Credit Farmers Love Platinum Rarity - Here's Why

[MayhemofChaonus]

After my jaw hit the floor at some of the GTN prices of late, I started reading through the forum threads to see what might be driving it. I found a large number of threads about people buying credits from those annoying, unscrupulous credit farmers. Dozens of people posted, blaming credit farmers for all of our current economic woes.

 

They have a point, but I don't think farmers are the biggest problem right now.

 

From what I can tell, SWTOR is driving people into the arms of credit farmers by increasing item rarity in packs.

 

Let's look at the facts.

1) The more rare the desired items become, the more hours it takes to grind the credits to buy them.

2) These hours have to be put into the game quickly, because item rarity only increases over time. You need to get the item before the pack is retired.

3) There are only so many hours in the week that anyone can play the game. Everyone has a limit.

4) People with more free time are usually those with the least money to spend, and vice versa. People with full time jobs and families often have more money than time to spend.

 

The number of hours required to get an item increases over time. More people competing for fewer items means more people putting in extra hours, which means more high price sales, which means more hours of grind to keep up, until finally most people just don't have enough free time and are shut out.

 

Eventually, the requirement in hours becomes unreachable for everyone except the most hard core players that don't have serious job and/or family commitments. What these working adults do have is plenty of money.

 

If you don't have the choice to put in hours to earn your prize, but you can buy it by spending about the same money as a fast food meal, you're going to buy it.

Dozens of hours of game play... or one hour at your full-time job, where you have to be anyway.

 

Before the rarity and thus the prices went so high, you could "buy" the items legally and fairly. You could purchase Cartel Coins, get something from the market and place it in the GTN. This would convert your real money into credits through an acceptable channel.

 

Now the credit prices are low, the Cartel Coins are expensive, and the items in the market don't change often enough to keep their sales high in the GTN. There is no incentive to use the Cartel Market.

 

So... TLDR: Increasing rarity of items is empowering the credit black market. It's a move in the wrong direction.

 

Leave the super rare items as bragging rights for those who fought many PVP battles, mastered Operations, and so forth. This is where an items rarity actually means something and there is no other way to acquire it. Make items more common when they are tied into real money (via packs) and likely to unbalance the economy. Let the Cartel Coins be the most economically feasible way of acquiring items with cash.

 

Thanks for reading!

 

This suggestion your making is almost word-for-word what Skyforge is doing. You could literally spend a decade of straight playtime and still not unlock every unlockable thing in that game. But you could spend any amount of money, from $5 to $5000 (don't look at me like that, some of the hardcore players have) to shorten that grind proportionally to how much money you invested. That is the way things should be done. Especially in this era of gaming where we have adults with money but no time, and kids with plenty of time but no little to no money. Swtor should really start trying to emulate some of Skyforge's non-combat mechanics more if they want to improve customer satisfaction

Edited August 17, 2016 by MayhemofChaonus

[Tsetso]

The obvious solution is to turn all the CM fluff stuff BoP and with the recent DvL packs and the "new pack opening experience" BW seems to be going in this direction. Next thing that'd probably go would be the collections system.

[sethdil]

As I said, players CAN still "legally" purchase credits through the CM using CC's. The fact that some players are incapable of selling unopened packs/hypercrates does NOT negate the fact that using CC's to "purchase credits" IS still a viable option. The ONLY drawback is the bind timers.

 

IMO, it is more the "instant gratification" and "have to have it NOW" attitudes that drive players to cheat and violate the TOS, risking being banned. I say this because those cheaters get those credits much faster by violating the TOS and purchasing credits from gold farming sites.

 

In all likelihood, the CM is still the better deal with regards to credits to dollar ratios, provided players are SMART about it.

 

Everything you said is negated by the fact you stated CM is a better credits to dollar ratio. That is laughable since many Credit Sellers offer a much lower price per million then attempting to get it by flipping CM packs. It's basic math and the OP is correct in every one of his assumptions. But I will stop there cause below is my assessment of the situation.

 

There are 4 ways to get items

1. Play high risk low reward gambling with the CM by opening crates.

Risk/reward ratio: Extreme.

Results: Drop rates are insanely low leading to high dollar investments with no guarantee of obtain item

 

2. Grind for credits

Risk/Reward ratio: High

Results: You will have to grind fast enough to purchase said item before it inflates even further thus resulting in even more grinding. Risk is price outpaces grinding even more so now that credits from Heroics/crafting has been nerfed.

 

3. Buy from CM and flip for profit

Risk/Reward ratio: High

Results: Crates may not sell for weeks or months, stiff competition leading to a lower credits/crate yeld. price of items outpaces credit generation. High real dollar investment.

 

4. Purchase credits from credit farmers.

Risk/Reward ratio: Medium

Results: Higher credit/dollar earning than other methods. Risk of violation of TOS resulting in Ban or seizure of assets. Item available sooner/ less chance of price outpacing. Risk of spam/malware sites or credit card fraud if not careful.

 

Alternate choice

Risk/Reward ratio:non existent

Results: Just do not buy it don't worry about having the shiny digital trinket that will vanish when the servers shut down. Take your money and treat your wife, dog, kids or yourself to something you can have forever. Buy a new game, pay extra on your student loan, or save it back for that traveling vacation you want to take.

[FireFoxed]

3. Buy from CM and flip for profit

Risk/Reward ratio: High

Results: Crates may not sell for weeks or months, stiff competition leading to a lower credits/crate yeld. price of items outpaces credit generation. High real dollar investment.

 

This is just silly. The price of CM market items are directly proportional to the price of the crates they come from. If "crates may not sell for weeks or months" or "stiff competition leading to a lower credits/crate yield" then it follows the items that come out of those crates are also getting cheaper or else people will just buy the crates and resell. We see massive inflation of old items when the crates aren't available, but any inflation on new items is exclusively because either the prices of crates are inflating too or the drop rate of the item has been nerfed.

Edited August 17, 2016 by FireFoxed