On the subject of Gold.

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Wittgenstein wrote:

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Interesting wrote:

All ARPGs with gold except Diablo 2 prove you wrong.

Not sure what you mean by this, I can assure you that TQ/D2/TL/Sacred.. a huger percentage of drops were completely worthless (other then you could sell them for gold, which eventually became pointless).

First, this is not about gold. This is about the minimum common denominator currency. Trash drops. In other games, trash drops were worth gold.

Untill 2 days ago, the trash whites were the best value/time a player could get in Diablo 3 beta.

Now, 2 days ago, Blizzard comes up with the "we are adding trash". That you wont break, nor sell, nor pick up. And they go open about it this intended effect. Just because... "it makes other items feel valuable".

The thing is, they couldnt give the proper value to blues/rares compared to whites, so whites were still pretty much better than magic/rares. They couldnt make magics even better, and also they couldnt make them even rarer, because people wouldnt endure it. But at the same time people would just not feel rewarded enough when blues dropped time/value loot ratio. So instead of making players time more valuable by increaseing the value of blues? What they do? They nerf whites comparativelly, nerfing overall players value/time.

Anyway, the point is
Just having gold doesnt mean the economy sucks. It sucked in Diablo 2.

I didnt played Sacred. I did played Titan Quest on the closed server. I played Dungeon Runners back when it was alive. I played Mythos and the same itemization system from Hellgate London, both when it was under Flagship and under the korean company. I played tons of other single player or CO-OP multiplayer ARPGs. Gold was meaningfull in those games, EVERY SINGLE TRASH DROP WAS WORTH PICKING. The highest the item level, some had superior quality, the higher the minimum gold payback.

Diablo 2 failed because it only had the gambler.

Games like Fate, Torchlight, Depths of Peril, Dins Curse, Dungeon Siege, Dungeon Runners they had meaningfull ways to spend gold on. Gold had value because of it.

In Dungeon Runners you had a vendor that appeared on the dungeon that offered rainbow items for gold. It was rare, always worth it. Fate/Torchlight also had the vendor in the dungeon, selling awesome things, including rares of high level.

Torchlight and Fate also had the enchanting.

In these games its unaceptable for you to say that
"Majority of drops in all ARPG's are worthless, never traded, vendor fodder if anything."

And Im just talking about gold, the minimum common denominator. I dont even need to mention the particular valuable common drops.

In Diablo 2, it was used in bulk just in gambling rings/amulets. Thats why it sucked.

It wasnt the gold system's fault. IT WAS THE LACK OF MEANINGFULL SERVICES/PRODUCTS.

Now, why does Diablo 3 will keep gold? Because now they added the piece of puzzle that was missing. They have stuff to spend it on over and over at all levels, on itemization.

I was only commenting on the earlier statment about how a majority of the orbs are "worthless" as far as trading goes.

Similarly, a majority of drops are "worthless" as far as trading goes.

That was my only point. Nothing about economy or balance or anything else.

Just that, simply because an item has little value for trading doesn't make the item completely worthless.

"We're supposed to value our own items, and trade according to what we want/need."



But the currencies are shit and nobody values them. The only way for them to have some value is on the base of another item.


The only way the currency could work was if all currencies had an actual value. Something people wanted and gladly accepted as exchange.

Right now people want none of "low currencies".

So the "player evaluation process requirement" is IMPOSSIBLE.

The system fails because some currencies are worthless/useless, have no demand, no utility, no exchange rate, no minimum value whatsoever.

Therefore the evaluation process doesnt even start.

Because, if a currency is not worth "1", then 10 or 50 or worthless currencies are still worth "0".

Ten times zero = zero. Simple.

They have to make it so all currency items are worth "1". Worth something. Or that atleast a bunch of them together are worth "1".

Right now, on the players evaluation no ammount of crap is worth a single usefull item.

They have to fix it. Adding a minimum value for the below "1" currencies, so that it BRIDGES the value between "0"s and "1"s.

See, the DESIGN PHILOSOPHY DOESNT WORK ON THE PRACTICE.

Chopatron idea exposes the problem, attacks its core and offer a suggestion to solve it.

Purists need to read my post and understand instead of keep repeating the same mantra.

until all the recipies are in, i see no reason to debate the current state of the economy.

I want low currencies, I use them all.

Be careful not to base your feedback only with endgame experience. The first run of the game is as much important as endgame. Especially when current endgame is just a place holder where people fight lower level mobs...

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zriL wrote:

I want low currencies, I use them all.

Be careful not to base your feedback only with endgame experience. The first run of the game is as much important as endgame. Especially when current endgame is just a place holder where people fight lower level mobs...

winner!

i have high lvl and low lvl characters, i use all the currencies. sometimes people forget we are not all the same, i love the inventory/vendor minigame.

the feeling i get picking though items on the ground to match a recipe, filling up inv, going to vendor to complete recipes, then moving those newly acquired currencies to my stash is just as important to me as lvl up progression.

...and I know there are still more recipes to come to make the system even better!

It seems to me that the idea of a gold-less system is novel but overly cumbersome.

There is a reason that all modern civilizations have moved beyond the barter system; it is more fluid and not subject to how much someone values their Orb of X.

If I have a bag full of Orbs of Awesomeness that are worth millions, but I run out of Scrolls of Wisdom (SoW), then I can't identify anything unless 1) I trade with someone, 2) vendor an Orb of Awesomeness and get raked for the exchange rate, or 3) make a new character for the starter scrolls or grind for a drop. All of these options are annoying as compared to a more fluid common currency, e.g. gold. I would much rather pay a small amount of my "cash" to a vendor to have something identified. There is still very much a place for the various augment/re-roll orbs that are relatively rare drops, but there needs to be an underlying common currency. I don't see any difference between SoW and gold, other than SoW are more awkward to manage, especially since there is a stack limit...

-Gobbler

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Gobblerbaster wrote:

It seems to me that the idea of a gold-less system is novel but overly cumbersome.

There is a reason that all modern civilizations have moved beyond the barter system; it is more fluid and not subject to how much someone values their Orb of X.

I agree with this.
I loved the orb system at first but now the initial awesome has worn off and I'm sick of it. It also impedes/prevents implementation of some other basic systems that'd be really helpful to have (i.e. Auction house).
If there's one reason I could see the developers not moving to a gold currency system for it's all the time and effort they've already invested into trying to make the orb system work. It really hurts to abandon something you've worked so hard on, but now is the best time to cut your losses and accept gold is the most frequently employed currency system with good reason. And hey, you wouldn't have to undo all your work, orbs would still be intact, they'd just have gold underneath giving them a common value.

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Gobblerbaster wrote:

There is a reason that all modern civilizations have moved beyond the barter system; it is more fluid and not subject to how much someone values their Orb of X.

Unfortunately, there is no modern civilization in Wraeclast.

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WhiteBoy88 wrote:

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Gobblerbaster wrote:

There is a reason that all modern civilizations have moved beyond the barter system; it is more fluid and not subject to how much someone values their Orb of X.

Unfortunately, there is no modern civilization in Wraeclast.

So what?
The reason he is hinting at is that it's because it's simply better and everyone has prefered it.
It would be such a trivial thing to write in gold in the lore so to even make that argument is just ridiculous.

To be against a uniform curency is like to be against toiletpaper. It's fun to be different, but do you really comprehend the alternative?