POE aka "Capitalism Simulator"?

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DalaiLama wrote:

From what I have seen in the game, GGG has slightly started to go in the direction of your third suggestion.

Are you sure?

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DalaiLama wrote:

2) removing "of quantity" modifiers, which would take out some of the magic finding boost that is a gear check.

Doesnt change much for the lategame-gearcheck, but less currency in lower levels

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DalaiLama wrote:

3) They put some of the best items as map only or higher level drops, which means that players need to play more difficult areas to get them.

less valuable drops before lategame == more gear check

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DalaiLama wrote:

4) They reduced the overall quantity of drops and improved the quality (rarity).

less currency drops in general

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DalaiLama wrote:

5) They continually add more uniques to the game, many of which are very nice items.

Actually: 4 groups of uniques: a) nice but very common soon b)common but very specific/useless c) (nearly) unobtainable by demand (like the new copper plate) and d) unobtainable by OP-ness/BiS. Most will only make middlesmen/flippers 'rich', and I see no change on the horizon here

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DalaiLama wrote:

6) Item drops are improved for characters playing in areas that are still challenging for them, and diminished for areas that are far beneath their character level.

== more gear checks. If you dont play 'straight-rush', you'll end up way above the zone 'free of diminishing-returns', and you may have to clear/redo areas just to compete against the later gear checks...

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DalaiLama wrote:

but they want to be careful about making it too easy to find gear and having players become bored.

As long as less people become bored than frustrated, everything is fine? ^^

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Swagtrain wrote:

I spent 90% of my time grinding, and I made a few hundred exalts during the 4 month league.

lol

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RagnarokX wrote:

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Swagtrain wrote:

I spent 90% of my time grinding, and I made a few hundred exalts during the 4 month league.

lol

Yeah... it just proves how unrewarding is playing compared to trading.

90% of time playing -> 50 chaos?
10% of time trading -> "hundreds" of exalts

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

1. In a zero-trading environment, the vast majority of the wealth would be controlled by a very small handful of players. This wouldn't necessarily be purely from them playing more (although it would be a huge factor); it would also be from them playing smarter. It's time spent playing times wealth gained per unit time.

That kind of half true I think. In a zero-trading environment you would have a of course also a “Lorenz curve” of wealth distribution. Respect the fact that you wealth per minute grows with every minute you play (that’s mostly from better gear). However the straightness of the curve would be very less then it is now (compare the distributions of Japan and USA on the chart) with all the compensation effects that exists in the game.
The effect of smartness however is very minimal when you consider only how to play the game A by the fact that you get a straight feedback if certain areas are good for farming B that you can compensate smartness with simply reading (how many % of the players do the “Math of Exile” instead of taking the “Cookie-Cutter” Support Skills for there Skill-Gem?).

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

2a. The vast supply of mid-tier items serves the poor player; the low (or no) supply of highest-tier items available on the market does not serve the rich player very well, at least in terms of progression. As far as gear (not currency) is concerned, the system distinctly advantages poor players, allowing them to bypass some of the normal progression and catch up from behind. (This is why ARPGs have trading systems in the first place.)

Yes and no. The fact that almost all the bosses in all difficulty requires maxed stats makes is kind of a mid tier gear check. I totally agree with you: Passing these walls is easy and I see no bit problem in it (at least in a non-hardcore environment). The game doing a good job in balancing out content while respecting the player strength. When it comes to higher tier maps, there is definite another gear-check which a lot of players don’t pass, cuz of the wealth distribution.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

2b. This means: the greater the wealth disparity between any two traders, the more likely the trade is to be significantly beneficial to both parties, with no ripping off required for mutual profit; the less wealth disparity between any two traders, the more likely the trade will approach zero-sum, with both parties attempting to rip each other off. (In short: you can't squeeze blood from a stone.)

Agree. But, I think its more that the wealthy absorbs the currency of players who needs to progress. Poor Joe needs this one mid-to-high-tier-items which he impossible cant farm. Trader x has is easily and can therefore dictate the price to some degree.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

3b. However, one must also note that, when it comes to trade profit relative to mean/median price, it's a zero-sum game; for every player who is ripping off, there is a player ripped off. Dealing in high-end items (that is, being "rich") does not guarantee one a profit, and in fact increases the risk of being brutally ripped off. With that risk comes the opportunity of brutally ripping off another. It's a combination of wealth and skill which allows players to follow the path of wealth you glamourize in your point #2. .)

That’s the crucial part it think. How you become rich in POE? Be rich and have skill. So being rich to a certain degree comes from absurd amounts of farm (or botting) or luck. But get this wealth snowballing is only possible with skill. Skill in teams of getting your wealth snowballing contains imho some attributes, that are rly oncommon for a game.

A Be connect. That’s also the reason why rich men send there child to elite university. Its about getting connected to the high society of wealth owners. The same is true is POE. Being connected to a large amounts of wealthy players gives you access to profitable trades and enlarges your potential trading pool by a lot. Also that can let you grow faster: lend you big ticket items they currently don’t need. Buff your wealth per minute in party players by faster clear speed and a culler (see the reference from that one guy here in the thread).

B Know the market. Know the value of your items. Is it worth to storage, can you just threw them for 2 chaos or are they worth spamming the trade channel all day? Also this is not only about the current exchange rate, its also some kind of intuition to make you guessing how the market is developing which influence your trade decisions.

C Be wealthy. OK it’s an ARPG, but along with the connections its kind of the only think which grants you beneficial trades. You kind of need both to make it to the top wealthy players.

That’s my list of the skills that are required to get rly wealthy in this game (meaning to making it in the top 10% of the player base). The only point which is in my opinion kind of a skill is “being wealthy”, because that is the only factor that is influenced by actually playing the game. No matter what you will become more wealthier. However there is some game skill involved (knowing builds, monsters, farm spots, “mechanics” stuff like that) in that, much comes from connections (good luck to solo the content to high tier maps).
I mean sure that’s fine for some players and some players think its sucks, but lets face it and make it clear: End game content is not supposed to played solo and without the use of the (crappy) trading system. And even then knowing the game is far less beneficial then knowing the market.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

You can't really count on time, because you can count on top players to dedicate huge amounts of time to stay on top; at best, you can hope to tie them in time commitment, which won't help close the gap.

That’s my point. Playing a lot makes didn’t make you rich as working a lot don’t either. Its an requirement (if there are no bots/RMT), but you need for more, as I listed.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

You need to understand that "very expensive" and "normal" items here are relatives, not absolutes. The longer an economy ages, the higher the standard becomes; today's "very expensive" items will be "normal" items someday, as the supply of newer, better items increases. In short: price is subject to inflation. As such, balancing the game around "normal item level" is impossible.

That’s kind of inflation instead of flooding the game with currency its flooding it with good items. Take a look at standard there is kind of a currency and a item inflation. The exchange rates are kind of even, compared with the fact that Standard Currency is worth nothing in Real Moneys Markets.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

This wouldn't fix a single damn problem, and cause numerous new ones. Consider that, for brand new players, trading for cheap upgrades is their primary means of catching up.

I don’t like the idea too. But making trades harder to pull of would for sure hurt traders. Is it wroth it: I don’t think so too. Brand new players are totally fine in this game without trading btw.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

This also doesn't fix a damn thing. Remember that wealth is determined by time x wealth per unit time, and the elite players have access to the exact same systems. Do you honestly believe an elite player wouldn't exploit these systems harder than an average player? There will always be disparity regarding wealth per unit time, because some players are simply smarter than average.

I think it would fix a lot. Note how to make money in this game. Being connected will ALWAYS be a huge benefit in any online game, so we can cut this out. Game knowledge as well. But getting rid of the fact that you have to use the marked lesser A they synergy effect of well connect players and shrinks down the wealth which is exchanged significantly less. That means: While still wasting the same amount of time (=wealth) traders would get far less beneficial trades (cuz the market is much smaller). Same with the stock market. Getting a stock market for everything in and outside the business word ensures these “traders” (brokers) a much bigger lever (hope you know what I mean. Not sure about the right terms)

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Swagtrain wrote:

I spent 90% of my time grinding, and I made a few hundred exalts during the 4 month league.

People like to blame the game for stuff, but when it comes down to it, getting wealthy in PoE comes down to game knowledge, and experience and people that have neither of these feel screwed over and want to be showered in loot. It took me over a year to have any idea how to make tons of currency(Like I was poor as fuck all of CB and all of Onslaught) but then I took the time to study the game and study the player that I saw making currency, and I don't flip/rmt/anything I just play the game, I don't even enter trade channel aside from trying to pick up a few jewelers or something.

I agree. I wasn't in CB, but been playing since OB. I can honestly say this was like reading my mind. I played blindly, didn't pay attention to good strategies for building a currency base. All I was ever told was to farm piety or maps, and vendor rares, or keep them for the chaos recipe. Though this is where the possible p2w aspect comes in. It's not to hard to make a 'living' in PoE...as long as you have about 40-50+ stash tabs. I don't want to write a huge wall of text, but please refer to Hegemony's youtube videos about this same subject. He is how I learned to make the 'grind' into a productive game flow, utilizing alot more than just picking up rares. Yes you can do nothing but flip, but to most that's boring, and it really isn't as easy as most make it out to be. Or you can mindlessly farm Piety/Dominus, vendoring rares. But theres more strategy to it, you just need more stash tabs to utilize those strategies lol.

I feel like the OP has no idea how Capitalism actually works.

Just play the game, learn the game, figure out the mechanics, recipes, and how to make a well balanced character, and have fun playing the game. Don't worry so much about what other people have and how badly you want godly gear but can't afford to buy it with hundreds of orbs.

If you dedicated yourself to the game to the same level as those players, you probably would have them.

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Nasakenai wrote:

I feel like the OP has no idea how Capitalism actually works.

Well that kind of implicies you know it. So to make it clear: I just compare POE in several aspects with capitalism. My main intension is to say, that the accumulation of wealth we see in capitalism (whatever flavor your prefer) and in POE are comparable. Hope you read my posts....

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Nasakenai wrote:

If you dedicated yourself to the game to the same level as those players, you probably would have them.

Well thats the hole point. If you want to see the hole content you have to dedicated yourself to the game a lot. A crazy much more than in any other game i know so far.

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roteweste wrote:

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Nasakenai wrote:

I feel like the OP has no idea how Capitalism actually works.

Well that kind of implicies you know it. So to make it clear: I just compare POE in several aspects with capitalism. My main intension is to say, that the accumulation of wealth we see in capitalism (whatever flavor your prefer) and in POE are comparable. Hope you read my posts....

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Nasakenai wrote:

If you dedicated yourself to the game to the same level as those players, you probably would have them.

Well thats the hole point. If you want to see the hole content you have to dedicated yourself to the game a lot. A crazy much more than in any other game i know so far.

'hole'

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However, this is not necessarily the case; it's possible for ARPGs to offer builds where the skill bonus is large enough to take a build from mortal without, to superior performance metrics with. In other words: the size of the skill bonus is something which is under developer control.

Unfortunately, the gem linking system absolutely goes against this. your main skill (generally with some form of aoe) with 5 linked support gems will be used likely 99% of the time simply because it generates the most damage per action time. You may have a single target in a 4 link , some curses, some codt links but thats really the extent of skill diversity for any given end game build. I do not think having a curse makes a build more skillfully nor would i think having a 3rd active offensive skill much more skillful than just having 2.

Even the very concept of a 'build' will generally involve a mention of the one or two mainskill the build uses.


Builds that have a large amount active offensive of skills simply do not perform as well because only one or two of them will be supported by more than 3 support gems. The reason for the auto pilot end game is inherent game design.

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Shagsbeard wrote:

Option 3 wouldn't do anything but shift what players consider "good". Good stuff will adjust to be just as rare as it is now, and traders would trade and become richer still.

There's nothing wrong with what's happening with trade, and changing the game isn't going to change that. It's the players. You'll see this once Diablo 3 comes out with it's "Loot 2.0". It wont help.

The game developers need to focus on fun and quit worrying about people who break their game for the fun of it. Spending 90% of your development time to make 10% of your population happy is a bad choice.

I agree with your first and third points Shaggy. The 2nd point not so much. D3 on console is fun and it uses Loot 2.0 and no AH.