Let\'s revive this. Sorry for not posting here sooner.
I should have dug through here, instead of posting to the tail end of other threads.
Here\'s how I see it. Adventuring should be difficult. An economy needs to be established, and players not NPC\'s should be responsible for establishing that economy.
We have to stop thinking in a way of just things costing money...
The biggest worry is that economy will drive down the cost.
The game begins.
We\'ve established teachers... that solves the initial training factor, but for the most part schools are for theory. It\'s not very often that we keep going back to school 100 times to upgrade skills once we\'ve chosen a profession, or trained for a profession.
The reason you go back to school is to learn theory for a different skill. To impose a constant constraint that requires continual spending of money to level up is unreasonable, real life just doesn\'t work that way.
hmmm... this is going to get long.
When we create our characters we can choose limited birthing characters that are esentially genetically imbred into us. Each covering a basic line of work. So when we create out character we are choosing a potential career.
It should be said that often people go to school for a profession and find out when they get into it, it proves to be something they just don\'t want to do, or they find out that there\'s already so many of them out there, it\'s impossible to compete it that job market, so they go back to school. Unfortunately that\'s how life is, but the fundamentals for this are already established in PS.
Everyone agrees, that it should require multiple people to create nearly everything in the game, and it should be diverse. I agree 100%. But the problem is over coming the fears of items being undersold.
The basics for a smith to forge a weapon will always be the guiding factors. In PS already when I\'m mining, people approach all the time who claim to have great strength and can carry many arm loads of ore, or are willing to ferry items to town. As crude as PS is, it\'s already begun to form an economy. We\'ll get to how money factors later.
The miner already realizes he can get say 6-8 trias from a blacksmith for his ore, but may only be able to carry 4-5 based on his strength. So for each really long trip he\'s making upto 30 tria. Anyone who has mined, knows it takes a long time to find ore.
Now the ferryman can say carry 30 ore, and sell them for 6-8 trias, and says he\'s wants a 30% cut.
But we can all progress in strength training, so eventually the miner who should naturally get an increase in strength from mining as he\'s working his muscles, and natural gaining experience in how to mine. Will eventually be able to carry more ore, but at the same time, for the ferrymen not to be eliminated they\'re strength training, or doing activities that natural increase there capacity beyond what the miner is naturally attaining for his job.
Think of this like a miner, compared to a professional weight lifter. The basic economy is balanced natural on skills are attained and leveled. Schools should be used to advance skills quickly, natural work should advance skills slowly, but for free once a basic theory has been learned in that skill.
By establishing different metal deposits, which the game has already done, different mining markets have been established, and greater distances needed to be traversed from the mining point back to a blacksmith that is willing, or able to pay for the ore.
From the blacksmiths point of view, he needs some way to make money to pay the ferryman, who in turns pays the miner.
It gets a little more complicated, I\'ve actually other users who have attempted to establish a group to mine, now you\'ve established the miners guild. And a pyramid effect is born. You\'ll always have people trying to undercut the union, but by the long and means, natural order states, the guild will put pressure on the little guys to join. It\'s progressive strong-arming.
Side-tracked sorry.
Back to the blacksmith, as mentioned in the
http://planeshift.oodlz.com/wbboard/thread.php?threadid=15758&boardid=11&sid=e2db3536e577c0b5a4be1fb5adbe443f&page=2#21Natural trade and the barter system was the primary mode of conduct for currency in the middleages. It will always have a place. Leather workers, people raising and slaying cows, or skinning gobbles, or rats, or otherwise. But we still don\'t have a need for adventurers.
Mines, minerals and things should be guarded or in locations that readily inhabited by creatures that require the adventurers to keep them safe. Platinum mines should be hard to get to, but I don\'t think so much that creatures aside from the basic ones needed to establish an economy are necessary.
If you permit PKing, the economy would collapse, because the people needed to keep it running will be strongarmed by the thieves guild to give up there goods.
Now you\'ve established guild wars, Hack-N-Slash has been eliminated aside from the natural progression of players RPing out there the class they decided to evolve in. This is what gives PS the potential everyone is talking about.
The biggest problem is establishing how do we introduce currency. Even in the middle ages, money was a necessity. Banks formed and otherwise by the establishment of greedy corporations hoarding money. Or kings, thugs, and mofia type gang rings imposing the, \'give me your lunch money, or I\'ll pound you\'. People wanting to play paladins now have a purpose. More importantly at the time of creation people should start out with some amount of money. Not a lot, but monsters can drop money.
There\'s a problem with paying teachers as they\'re not part of the economy, so they\'ll effectively be eating coinage. Think of this as people who burn dollars, or hoard pennies, or money that has to replaced do to natural loss, or wear and tear. Initially money might be pretty hard to come buy. But if you introduce a basic farmers market... depending how complicated food is, but bakers and cooks will need grain\'s, wheat, flour, or whatever. Farming is unrealstic, it would require a bizarre deference in time. But this is likely to require putting out money... another source for a void to money.
Possibly a mint, or individuals who could manufacture money. Give mining gold, or something a purpose, through refining it. Platinum, the same way. I know there\'s trias, hexas, and such... We still haven\'t really solved a money shortage problem. For the most part, individuals during that time period were essentially self-sufficient.
A minting guild, might solve this... But now you have bankers... This oddly enough was usally given to the local Abbey/Church, as they were just, and upheld the beliefs of the kind, and his reigning feudal/monarchy of the time. If you can trust the church, who can you trust?
Still doesn\'t really solve a neverending pit of vanishing money, and miners/minters from controlling the economy. Groowl... okay... Even if banks were introduced, along with the local church/abbey/paladin/cleric guild, etc... it wouldn\'t solve anything, as people would take out loans, and the entire economy would be running a permanent deficit. And having individuals minting money would create a bigger imbalance.
But if you think about ancient times, money was very scarce, to have a gold coin was considered somewhat well-off. The king imposed taxes, and hoarded most of the money. But it\'s believed that most people were required to go work for the local governement for a few days each month, and they recieved a very limited wage.
The problem is establishing what these roles could be. Possibly on bounty, outstanding warrants, or people on the payroll of the local governement. How much time passes, would it be a daily payout? monthly lump sum... Or maybe the ideas of NPC teachers isn\'t such a good idea. If people as mentioned in a couple threads could teach the theory of there honed skills to others, the guilds really then serve a purpose.
Initial character creation assigns basic skills. They level through use. People are often born with things are naturally good at, that evolves naturally without formal education. Money that would have been lost in the NPC teacher pit, is now rotated through players. Minting is scrapped, but if a bank was instated, that took raw ore materials and paid out cash, then money is being distributed back in the economy through a bank controlled NPC guild. Miners are still likley to be more profitable, but as is any mining operation. It\'s a risky business.
I think you get the idea at this point. Still has some things that need to be ironed out...
Alright... what about Quests...
We\'ve do away with them. To a point...
If you scrap NPC\'s
http://planeshift.oodlz.com/wbboard/thread.php?threadid=15750&boardid=11&sid=e2db3536e577c0b5a4be1fb5adbe443f&page=1#11The economy has created a need to for say a dragon tooth as a regeant for a potion. The alchemist puts up a post to the mercenary/adventurer guild that he needs a tefusang tooth, and feather from a pheonix, and his own alchemy skills such as herbal gathering, or such, has been able to able identify plants to aid in the final regeant requirements.
I fail to see how restricting, and introducing NPC\'s helps the game.
For that matter, there\'s enough people from around the world, I\'ll bet you\'ll see portions of towns or entire guilds devoted to people of different languages. You\'ve spawned a whole new portion of trade. Hiring a translator. It just so happens the greatest person the game is Italian, and he knows his craft well, but he has no way to communicate to the public.
This is totally how I see PS progressing. The greatest thing as mentioned in some of my other posts, is that it cuts down on the time required for Developers. I think these ideas are worth everyones pondering...
Instead of developers worrying about populating the world, let people do it. Basic NPC\'s are required sporadically through out the game as limited control mechanisms. PS is free, it will inevitable grow. There\'s 18000 people registered in the PS database. That\'s huge.
If the Developers focus on the things required to create the economy, instead of gives means to populate everyone wins.
What we need to do instead of bickering. I owe all an appology, is find ways to Help the PS Team.
Moogie... My appolgies...
Peace...
