How the Economy Actually Works
" This would be true if the exalts built up over an even or close-to-even distribution, but they build up in only a few hands. Those people hoarding the exalts don't really need them for crafting because the amount of exalts they would need to upgrade from near-perfect gear to perfect gear is astronomical, so your premise falls apart. |
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" You know what that sounds an awfully lot like? My idea on how to make the economy better. It was basically linking the drop rates to the total number of a currency in a system (the economy). More exalts in the economy? Lower the drop rates. This forces use as they have intrinsic value and are harder to get, but there are more in the economy to actually use. Less exalts in the economy? Raise the drop rates. People get more and will use more since they are less valuable for trading and far more plentiful. For the top end players who have tons of wealth, they can only influence the drop rate changes so much, so they are weighted differently with a hard cap on their total input. This is how Bitcoins whole system works for mining. More difficulty? Harder to get Bitcoins meaning less people will mine forcing the difficulty down. Less difficulty? Easier to get bitcoins meaning more people will work forcing the difficulty up. When one pool of bitcoin miners gets close to 50% network use (meaning they are the majority and control the difficulty exclusively), they get throttled to prevent them from basically printing money twice over (double spending, kinda). This doesn't fix problems of extremes (where exalts are uber expensive or Glassblower baubles are uber cheap). It simply causes them to happen less or happen faster to get them out of the way. The system corrects itself, basically based on player reaction. This wouldn't work of course if currency didn't have intrinsic value like it does in PoE. Now, Scrotie, I know you shot that idea down before (not exactly remembering why again, but eh). However, I think it would help mitigate the effects of extremes because those extremes tend to hurt the average Joe and help the top guys (which is bad considering the ratio of average Joe to top guys). Eh. I've pitched it before. Whatever. Still, quality OP Scrotie. Very good explanation. I assume it would look like an exponential curve on a graph that charts trading to crafting for players. The top being people like Krip who both craft and trade and the bottom being the average Joe who (should theoretically) only trade. Actually, now that I think about it, that's a weird way to imagine it. Ignore me. *rambling* Last edited by TremorAcePV#7356 on Jul 10, 2013, 1:05:07 PM
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Hello...I'm new to this game...DLing it now. I have played many similar games and all eventually have issues with the economy and other things. So as I sit here reading the forums to get a feel for things I keep asking myself, can a noob get an enjoyable experience out of this game? I do not care to be the best geared, great at PVP (IM NOT) or even known in the game...I just want to have fun, help others if I can and compete with my group of friends.
Any thoughts or advice from you vets? I've lost control of the controls... Jesus take the wheel" RAizQT during Kammel HC race Last edited by Ain_Soph_Aur#3799 on Jul 10, 2013, 1:44:51 PM
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" Some advice: 1. This game is balanced around trading. Use http://poe.xyz.is/, select your desires, check the "online only" checkbox. At lv50+ you should engage in buying gear through there. Perhaps even as early as lv40. There is no gold, but there is currency in form of orbs. By checking trade chat you can get an idea of how much different orbs are worth. 2. Play Standard League or Anarchy League. 3. The game is the best Multiplayer Online RPG currently on the market. Perhaps only EVE Online and FFXIV are comparable. Strongly recommended. 4. Do not craft. Using orbs for crafting is usually far more expensive than simply buying through trade is. To answer your question: yes you can have lots of fun. This message was delivered by GGG defence force.
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" Well, don't try and craft things yourself unless you consider that fun. I do. I love it. Others don't. If you are a gambler, you will love it. If you aren't, you won't. Yes, you can have fun. Just set your expectations... not low, but not high either. Like, expect to start over a lot with different characters. Expect to lose a lot before you win. That's just sort of how the whole game goes. At least imo. |
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"I actually covered RMT, and to some extent bots, in a follow-up post. However, in terms of behaviors, while RMT buyers are simple to understand, botters not so much. In order to understand the moves they'd make, one must accurately estimate their marketshare, which isn't easy and could change in a day due to GGG anti-RMT efforts. If I had to guess, even with their massive operations, botters control less than 40% of the marketshare. As such, the conspiracy theory that they are engaged in trading to further manipulate Exalt scarcity to encourage use of their sites is most likely inaccurate, or perhaps they are trying but will never be ultimately successful due to not having a marketshare majority. I think legitimate demand from the top of the food chain is the primary driving force behind Exalt price increases, not the shadowy manipulations of bad people. But that's a guess. Criminal activity is usually harder to track than legitimate. "That's kind of a myth. As I explained, it's a gradual, sliding-scale process; it's inaccurate to believe that you make a full switch from trading to "crafting." This is because upgrade availability doesn't just do a full switch either; it's also a gradual, sliding-scale process, and at some points in largely depends on when you log on and who gets to the upgrade first. When you're at that stage when you fighting for other players over upgrades, due to limited but non-zero supply... that's when it actually becomes the difficult, calculated decision you're looking for. The problem isn't that there isn't a tension there; the problem is that the tension is determined by your gear level relative to all the other players on the market, and thus a huge number of casual players will never get to experience it that way. For them, the choice to craft is a choice to temporarily forsake optimization in the name of fun. "Considering the two paragraphs I wrote before this were in the original text if you looked (although not as well explained), I believe I had pertinent things to say from the start. And orbs are not gold for everyone; they are only gold for most. When Stephen Colbert was killed by HYDRA's Project Insight in 2014, the comedy world lost a hero. Since his life model decoy isn't up to the task, please do not mistake my performance as political discussion. I'm just doing what Steve would have wanted. Last edited by ScrotieMcB#2697 on Jul 10, 2013, 2:23:25 PM
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" Omfg, you just ruined my day. I read this whole thread, laughing all the way, expecting to add some sarcastic remark at the end for all the morons itt. And then you come along and spoil everything with your accurate information and facts. Well boooooo to you. |
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" I'm leaning towards agreeing with this guy, regardless of hoarders. The difference between orbs and "gold" currency is that there is no set value for what orbs are worth in relation to each other (apart from the limits set by vendor recipes) I know this is kind of counter-productive in the 'fun' department, but if you can understand that using an Exalt is only beneficial past a certain point (a very, very, very high gear level), it's very easy to see how this system is actually not that terrible. The more Exalts go up in price (for only that 5% that can actually benefit from them and wouldn't be 'wasting' them), the more you can get in return for one. If everything revolves around Exalts, a noob finding one will go A LOT more in their progression then if the same noob found one and they were common. Think about it, is it more beneficial for that "average" geared person to buy an upgrade for that Exalt, or try to craft a few upgrades with the 65 chaos? (Anarchy) If I'm stuck in a mid-level gear range, and I could get 150 Alch orbs and drop them into rings, armors, etc, or re-roll a bunch of my linked gear with Chaoses; I will upgrade my gear faster and probably for cheaper then if I just bought for the pure Exalt. I'm so bad at economics that I'm probably just making a fool of myself while completely missing the entire point. Either way, I really like this economy, and I'm not good at it. I have NO PROBLEM treating Exalts as Currency Only. Exalts growing and growing in price is a good thing, it allows people on lower tiers to reach mid-high tiers faster, while slowing those at the very top down (due to increased Exalt rates) The Russell Wilson Era
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" It's extremely rarely a black and white decision. That said, how many players are at the stage where the use of an Exalt is comparable to its value as currency? As far as I understand it, the ideal craft-path is to Transmute, Alteration until you get a desired stat, and then Regal. Scour if the Regal mod sucks, rinse and repeat until you get something good. Then possibly Eternal it, and start with the Exalt/Eternal route. How much currency does it take to roll an upgrade by then? I don't want to throw out hyperbolic statistics, but I would hazard that a large majority of the player-base is far from this level of progression, which in turn means that the adage of "Using orbs as currency is far smarter than as crafting reagents" probably holds true for most people. |
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