The fact someone came on the forum whining about being over encumbered because they had a zillion glyphs as a hedge against a new wipe and they suddenly had weight is evidence of this fact. The game is long overdue for a full wipe because you have no idea what the system is actually doing when you have remnants of ancient bugs and their work-arounds infesting the older characters. If this was my game and I was serious about it being pre-alpha I would wipe it at least once a year to start fresh. You can be fairly certain a new account will not have any hangovers from previous issues but you cannot be certain with a new character on an old account.

I didn't want to be the one to say it, but you are ABSOLUTELY right. Once the DEV team feels they've tweaked things into balance, the ONLY way to find out is a complete wipe.

My current thinking is that perhaps the training costs need to be decreased. I'm not sure how Xillix feels about this, but you do run into absolutely outrageous costs at the higher levels.

For the record, in case anyone is wondering if I was serious or not about reducing spawn rates: we HAVE discussed it - ask the other settings devs, and we have chat logs to prove it. You want realism, we'll give it to you. Just be careful what you wish for.

I still believe that would be a bad move. After all, even now with a low player count, it is sometimes difficult to find some combat action with an NPC suitable to your ability. Now, consider three times that many players on at once. It would be disappointing, and dare I say, frustrating. A game is meant to be fun. Once you reach a comfortable number of players, that would plateau, as any more and you've have players quitting as constant as you'd have new players.

* Roderyck Slywolfe wishes spawning would stay as it is...

[Draklar]

While I respect that a balanced economy is important, reducing the gold is devastating to the economy. With a system in place for so long that allowed ranking up and stimulated the player-made item market being altered so drastically, the entire economy, instead of being balanced, will crash.

I have done NO whining or "gnashing of teeth" about the current state of the economy.

Oh really.

Now you know what is really devastating for the economy? The large division between PC and NPC economies.
NPCs don't earn much. As such the rewards they can give for completing their tasks are absolutely nothing compared to what PCs can earn by crafting. First of all why NPC earns less than PC for doing the exact same job? Second, what's the reason to go on errands if easier job gives more money? Reduction of Trias earned through crafting is a step towards fixing the problem. Balancing the economy, which for the time being is a complete disaster.
If a player enjoys combat, let him play a warrior. I'm sure there's lots of place for adventurers, gladiators and people who simply need to defend themselves during their travels.

If you think you can offer something for the project, consider applying. If you have experience in game design, then you should know that you need an entire picture about the game design in order to make any assumptions about what future may bring. If you know nothing beyond some basic tweaks done now and then, it's not nearly enough to make any assumptions about whether something will fail or not.

@bilbous: To first point, yes, exactly. That's why I said basic training is still needed. But you actually start with this basic training no matter how you created your character. You know how to handle a sword even at 0 skill.

I still believe that would be a bad move. After all, even now with a low player count, it is sometimes difficult to find some combat action with an NPC suitable to your ability. Now, consider three times that many players on at once. It would be disappointing, and dare I say, frustrating. A game is meant to be fun. Once you reach a comfortable number of players, that would plateau, as any more and you've have players quitting as constant as you'd have new players.

Ugh. There are many obvious ways to fix that.

[Fethrin]

Eyoro, you'll notice that I'm not disagreeing with you. I have said multiple times that this is only step one of balancing out the economy, and not the only change that will come. We just can't fix everything in one sitting, so some things will appear skewed at first.

Tell you what - I'm NOT looking forward to step 2 !!