Well Fuck, SoE finally Did it...who will follow suit?

[GiR]

I skimmed the thread so I might miss a point or two, but it's a brilliant move by Sony. The server rulesets probvide guaranteed safety of sales between players for cash.

Guess where all the god damn bot farmers are going to go play? Guess where all the folks with expendable cash that don't mind paying $50 for loot rights to Breastplate of Vindication are going to go?

It'll provide incentive for farmers to move off existing servers and onto Exchange servers.

It's a fucking penal colony for RANGRANGs and rich brats. Win!

[Kaige]

/quote]If we came up with a game specifically designed around these sorts of transactions, it might be pretty cool.[/quote]

I thought that sentence from Smedley's message seemed kinda funny.

[Froofy-D]

As long as the best stuff in the game is no-drop off raid level mobs then who cares. Buy all the plat you want but still be a gimp compared to a hardcore raid guild player. Its that way in WoW and EQ, and almost certainly will be in VG.

Same deal to a lesser extent with the WoW PVP rewards system. Some of the PVP gear is really nice, but you cant buy pvp skills off ebay.

Bottomline: People who buy buy plat will still be relegated to the same low-end crap just like they've always been.

Now, if SOE starts putting a lot of droppable gear in the EQ2 endgame equivalent of Anguish to boost their auction revenues - then people will have a reason to be pissed.

[Nyceane]

part of SOE's profit come from people that buys plat, etc

lmao, this is just too funny

[Velk]

Originally posted by JerleMinara
They're giving out a limited license to use their stuff. They're not giving it a value.

They are though.

Imagine that this system was retrofitted back to the start of kunark. Remember the moss covered twig ? Now imagine that a few people sell them for $600 each and then the next week SOE goes ahead and nerfs it into the next century.

"We change shit, all deals are final, suck it down losers" could be tried, but I suspect there would be rioting.

[Samus Aran]

Originally posted by Velk
"We change shit, all deals are final, suck it down losers" could be tried, but I suspect there would be rioting.

Do you think they haven't had far more potent legal minds go over this entire concept?

[Trucari]

I'll be completely frank.

I think WoW should have done this from the very start and I think EQ II should move to maximize this opportunity.

IF a secondary market must exist, I would rather the profits go back to the developer now matter how much I hate them, than go to a secondary market facilitator THAT DOES NOTHING TO BENEFIT THE GAME.

In my perspective, although I'm sure it's faulty, they could subsidize the montly fees by earning revenue this way. People are going to buy and sell currency, it happens, but please developers, DO THIS AND CUT ME A $1 a month savings or something. I don't care, i know it's profitable, do it please, it's easy, it's much more secure if you do it, and then hopefully the entire playerbase can benefit from this.

The only reservation I do have is that I wish there was some way to prevent people from solely making their livings off farming platinum in game. I don't believe that russians and chinese and koreans or even Americans should be playing a game solely to feed their families. However, I understand it.

Lastly, I think by "legalizing" the process, it will help to make the business less profitable. If EQII charges a smaller fee and is thus able to provide the goods cheaper and easier to the player in game. Then the overall profit margin of the entire industry will decrease, and presently, i think the margin is a bit obscene considering.

Summary:

Facilitate the transactions, subsidize the development of the game, and offer discounts to the playerbase because of the additional revenue, and if WoW did this, patch more often. That is all.

[Yermum Onceme]

Could someone please tell me a personal example of how plat farming and selling truly hurt them? All I ever hear is bitching at not being able to get a camp they want, and longwinded rants on the economy. Please, someone, anyone, explain to me why plat farming is so terribly and personally bad.

I'm personally a big fan of this in the same way GiR is. I want plat farm servers to get the the farmers off mine (not that I mind them, its the whining that surrounds em). I want a "badass hardcore motherfucker" server to attract the would be badass hardcore motherfuckers off of my normal server. The key to all of this though is that you can easily choose NOT to be a participant in it, and its existant in a different server means that it will exist LESS on yours.

[Sylas]

I skimmed the thread so I might miss a point or two, but it's a brilliant move by Sony. The server rulesets probvide guaranteed safety of sales between players for cash.

Guess where all the god damn bot farmers are going to go play? Guess where all the folks with expendable cash that don't mind paying $50 for loot rights to Breastplate of Vindication are going to go?

It'll provide incentive for farmers to move off existing servers and onto Exchange servers.

It's a fucking penal colony for RANGRANGs and rich brats. Win!

Lose.

Guess what this will do the IGE's profit margins on those servers with an increased supply (*everyone* on the server with spare coin will sell for RL$) and plummetted demand? (why use IGE when you can use the official SOE service?)
Now guess who won't be attempting to compete with SOE on those servers?
You already know who won't be wanting to migrate to publically ridiculed "Gimp losers at life" servers, but if you need to guess it's every halfway decent human being/respectable guild. Hell look at the shit the $tormhammer folks got.
Now guess who's still going to want to use the unsanctioned secondary market on servers in which SOE will not be competing? (The irony is, SOE unwittingly lowered the supply and therefore increased demand on the non-ebay servers)
Now finally, Guess what this does to farming/ebaying on the non-ebay servers?

Penal colony for the folks who use eq as part time income in between their fulltime job relisting shit on ebay, sure, until they realize their return on their time investment just dropped to shit, and then they'll be back on the real servers. Penal colony for the Rich brats who couldn't buy friends in game if they tried and therefore don't care about their rep or the stigma associated with their server, sure, for a minute. But if you think this anything other than SOE cashing in on the secondary market by creating new servers that they can monopolize, you're wrong.

Now, if SOE starts putting a lot of droppable gear in the EQ2 endgame equivalent of Anguish to boost their auction revenues - then people will have a reason to be pissed.

I'd be surprised if there isn't atleast 1 ebay server with the FV-style "everything's droppable" ruleset. You can certainly bet on atleast a few high end items getting "overlooked" when they go through flagging no drop items. The moment the revenue from auction listings shows up on a quarterly financial report there's going to be 20 accountants who's job it is to increase it. The question isn't if more droppable high end gear will be created, it will by default. The question is if they'll be willing to spend the time making non-droppable versions for the regular servers, and that time spent negatively affects the profit margin of the auctions, so will be avoided at all costs.

[softwillow]

I am looking at two views: Consumer Strategy and Competitive Analysis.

I. Consumer Strategy
It was a black and white interpretation up until now: Buying in-game money and items for real money is bad. End of discussion.

SOE just moved this into an area where people accept the fact that Sony wants more money (under the guise of helping the players out). Half the people in this thread say this is acceptable since it benefits the company that produces the game.

Once players buy into this argument, SOE will have an easier time convincing them of their next argument: that SOE want to help players with too little time enjoy the high-end of the game by selling them just what they need. Just like the announcement today, SOE will say players want it, most others don't mind it, and it benefits SOE's profitability. The same argument that people bought into with them legitimizing the secondary market. How can you say yes to the first argument and no to the second one when the premises appear almost identical?

At this point the game panders to the wealthy and SOE will start designing content around out-of-game purchases. For instance, You can only kill Nagafen with the Nagafen-Slaying Sword. To get the sword, you need to spend about 30 hours doing quests and require a raid-sized encounter at the final step -OR- you can buy the sword directly from SOE for just $12.95.

The line between in-game and out of game just became non-existant: you can do the difficult 30 hour quest or you can farm in game (in which SOE takes a cut of the real money) or you can pay SOE directly (in which case SOE take 100% of the real money). The game is just a facade for an unregulated "black tulip" market.


II. From a competitive analysis view...

Today's decision is designed to harm the more successful MMORPGs: SOE is removing player guilt and the social stigmatism of being an e-bayer. As players move away from SOE's diminishing market share MMORPGs, they will feel alienated by WOW and Vanguard's stance on the secondary market. They will continue to use the secondary markets, making it harder on Blizzard and Sigil to uphold their policies on these markets (reducing profitability if they enforce the policies).

In short, SOE had a monopoly on the drinking water and are now getting squeezed out. They decided to shit in the water to disrupt their competitors' plans for using it.


-----------------
Two very different ways to look at what went on with this announcement, both with a very large impact on the future of MMORPGs.

[Brash]

Originally posted by Froofy-D


Now, if SOE starts putting a lot of droppable gear in the EQ2 endgame equivalent of Anguish to boost their auction revenues - then people will have a reason to be pissed.

I’m pretty sure SOE will remove NODROP from these items just to increase their cash flow. Bet some suit will suggest this and get a promotion. Fun..

[Elgonn]

Originally posted by softwillow Two very different ways to look at what went on with this announcement, both with a very large impact on the future of MMORPGs.

Different but both are very tinfoil-hat-esque.

It really could simply just be a big fuck you to Yantis and a reduction in customer service issues. If they also make some cash? Well this is SOE.

I think that is far more likely than some inane slippery slope that ends with a raid zoning into Naggy's lair and being charged $15.00 to spawn him.

[Ronne]

As long as the best stuff in the game is no-drop off raid level mobs then who cares

Now, if SOE starts putting a lot of droppable gear in the EQ2 endgame equivalent of Anguish to boost their auction revenues - then people will have a reason to be pissed.

The best gear is already tradeable, player made no less, so yeah, the dollar is the win.

[Snagglepuss]

Originally posted by Awanka
I predict some retard who took high school economics is now going to tell me how ingame selling ruins the economy.

demand for external secondary market currency creates incentive for people to farm
more currency enters the economy than would have without this demand
inflation ensues

BOOYAKASHA

[Duppin]

Originally posted by Snagglepuss
demand for external secondary market currency creates incentive for people to farm
more currency enters the economy than would have without this demand
inflation ensues

BOOYAKASHA

This is different from the existing situation how, exactly?