Architect Archive
Thread: Structure Pricing vs. UXP
After I build houses as well for all my PA mates, I will likely sell for 15K (small house). I sell for less if someone is ambitous enough to gather the resources themselves.
Neema K'tane
Architect in Training - Keren, Naboo, Corbantis
The problems with a fully player driven economy are soon going to be realized. No matter how much discussion takes place regarding appropriate costs for resources per unit, or for full structures themselves, all it takes is one person to undercut the entire "price fixed" market, and we're all out of business.
I'm very interested in seeing how this game's economy will evolve. My prediction is that as a server approaches its 6 month mark, 98% of the items in the game will be completely worthless. We'll just have to see how things unfold.
People who undercharge won't be able to afford enough infrastructure to have any noticable impact on the market, plus they'll end up as wholesalers for merchants looking for goods to sell at a big markup, whether they want to fill that role or not.
I'm not too concerned.
GoCanes wrote:
All the players who get the low priced houses and harvestors will be able to pay maintenance with the credits they saved, while the Architect who sells too low will not be able to use his own creations because he cannot afford to pay maintenance.
This sounds good on paper, but it's inaccurate. What about having a combat-oriented friend hook you up with some of the cash he's making from destroy missions? Or a PA who is supporting the harvesters for you? There are many other ways to acquire credits other than from selling structures.
Another point is that the only thing giving resources value is the small maintenence fee on harvesters and the actual time invested to gather them. How do you put a price on time? What if I decide my time is worth nothing?
Just as an aside - with personal mineral harvesters and wind generators running, your only cost to produce resources is maintenance cost. If you do the math, a theoretical 100% site produces 1 resource unit for less than one credit (I'll try to get the exact figures when I get home). So you're making money if you sell for 1 credit per resource.
Anything else is markup. Granted, you'll want to mark up prices - time spent shouldn't be free, but as the previous posted stated, how do you put a price on your time? That's a personal decision and should remain a personal decision.
Price fixing won't work unless you have a group that is bound together by some unbreakable convenant. We don't have that. We won't have that.
Charge what you think is fair. If you charge too much, you won't make any sales and your price won't affect the economy (much). If you charge too little, you won't be able to stay in business and you won't affect the economy for very long.
The system will balance itself out. And the system will change. During BETA, where we had easy access to money, small houses could sell for 15K+ at the drop of a hat. Now that they have nerfed missions, I'm betting 15K will be the TOP of what we'll be able to charge - especially early on.
All this will change as the economy grows and a new balance is achieved. Artificially saying "the price will be X" won't work unless you have a monopoly.
Oh, and the obvious unsaid addendum to my first paragraph is that having to harvest from a site that's less than 100% increases the cost associated inversely with the drop in percentage. A 50% site would produce for slightly less than 2 cr per resource, a 33% for slightly less than 3 cr per resource. 25%/4, etc.
well think of it this way: a new character has the potential to getpaid about 2000 credits per hour (running deliveries between cities). You could figure it out from there to find out how much they are willing to pay. Who cares how much it costs to make. It all boils down to how much they are willing to pay, and how much we are willing to sell for. Keep it high, and we compete ourselves out of our jobs. Keep it low and we miss out on profits. Draw a graph--it might help 
If you are really good, keep an eye on the average sales price, and find an equalibrium. OR you can just hang out for a month and see what they all settled at (Adam Smith's "Invisible Hand" is everywhere, hehe).
I am skeptical that uxp for deeds is working. The last day of beta I gave away 2 small house deeds and a factory to test it. I went with the new owners and stood there while they placed. Neither house gave me ANY exp. The factory gave me slightly over 100 xp.
Bugged it of course, but it wasn't a gamebreaker so someone needs to see if it is working yet.
I dont plan to overcharge ever, I would only charge based on the material cost only (which is usually hard to judge as it's free, just time consuming) but I would rather have the UXP coming in than more cash.