Business And Economy Archive

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Phaelyn wrote:

From the Stratics HoC Chat:

Brannoc: *[WH]-Banana-SillyWalker* What is the opinion of the Development Team on reducing the Demand for Jedi Power Crystals and Pearls, by making them easy to collect this will therefore make the markets elasticity to change and therefore bring down prices for low level Jedi ?

Lord_Pall: I love price elasticity.

Lord_Pall: Prices dropping are the bane of a lot of merchants, but for average players it's a great thing.

Lord_Pall: Having items be more affordable across the board is not a negative in my view

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This seems to be the crux of our Dev team's vision for the economy of SWG - Make it great for the "average" player. And as we see from all of our discussions on the Forum, we all tend to agree - Prices SHOULD reflect our customer's ability to afford the EVERYDAY items they need - But look at the question above.. REALLY look at it, and there is something VERY wrong with what at least Lord_Pall as a developer assumes to be a problem.

He blames MERCHANTS for LOOT costs. And that's why we have mechanics going in game now to minimize the Merchant class. NOT because Chef foods or Armors are too high - Look again at the question and answer. Player asks about high LOOT item prices, and then a Dev says prices dropping are the bane of OUR existence.

The completely UN funny thing about it is that MERCHANTS aren't the ones out looting, and selling high end Loots via the Trade Forums.

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Poldano wrote:

There are some very interesting comments about the general direction of crafting and the economy in this game. They are beyond the scope of this thread, and deserve a thread of their own. I think I can summarize it by asking, what should be the role of economic activity in the game and particularly in GCW activities? My bias is that economic activities should be promoted in importance, tying into political activity via influence on planetary control. I don't see crafting and economic activity as necessarily secondary to combat role-playing.

In particular, I findthecomment that most players want "...POWER..." somewhat inconsistent with the notion that economics is secondary. There are a few historical empires that were not based on superior economicand political power, and those that were not short-lived followed up their military gains with economic and political consolidation. In traditional "fantasy" role-playing, the economic back-story was mostly abstracted. In SWG, much of it is not, intentionally so.

I really thing that, to some extent, the SWG designers created a beast, the economic game, that they do not truly understand and do not really know how tomanage (the game, not the economy). The same can be said of the political game, and as I have implied above, I believe the two are intertwined in a role-playing context.

Saego Kennar, Wanderhome

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Many, many times I've stated this in one or another form. A truly long-lasting communal MMORPG is going to have hooksthat keep a core group of players. That hook is the economy in SWG, no matter how you disect it. Different goals combine from a variety of players, but the "clan" mentality has been modified and evolved into a power base that is based upon the economy in this game. The only way to get around this is to have virtually every crafting profession in the game (*shush* ) and the wherewithall to define and stick to long-term goals. Credits ingame are nothing more than a measure of your economic power. How you choose to exercise that power is what defines the economy. I know plenty of old school crafters that have been in the game and stayed longer than Jedi.

Fivo Asia