Remove gold from MMOs once and for all!

Witblitz · April 2014

How hard can it be? Attack the root of the problem, remove gold from the game. Come up with a better idea, speaking of which, what would you recommend?

Noth · April 2014

even in games that don't have gold, there are farmers that sell things for real money. Getting rid of gold does nothing to stop botting and gold sellers. It simply shifts them around.

Gwarok · April 2014

3 Words:
Craftable Repair Kits.

The only time I've hit up a vendor was to repair, and have yet to buy a single item from them (except for maybe a soul gem or two).

That being said, I have a dozen chickens I'll trade for a goat, so I can retrade that said goat, to be broken down to make a pair of nice, warm, woolen caster gloves.

(edit, please excuse my babbling) The only problem with this is, it will spawn "professional crafting guilds" (basically a more polite term for gold spammers, which BTW is already starting to develop) that will then have the means to start charging people RLC for their crafted items out of game and off site instead of gold, (In case you don't already know @ZOS they are already starting to advertise in-game items in their spam mails.), and the next thing you know we will have another AION type economy on our hands.

Long story short, Is there really truly a way to completely rid a game of gold and "gold sellers?

Wreaken · April 2014

As the above poster pointed out, in game currency is not a third parties only form of salary.

To make it truly work, you would have to remove the ability to trade altogether. Then how would you implement a player driven economy?

Witblitz · April 2014

Don't make gold a sell-able commodity then. Every penny your earn belongs to you alone. Place all gear and equipment in value brackets allowing for trade. Get these damn bots out of the game already.

Noth · April 2014

Witblitz wrote: »

Don't make gold a sell-able commodity then. Every penny your earn belongs to you alone. Place all gear and equipment in value brackets allowing for trade. Get these damn bots out of the game already.

That still would not fix it. There are games that do that and they still have bots a rmt problems.

Getting rid of bots is not something you can easily do without severely harming the game itself.

Zyffyr · May 2014

Just a piece of advice for the future - if you ever find yourself thinking "All they have to do to fix problem X is to do Y", you are almost always missing some key information that makes your solution unworkable.

Demeos · May 2014

Get rid of the game's economy all together. Everything's a quest reward. No armor decay, no crafting, no trading, and no NPC merchants. In fact, lets take all stats off of armor and weapons and just make it purely aesthetic. Put all the stats into character skills instead.

This will leave gold sellers with only one area of revenue, selling their services to level your character up, do the quests for you. It'll be much easier for the developers to track just one venue of activity rather than several at once and make people far more hesitant to use such services due to the fact that they'll have to give their log-in information to such individuals in order to obtain such services.

Yes, it sucks that we can't have an in-game economy without real world economics becoming involved, but this is NOT going away because there will always be someone who will buy gold from them, buy a carry through a tough dungeon, or leveling services.

...Or they could go with the alternative that certain other MMO's went with and provide a legitimate way of buying gold within the game and essentially make it not worth the time and effort that gold selling sites would need to put in to compete.

ThePedroKid · May 2014

It's not hard at all actually.

There are many ways to have currencies that are not so easily transferable.

One system is to simply limit how currencies are used and how one can earn/own them. For example, if the only way to transfer a currency was through a regulated market, it would make it very difficult for gold sellers to fulfill orders. They would have buying power but not the ability to transfer directly what they earn. Sure, they could sell mats, etc., but why would they? To make gold? For what? To buy more mats? They can't transfer the gold directly so there is no longer an incentive.

Unfortunately, things like shared banks, guild banks, being in multiple guilds and direct player trading can make it very difficult to manage in current systems but new systems are entirely possible that would still allow these things... Devs just haven't put them in yet. I.e., they can regulate how those things are handled to remove some capability. Direct trading is the only one that would basically have to be removed completely if you wanted maximum protection.

Build an economy where players can increase their own buying power but not their own selling power essentially. You still progress, you still grow more powerful, in fact, you still gain everything... you just sell at market rates to a market not an individual. The individual then buys from the market. There would be no way to target something to an individual. NPC merchants are set up as clearing houses. You would also need separate exchanges for commodities and more unique items that use separate market systems (kind of how W**dstar is doing it). Just can't help your friends in the same way anymore.

Then, you add other currencies that are specific to content that open other pathways to itemization. It's actually really easy to do and shuts bots out.

A VERY basic example would be dungeon tokens that are earned, soulbound and used to buy really good items that people will want. You do the time, you get the rewards. Simple really. Can get them at your own pace... fast or slow.

As a side effect, you would never have to see trade/sell spam in zone chats again! Instead, you would see spam for groups, content or whatever it takes to earn currency to participate in the mass market. Ergo, players are encouraged to simply play content... together.

You could still play a crafting/AH/trade game even but now you would be on an even playing field without artificial price fixing and fluctuation from bots affecting the economy.

The only thing left for bots to sell would be full blown beefcaked $$$ characters/accounts essentially. A much easier to police activity.

Just typing outloud as I think through ideas, but... discuss.

Wreaken · May 2014

Witblitz wrote: »

Don't make gold a sell-able commodity then. Every penny your earn belongs to you alone. Place all gear and equipment in value brackets allowing for trade. Get these damn bots out of the game already.

Gold is not the commodity here, the items that people want to buy is the commodity. Gold is simply the tool in which one gains said commodity.

Now as we said earlier, the only true way to stop RMT'ing and Botting is to remove the ability to trade altogether, and again, how will you implement a player driven economy? Unless you plan on not having one.

The only reason gold even exists in Western based MMORPG's is because the culture here demands rewards for a players time spent playing and having gold drop per kill is the easiest way to implement that sense of achievement or reward. In other words, the Western culture is it's own enemy, they want reward, but aren't willing to put the time in to achieve it, hence why business is booming for the RMT companies.

RedTalon · May 2014

Wouldn't solve an issue moving away from gold, I have seen in-game spam mail for selling craft resources and the like.

The boting problems runs deeper then gold always do.

Taid · May 2014

Actually Path of Exile ( Action-Rpg like diablo 2..not 3 ) did a great job introducing Orbs. The Orbs are basically Craftingmaterials to generate Items. Basically you have a white item, an orb can transmute it into a blue ( orb of transmutation lol ), then you have an orb which adds a second stat for a blue item, an orb that transform an white item into a yellow, reroll items on yellow, add an stat to yellow, change the value of yellow stats, an orb that randomly rolls a white item into a blue, yellow, legendary! and so on. Tons of different effects.

Some of these Orbs can be traded ( not sold ofc) by vendors, so that half of the orbs have a fix value cause of vendortrade. Orbs can be randomly found from mobs and objects and their tradevalue changes due to player progression on that specific server. They have regular 100% uptime server, some leauges which take month, some races.

so you can either use them to progress in your character gear, or you trade the orbs for an allready good item you need but the other trader dont want.

Believe it or not, but this is by far the best valuesystem besides gold that i saw. But to be realistic, no other system besides gold would work for ESO. Just because of lore, there was and will allways be gold in eso, and even if >>> now after release its pointless to discuss about it

but hey, you guys should try path of exile, its f2p with cosemtic itemshop ( besides stash upgrade )

stefaan.de.wasch1b16_ESO · May 2014

to the OP... euh... no thanks

BenjaminKacher_ESO · May 2014

The problem isn't "gold" it's "currency" weather that currency is in a $ type unit or in the best weapon in the game, you'll always have some form of currency.

EvE online for instance runs on an economy of tears and flame forum posts.

MissKiwiana · May 2014

Its really sad to see a game having to "fit" around the gold sellers and bots and then try and make the gaming population that play their game content with it all. Never ever gonna happen.

I don't want to see crafting go, as now that I finally figured out how it works and how to level I'm loving it. (minus the lack of storage space) to me a vital part of my game.

kcolasaccob14_ESO · May 2014

My best suggestion is finding out who they are in real life and beating the f*** out of them.

Laura · May 2014

ever heard of prison? people will just use something else as currency.

qwertyburnsb16_ESO · May 2014

How about block all IP address's from China, India and so on? Give them there own server instead for them to ruin the game.

Apart from that, technically isn't this like criminal damage, fraud and theft? Couldn't this be taken up by the authorities via Interpol?

Tieberion · May 2014

Spoofed IP's

Witblitz · May 2014

How did Blizzard manage to remove botters and spammers from Diablo III. Go look there for answers.

Lox · May 2014

Witblitz wrote: »

How did Blizzard manage to remove botters and spammers from Diablo III. Go look there for answers.

Diablo III is a completely different type of game, it is not an MMO. Therefore, measures used in that environment will not likely work in this.

felixgamingx1 · May 2014

...?

Chryos · May 2014

The problem with removing gold and tradable items is that is takes ALOT of immersion away from the game. Items feel less tangible when they cant be freely traded. Botters can be thwarted, it just takes money and time, something most MMO's dont want to sink profits into.

knaveofengland · May 2014

if you look at all mmos they have the same problem , you can make it a lot harder for the gold sellers, there are many ways to do this, but you will still have the same problem , so do what the rest do let eso sell gold them selves or make gold so plentyfull it wont mater .
if there are gold sellers then the economy hasn't got it right just yet , so game had created a demand , also players greed , so what you all can do for now is report the bots and support eso , in time they will make it better .

tylarthb16_ESO · May 2014

To remove gold sellers you simply make it absurdly hard for them to profit. Most cater to players with no patience and more cash than sense. Lower the reasons for player to need vast sums cash or need of quick fix solutions like power leveling to get an endgame character. If the farming gangs can't readily sell lazy player a quick solution then they will move to games they can. Active anti botting is a cost increaser for such groups combined with lowering demand for offered services will ultimatly eliminate botting on an industrial scale.

Faolanhart · May 2014

I think that anyone who has played Path Of Exile can agree with this.

stefaan.de.wasch1b16_ESO · May 2014

qwertyburnsb16_ESO wrote: »

How about block all IP address's from China, India and so on? Give them there own server instead for them to ruin the game.

Apart from that, technically isn't this like criminal damage, fraud and theft? Couldn't this be taken up by the authorities via Interpol?

Euh.... That utterly smells of racism... not saying you are one, but it can come across as such. You can't "ban" half the worlds population... Cause that's what you are talking about... India + China > half the worlds population...

And interpol... lol... yeah right... they have "alot" to say... even in Europe let alone in China or India

Chryos · May 2014

Best thing you can do is educate people on real world implications of buying from them. They (the gold farmers, botters) do break the law by reverse engineering someone elses software product. Thats illegal pretty much anywhere in the world for one. Second they buy accounts from stolen credit card information via identity theft. We all have to convince people to not buy from them. These are the same types of people who ding your cellphone for misc surcharges when u callback an unknown mystery number only to get a cryptic answering machine message. These people are just plain bad. They hate the world and feel entitled to take the easy way out and steal from others. There has never been one legit virtual item selling company because you arent supposed to do that in ANY game, its always been like that. I avoid MMOs that dont keep spammers away just like alot of you guys, and that hurts legit businesses.

The main thing is dont give up or get lazy in your fight. It's the ones that always say "nothing will be done, or thats just how its going to be from now on" who are either weak at heart or are the botters themselves trying to discourage you.

Botters are hateful little criminals, dont think they are just some little kids playing and trying to make a buck, these guys are professional organized criminals running loose on the internet. No one reports them or makes it the big deal that it needs to be. to law enforcement. I garuntee the FBI wants to know about this multi million (or billon dollar) crime spree, because its also about peoples stolen identities and money.

Chryos · May 2014

Here is some other insight... where do you think the smartest computer hackers work for? Do you think they work for the legitimate computer companies that dont pay well. Or do you think they are smart enough to figure out how to make the system work for them? Or work on a criminal organization that pays more? This is why hackers are criminals. You can sell a name and birthdate on the blackmarket for 1.99 a pop, steal some personal data from a credit card company database and you can do the math on what the data thief makes and what the person who put someones personal information puzzle together can make. Anyway, botters and websites for GoldAH are the same, criminals... Just going to GoldAH means they have auto phished your IP for whatever they can find.

Mightylink · May 2014

No matter what there is always currency, if there is no gold people will find something else to trade for, its unavoidable.

skeletorz_ESO · May 2014

kcolasaccob14_ESO wrote: »

My best suggestion is finding out who they are in real life and beating the f*** out of them.

This