BioWare, GTN prices are insane, its time to do something

[Cindron]

It is breathtaking, I don't think it has been just over a year I was trying to decide if it was worth 200 million to buy a hypercrate. They are now going for 1 billion. If you can get one. People are working around the 1 billion cap by purchasing the hypercrate then selling the cartel packs for 42 million or more which of course means about a 250 million profit. I bought a dance emote for 4.5 million. Friend asked how much I spent and ran to the gtn to get it but to his dismay, one person had bought all the emotes in question that were on market and was selling them for 115 million each. Buy low, sell high because enough people are willing to pay I guess.

[Tsillah]

Look at the bright side - with the GTN cap being 1 billion and so much stuff already priced that high, at least inflation is going to stop now.

Inflation won't stop because of that. It will actually continue as people have more and more credits to spend. So really expensive items will go to direct trade and bypass the gtn and more and more items will keep going up in price since they're not at a billion yet. People will open up armor boxes themselves and start selling each armor piece for a billion a piece etc.

 

You know what's causing inflation too? Those damn sets you can't buy on the CM anymore. Guaranteed to sell at 1 billion when people get one from a crate. And people will buy it because they've been waiting for it forever.

That's supply and demand and I don't believe that those items are a big part of the in-game market, but because are credits are getting worth less and less, the prices of these particular items are doubly affected.

[OlBuzzard]

This will be my last posting on this matter.

 

CAUTION : wall of boring and unwanted text.

 

Part one: as for inflation in the game.

 

Most will not admit what has happened to the game. And the following is simply my own personal (and somewhat biased ) opinion based on RL experience and those activities in game since 1.0

 

Inflation itself can come from several sources. Primarily two sources: Demand pull / Cost pull. Those sources can have both positive and negative effects on just about any economy. While there are other factors that are usually discussed when reviewing this subject ... I will only "briefly" touch on a few that have shown up in game.

 

Increased money supply: Self explanatory. Several sources. Most are legit. Only one that I'm aware of in game that is not legit. Only one way to stop it ! Complaining that too many people have too much and taking it away is never a solution.

 

Higher wages: For in game purposes I will restrict this to credit farming. Make no mistake about it ... this is a big source of credits being made in game. Consider this: for how many years now about the only thing to do is to play the same areas over and over again. Since 1.0 we have seen how many players can and WILL play this game has hard as anyone can. It's not that far of a stretch to see how anyone who wants to can figure out which parts of the game have a high yield in credit pay offs and play those repeatedly over and over again .... making hundreds of millions of credits. ( Some have actually bragged about this in the past on this forum board). Multiply this times how many years now ???

 

BTW... people who have spent the last 8 - 9 years credit farming have done nothing wrong. IMO griping because someone else has invested their time playing SWTOR to achieve a different goal in game other than what I see as important does not make it right or wrong.

 

Devaluation of currency: When huge amounts of credits are available to everyone ... those credits soon will lose their purchasing power ... what was once costing 1000 credits now costs 10,000 credits. (just an example). This happens in the situation that we have right now.

 

Increasing VAT : Increasing the taxation of an item will only drive up the cost beyond what the old values once were. This has been proven even in RL. (Note: VAT: value added taxation). It should be noted that this factor by itself will not drive inflation ... but will simply contribute to it !

 

 

Broken supply chains: This is seen primarily ( when applied to SWTOR) ... when either crafting mats become too difficult to obtain ...or are limited in production or gathering when said items are in demand for any one of several applications. This will result in higher costs in all products associated with this particular mat ESPECIALLY in a high profile/usage item.

 

Demand exceeds availability: Self explanatory. We have seen this reflected in the cost of mats and armor items repeatedly on the GTN. I can quote off the top of my head at least three items where the cost of those items is currently approximately 1/10 of what it use to be 2 years ago. But few want to admit to it ...especially since cost reduction of anything is not what some folks what to hear when discussing the runaway inflation on the GTN.

 

Raw material supplies ( lack of availability) ... this is pretty much the same as supply and demand. When applied to SWTOR to use one example of how the cost has dropped (should be seen as a positive) solid resource matrix use to sell for well over 1,500,000 EACH approximately 18 months ago. But now ... with those resources being made much more readily available upon completion of parts of the game the cost has dropped significantly.

 

Monetary policies. Credits should not be made available for sale (in terms of REAL money) ... AND there must be a way to block credit sales for real money ... period !

 

Legacy Credit caps: Only BW can see the real numbers and make an accurate determination of what the ceiling cap should be for Legacy Credits.

 

IMO taking away what people have legitimately earned (regardless of whether playing various activities provided of SWTOR or the GTN aspect of the game) is a really BAD idea !!

 

Additional notes:

 

I'd like to add a couple more thoughts:

Boredom... while many will laugh at this... Please stop and think for a moment. Aside from finding something constructive to do whether as an individual or an active member of a guild what else is there to do? Many players have found some means of finding something to do ... get rich(er). Mega guilds get bonuses ... and bonus credits are a part of running anything. Turning crafting into "factory styled" production centers is so easy to do until it's not even funny. It's not that much of a stretch to see how billions of credits can be amassed over a period of 9+ years without anyone doing anything wrong.

 

Raising credit limits for F2P and Preferred players might make it easier to facilitate their ability to purchase items. But there again this is a BW decision. They have their reasons for setting those guidelines.

 

Trust me ... there is a LOT more that could be published and discussed. In the end it is up to the individual to:

** Save credits when playing the game.

** Don't blow what you've saved when a new fancy (whatever ) item comes out.

** Learn to EARN ... ( yeah that means work at it )

** Play the game ... and have fun !!

 

I'm quite certain this will be taken apart ... and I'll be told that it's all BW's fault and that ...

 

[/shrugs] Oh well ... never mind.

 

It seems my old professor was right ..." A man convinced against his will .... is of the same opinion still. "

 

Thanks for your patience reading though this mess. I'm really not on a rant of any kind. So if you have read it that way ... please re-read as though you were in a calm state of mind having a civil discussion with a close friend.

Edited September 21, 2021 by OlBuzzard

[OlBuzzard]

I believe that there is no real problem here to solve. The issue is being kept alive by players who want stuff from GTN that is NOT necessary to play the game, just cosmetic stuff. But these players don't want to spend the real-life money other players spent. They don't want to spend the real-life time playing the game - over several years - that the other players spent.

 

They want shiny stuff, they want them now, and they want them just handed to them without spending money or effort.

 

I believe that there is no real problem here to solve.

 

Simple ... concise ...

 

agreed 100 %

[Tsillah]

I believe that there is no real problem here to solve. The issue is being kept alive by players who want stuff from GTN that is NOT necessary to play the game, just cosmetic stuff. But these players don't want to spend the real-life money other players spent. They don't want to spend the real-life time playing the game - over several years - that the other players spent.

 

They want shiny stuff, they want them now, and they want them just handed to them without spending money or effort.

 

I believe that there is no real problem here to solve.

The real problem is that there is not enough stuff to spend credits on in game. If you would take the cosmetics from the CM out of the equation entirely, there still is the issue of too many credits and not enough credit sinks or rather stuff to spend credits on.

 

I'm sitting on 2 billion now and I don't need any stuff from the CM anymore since I pretty much bought everything I want from the CM, mostly with real money. The 2 billion isn't nearly as much as some other players have, but I give stuff away now because I'm not one of those people who wants to get as many credit as possible... but I have nothing to spend credits on in game and that's the real problem.

 

I mean as far as cosmetics are concerned I'd be fine with everything you buy from the CM being bound to legacy and not tradeable, but then there still is the issue of there not being enough things to spend credits on in game.

[Tsillah]

There's a lot in your post but I'm not going to answer to everything since most things I already said what I have to say on the topics and I largely agree with those points anyhow.

Devaluation of currency: When huge amounts of credits are available to everyone ... those credits soon will lose their purchasing power ... what was once costing 1000 credits now costs 10,000 credits. (just an example). This happens in the situation that we have right now.

The only way to off set this is to have enough credit sinks in place, but more to the point stuff to spend credits on and not just taxation. Taxation is experienced as negative where stuff you can buy is a positive experience since you get something in return for your credits.

Monetary policies. Credits should not be made available for sale (in terms of REAL money) ... AND there must be a way to block credit sales for real money ... period !

There is no way of blocking credit sales for real money. Well, there is actually an alternative. It's to make credits worthless.

 

That way you let inflation just go wild and not have enough credit sinks and just leave it at that. In that case credits become essentially worthless and that would stop the credit sellers because there is no more market for them. It would also mean a stop to CM cosmetics being tradable because that's what the main reason for the value of credits is atm. What effect that will have on the game and particularly the population I wouldn't want to speculate about.

 

Otherwise you'd have to make the game sub only again. The issue with F2P is that credit sellers can create accounts faster than BW can close them down. When there is a sub there is a regular payment and credit sellers don't want to create accounts that they have to pay for cause it cuts into their margin. But again, what will that do to the population?

 

---

 

GW2 has a clever system, with their gems (their version of cc's). There is actually an exchange in game where players can spend gems on gold and vice versa. Why is this clever? Because the gold that is on offer is the gold that people spend on buying gems so they are already part of the economy but are put in the exchange to buy with gems. And the gems that people buy with gold are limited to the gems that people spend on buying gold. So this is why it's an exchange rate and the prices therefore fluctuate because of supply and demand.

 

That game does have inflation but is almost as old as SWTOR and the rate of inflation is MUCH better than here. And they don't even have subs. However, their direct sale items are not tradeable and are bound to your account. Only some items from their loot boxes are tradeable and so they don't have a big impact on the game's economy.

 

But I daresay that it's too late to change much in the direction that SWTOR has taken.

[ceryxp]

Real talk, the inflation problem is partly caused by bioware, not the GTN...

 

Sadly, since bioware is largely the reason inflation exploded like it did, I have little faith in them making it any better. I expect 7.0 to introduce a lot more arbitrary paywalls and ridiculous vendor prices, and the GTN will only get worse as a result.

 

Fairly on point, but you missed one very large factor. BW is not largely to blame for inflation, BW is entirely to blame for inflation and the single largest factor is the infinite credit generator that BW has in their basement that is constantly pumping out credits. No economy in the world could support constantly printing more money, and yet that is exactly what BW does. Every credit in the game came from BW, even those acquired through exploits and cheats. I have seen people blame the credit sellers, but those credits they are selling came from BW. This is further compounded by the fact that BW is awful at credit sinks.

 

They overlook good credit sinks like, for example, the appearance authorization terminal, where all changes should cost credits, because it is a source of monetization whilst implementing foolish sinks like the 500k to train skills. The single greatest credit sink in the game is the GTN tax and BW gave ways to effectively eliminate the tax. If possible, the GTN should have a variable tax rate. Of course, the GTN tax will not matter soon if inflation continues as it is because people will take their merchandise off of the GTN to go to direct trades, which are not taxed. I can understand having a secondary currency needed to purchase gear so as to time gate progression, but nothing else should have cost tech fragments. Not the mounts, not the pets, not the 5.0 armour shells that never appeared. Space Barbie is likely one of the largest credit sinks in the game, and yet far too many pieces are locked behind a secondary currency. Drop all of those and just apply a credit value so people have something to spend their credits on. What do I mean? The Dantooine event items all require a secondary currency. Drop those and apply a credit cost to everything. The industrial, synthetic, and universal prefab vendors sell decorations that require a crafted token. Drop those and sell everything for credits. Drop all of the secondary currencies from everything and sell everything for credits.

 

The simple fact is is that BW is to blame for the inflation. They continue to add more and more credits to the economy and do not give us enough to spend them on.

[xordevoreaux]

People typically don't burn through cash without ever wondering exactly how much they're bringing in versus spending.

 

Anything that increases the demand to consume credits -- regardless of the nature of the credit sink, whether it be something new or one made more expensive -- will simply send people of a certain predisposition into the arms of the gold sellers.

 

Their thinking is that the line of least resistance is to spend their in-game time doing anything but harvesting money and let the gold sellers handle the rest. That's not a mentally easily overcome.

 

Motivating those singularly minded to maintain that line of least resistance to seek out the gold sellers doesn't make sense to me.

Edited September 23, 2021 by xordevoreaux

[TrixxieTriss]

Fairly on point, but you missed one very large factor. BW is not largely to blame for inflation, BW is entirely to blame for inflation and the single largest factor is the infinite credit generator that BW has in their basement that is constantly pumping out credits. No economy in the world could support constantly printing more money, and yet that is exactly what BW does. Every credit in the game came from BW, even those acquired through exploits and cheats. I have seen people blame the credit sellers, but those credits they are selling came from BW. This is further compounded by the fact that BW is awful at credit sinks.

 

They overlook good credit sinks like, for example, the appearance authorization terminal, where all changes should cost credits, because it is a source of monetization whilst implementing foolish sinks like the 500k to train skills. The single greatest credit sink in the game is the GTN tax and BW gave ways to effectively eliminate the tax. If possible, the GTN should have a variable tax rate. Of course, the GTN tax will not matter soon if inflation continues as it is because people will take their merchandise off of the GTN to go to direct trades, which are not taxed. I can understand having a secondary currency needed to purchase gear so as to time gate progression, but nothing else should have cost tech fragments. Not the mounts, not the pets, not the 5.0 armour shells that never appeared. Space Barbie is likely one of the largest credit sinks in the game, and yet far too many pieces are locked behind a secondary currency. Drop all of those and just apply a credit value so people have something to spend their credits on. What do I mean? The Dantooine event items all require a secondary currency. Drop those and apply a credit cost to everything. The industrial, synthetic, and universal prefab vendors sell decorations that require a crafted token. Drop those and sell everything for credits. Drop all of the secondary currencies from everything and sell everything for credits.

 

The simple fact is is that BW is to blame for the inflation. They continue to add more and more credits to the economy and do not give us enough to spend them on.

 

Very accurate description and analysis of the situation and some good suggestions.

Edited September 23, 2021 by TrixxieTriss

[Tsillah]

Fairly on point, but you missed one very large factor. BW is not largely to blame for inflation, BW is entirely to blame for inflation and the single largest factor is the infinite credit generator that BW has in their basement that is constantly pumping out credits. No economy in the world could support constantly printing more money, and yet that is exactly what BW does. Every credit in the game came from BW, even those acquired through exploits and cheats. I have seen people blame the credit sellers, but those credits they are selling came from BW. This is further compounded by the fact that BW is awful at credit sinks.

Well in the end BW is wholly responsible. However, there are factors that increase the speed of inflation and there the credit sellers are a contributing factor. This is also possible because of BW's decisions, so I do hold BW wholly responsible in the end.

They overlook good credit sinks like, for example, the appearance authorization terminal, where all changes should cost credits, because it is a source of monetization whilst implementing foolish sinks like the 500k to train skills. The single greatest credit sink in the game is the GTN tax and BW gave ways to effectively eliminate the tax. If possible, the GTN should have a variable tax rate. Of course, the GTN tax will not matter soon if inflation continues as it is because people will take their merchandise off of the GTN to go to direct trades, which are not taxed. I can understand having a secondary currency needed to purchase gear so as to time gate progression, but nothing else should have cost tech fragments. Not the mounts, not the pets, not the 5.0 armour shells that never appeared. Space Barbie is likely one of the largest credit sinks in the game, and yet far too many pieces are locked behind a secondary currency. Drop all of those and just apply a credit value so people have something to spend their credits on. What do I mean? The Dantooine event items all require a secondary currency. Drop those and apply a credit cost to everything. The industrial, synthetic, and universal prefab vendors sell decorations that require a crafted token. Drop those and sell everything for credits. Drop all of the secondary currencies from everything and sell everything for credits.

I agree that BW doesn't have enough credit sinks or, as I said, ways to spend credits. I don't necessarily agree with your proposals though. They are related to other topics, where people are encouraged to do specific types of content. This also relates to the population on various planets.

 

If everything can be bought with credits instead of in-game currencies, a lot of people will not play that content unless that is the content that generates the most credits. The problem with everything being available with credits is that a lot of people will chose one type of content to rule them all because it generates the most credits per hour. Or as I sometimes call it CPS instead of DPS meaning credits per second.

 

In your example of Dantooine...making them all buyable just with credits will cause people not to play the event because there are other things that you can do that make a lot more credits...

 

However, a combination would be good. In game currencies + credits. But it also needs that reputation vendors are updated regularly with new stuff to keep players spending.

 

Also your proposals for GTN tax increases will likely lead to more people using the alternative (direct trades) the higher the GTN tax gets. If you get rid of COD mails and direct trades, then people will have to use the GTN, but I can't see people getting very excited over that.

 

And cosmetics are locked behind another currency...well they cost cartel coins and they can be sold for credits, but there aren't enough cosmetics in game and that's the problem. There is very little that can be generated in game.

The simple fact is is that BW is to blame for the inflation. They continue to add more and more credits to the economy and do not give us enough to spend them on.

And that is certainly true.

[ceryxp]

If everything can be bought with credits instead of in-game currencies, a lot of people will not play that content unless that is the content that generates the most credits. The problem with everything being available with credits is that a lot of people will chose one type of content to rule them all because it generates the most credits per hour. Or as I sometimes call it CPS instead of DPS meaning credits per second.

 

In your example of Dantooine...making them all buyable just with credits will cause people not to play the event because there are other things that you can do that make a lot more credits...

 

Irrelevant. People will still have to run the events to earn reputation necessary to purchase those items. Making those event items available for credits rather than an event currency will not cause people to play them less as the reason most people continue to play them is Conquest. Conquest is the primary reason people continue to play the events after they have maxed their reputation and purchased all of the items that they want. If the events were not good for Conquest they truly would be abandoned.

 

 

Also your proposals for GTN tax increases will likely lead to more people using the alternative (direct trades) the higher the GTN tax gets. If you get rid of COD mails and direct trades, then people will have to use the GTN, but I can't see people getting very excited over that.

 

Whether the GTN tax is made variable or not, or even if it were completely removed, would not matter as the GTN is soon to become irrelevant to high value items due to inflation and the one billion cap on GTN trades.

 

 

And cosmetics are locked behind another currency...well they cost cartel coins and they can be sold for credits, but there aren't enough cosmetics in game and that's the problem. There is very little that can be generated in game.

 

Yes, that would be an example of what I said at the start, that BW ignores good credits sinks because it is a source of monetization. Far too many decorations and outfits are CM exclusive and there are far too few in the game that can be purchased with credits.

 

At the moment, the only decorations I can think of that can be purchased with credits (not counting the GTN) are the basic decorations that Felusia Stato sells, the Rakata themed decorations, and the decorations that can be purchased on Onderon and Mek-sha. Every other decoration that I can think of that can be purchased requires a secondary currency.

[Tsillah]

Irrelevant. People will still have to run the events to earn reputation necessary to purchase those items. Making those event items available for credits rather than an event currency will not cause people to play them less as the reason most people continue to play them is Conquest. Conquest is the primary reason people continue to play the events after they have maxed their reputation and purchased all of the items that they want. If the events were not good for Conquest they truly would be abandoned.

I would disagree with that. It's not irrelevant when the reputation is maxed and it doesn't take that much time to get them maxed. So initially, you'd be there but in the longer term you'd be absent. I'm thinking long term, you're thinking short term.

Whether the GTN tax is made variable or not, or even if it were completely removed, would not matter as the GTN is soon to become irrelevant to high value items due to inflation and the one billion cap on GTN trades.

True, some items are not available on the GTN anymore because their relative value is more than 1 billion in credits. I saw yesterday that the new pack of decorations is listed on the GTN for 750M credits. The pack costs 1800 CC. And the dark honor guard unstable lightsaber costs 5500 CC. So nobody with any business savvy is going to sell that one anymore on the GTN. And indeed not a single copy of that lightsaber is available on the GTN anymore.

At the moment, the only decorations I can think of that can be purchased with credits (not counting the GTN) are the basic decorations that Felusia Stato sells, the Rakata themed decorations, and the decorations that can be purchased on Onderon and Mek-sha. Every other decoration that I can think of that can be purchased requires a secondary currency.

There are some vendors on the fleet that sell things like imperial and republic flags and such for credits but yeah. The problem is that those vendors have never been updated nor have the craftable decorations vendors. If indeed they would update all of them and add credits to the cost of the ones that take another in game currency it would create a lot more credit sinks.

[Pricia]

Inflation won't stop because of that. It will actually continue as people have more and more credits to spend. So really expensive items will go to direct trade and bypass the gtn and more and more items will keep going up in price since they're not at a billion yet. People will open up armor boxes themselves and start selling each armor piece for a billion a piece etc.

 

That's supply and demand and I don't believe that those items are a big part of the in-game market, but because are credits are getting worth less and less, the prices of these particular items are doubly affected.

 

Eh that's where I'm out, I can't imagine wasting hours on the fleet trying to sell/buy something. Nope...

[xordevoreaux]

For all the overprinting of money, watch these forums burn to the ground if Bioware ever announced

"Heroics will no longer drop credits."

[robwettengel]

Controlling inflation is something that constantly bedevils monetary--and fiscal--policy. The credit supply is controlled by BW completely, and they can adjust it at will. This can be done by reducing/increasing credit rewards for running content--class missions, side missions, PVP, Heroics, ops, etc.--and by increasing/decreasing the GTN tax. However, decreasing credits earned or increasing the tax would be negative reinforcement for the player because we aren't getting anything out of such adjustments--most may view it was a penalty, and those of us who comprehend the economic rationale behind it may still grouse about it.

 

The most effective credit sink needs to offer some degree of exclusivity. This could either be a regular event or used when BW wants to reduce the credit supply. There are CC items that have been retired for a time, there are craftable armor sets that are only available if--say someone still around since launch--crafts it and makes it available via trade, gifting or posting to the GTN. These could all be items that could be made available during this special sale period via special vendors for X period of time. Armor sets could be broken down into their individual pieces--each one could be for sale at 1M credits. Decos could be offered for similar prices. Bioware is sitting on a lot of old content in terms of cosmetics that could be made available to serve as credit sinks.

[ceryxp]

I would disagree with that.

 

You disagree that the majority of people continue to run the events, after they have maxed their reputation and purchased everything they want with their tokens, because of Conquest? If that is what you are saying, and it must because that was the point I made to counter your earlier claim, then you really do not know what you are talking about. The only reason the events are as active as they are is due to Conquest. That is the motivator that will keep people playing them. It should not be to acquire a secondary currency to purchase the items from that event when a credit sink would be a better option.

[Toraak]

You disagree that the majority of people continue to run the events, after they have maxed their reputation and purchased everything they want with their tokens, because of Conquest? If that is what you are saying, and it must because that was the point I made to counter your earlier claim, then you really do not know what you are talking about. The only reason the events are as active as they are is due to Conquest. That is the motivator that will keep people playing them. It should not be to acquire a secondary currency to purchase the items from that event when a credit sink would be a better option.

 

I don't agree with this either. I had max reputation on Gree the 1st time it came out, and other the doing Xeno rarely, I never touch the rest of the event regardless. The conquest objectives are not worth me going back, and nothing else on the vendors I need. For me the only reason I used to go back was before everything was legacy bound, and gree was the only way to get legacy OH's. As for the other events, once the achievements were done, I stopped going. I play other parts of the game instead.

 

Not to mention conquest is easy to get from any content that doing the events isn't needed anymore for that.

[Pricia]

You disagree that the majority of people continue to run the events, after they have maxed their reputation and purchased everything they want with their tokens, because of Conquest? If that is what you are saying, and it must because that was the point I made to counter your earlier claim, then you really do not know what you are talking about. The only reason the events are as active as they are is due to Conquest. That is the motivator that will keep people playing them. It should not be to acquire a secondary currency to purchase the items from that event when a credit sink would be a better option.

 

I highly doubt that many people bother with those events. I sure haven't once I reached max rep and got the items I wanted.

 

I'd say that the people who run them are probably newish players. The only one that may be worth doing at this point for me is the swoop racing one - it's fun and good credits. The others - hard pass. Especially the Gree lagfest and the horribly boring contract week.

 

But it takes a LOT of farming to get the items for the rewards too... So I can imagine that people who don't have a lot of characters would take months to get them...

[Tsillah]

You disagree that the majority of people continue to run the events, after they have maxed their reputation and purchased everything they want with their tokens, because of Conquest? If that is what you are saying, and it must because that was the point I made to counter your earlier claim, then you really do not know what you are talking about. The only reason the events are as active as they are is due to Conquest. That is the motivator that will keep people playing them. It should not be to acquire a secondary currency to purchase the items from that event when a credit sink would be a better option.

Conquest should not be the reason to go back to content from the point of view of credit sinks. The whole point that conquest is the only reason why events are populated is an indication of the problem.

 

The thing about events is that BW intends events to run for a little bit and then stop running them for a while. The currencies for events also mean that you can only get those currencies from time to time. This is done with a reason as well and this is the reason why I say it's a bad idea to make it credits only because then you have access to the vendor all year AND you have access to the currency all year.

 

And other reputation vendors are not linked to events. So there my point is clear.

[xordevoreaux]

Tenet: Anything that makes credits scarcer -- but just as required -- for purchasing what credits have always been used for just means people will either find ways to farm more credits or pay people to farm credits for them, meaning the problem of cheap credits doesn't go away. Harming the supply side without addressing the demand side is not helpful.

 

Focus: This thread originally started out talking about insane prices on the GTN, but you can't have a discussion about insane prices on an an exchange without talking about what's getting exchanged for what.

 

In examining that, first ask ourselves why do we need credits to start with -- what's driving the demand -- and then let's be brave enough to say you know, maybe not everything we're tossing around to each other on the GTN needs to be.

 

Here's my strategy:

 

I'm asking for patience here. The final answer requires coordination of all of the solution's components, including the ones you don't bother to read.

 

Step 1 - Collapse the currency, reducing 10,000 credits to 1 credit. So if you have 1 million credits in the bank today, you'll have 100 tomorrow. This is preparatory work for the rest of the solution. Many nations have done this in the past to fight runaway inflation, but rarely follow through with the much-needed mirror to that, which is addressing the underlying reasons for the inflation spiral in the first place. You MUST address the underlying causes or any currency devaluation is a useless and ineffective stop-gap measure and the inflation spiral will continue as soon as everyone overcomes the temporary credit crunch.

 

Step 2 - Change what it means to need credits.

Here's the mirror. Move certain items out of the credit-based economy completely to a different means to (lazily) acquire other than the GTN (i.e., lazily, with credits). With that done, you can safely yank much of the profit motive out of the GTN.

 

Devalue your credits, reduce why you need them.

 

In other words, permanently shrink the size and scope of the player-based economy (I can hear the GTN whales sharpening their guillotine even now).

 

How do we do this?

 

Part 1 of 3 - Convert tokenized purchases to bind-to-legacy

At last count, I have 122 senator rugs in my main account's legacy. I'm addicted to senator rugs. They require cartel certs to get. I've often joked to my guildies if you want to bribe me, forget credits, hand me senator rugs and male twi'lek dancers. Now imagine that I (and my guildies) couldn't go to the GTN to get senator rugs because they're now bind-to-legacy purchases, that is, not traded or sold. Cartel certificates drop from the sky now, meaning bypassing the GTN altogether doesn't introduce an onerous burden to acquire those items.

 

Part 2 of 3 - Change what it means to have reputation.

Right now, reputation is a status, not a currency. You don't spend reputation. You acquire a level of reputation with various factions, and your reputation level then unlocks certain credit-based purchases. We change the reputation mechanism so that reputation is a currency, not a gate, and you spend reputation like you spend credits to get what you want (with no attached credit requirement) off reputation vendors. Rather than a measure of status, they're currency in their own right, not vendor fodder to acquire credits, and everything purchased on those vendors is legacy-bound.

 

Part 3 of 3 - Expand the list of what certs and other tokens (Manaan tokens, etc.), and reputation buy now

Here is the kicker. With credits devalued and alternative currencies bypassing the GTN for certain items, we expand the list of items purchasable without credits for all the things that drive outrageous prices on the GTN.

 

I'll let you guys bicker as to what any such list would include, but you get the idea.

Edited September 23, 2021 by xordevoreaux

[RikuvonDrake]

bioware just need to reduce the credit gain of players from everyday content and increase the cost of most stuff that players spend money on and potentially introduce more credit sinks, don't need to overcomplicate it

[xordevoreaux]

bioware just need to reduce the credit gain of players from everyday content and increase the cost of most stuff that players spend money on and potentially introduce more credit sinks, don't need to overcomplicate it

 

That solution drives inflation through the roof and gives every incentive to gold sellers to keep doing what they're doing.

Edited September 23, 2021 by xordevoreaux

[RikuvonDrake]

That solution drives inflation through the roof and gives every incentive to gold sellers to keep doing what they're doing.

 

credit sellers and exploiters have a very small impact on the overall economy and they are easy to handle through normal means, however the inflation that we have today is a result of players gaining too much credits while not spending enough

 

with players making less credits and spending more, the inflation will balance to an acceptable level over time

[xordevoreaux]

credit sellers and exploiters have a very small impact on the overall economy and they are easy to handle through normal means, however the inflation that we have today is a result of players gaining too much credits while not spending enough

 

with players making less credits and spending more, the inflation will balance to an acceptable level over time

 

You're just flat-out wrong on both counts, and your solution would drive the economy into the toilet and out into the ocean. Bad idea.

[RikuvonDrake]

You're just flat-out wrong on both counts, and your solution would drive the economy into the toilet and out into the ocean. Bad idea.

 

The main concern for most people is that they want cartel market items but don't want to spend cartel coins to gain them, naturally with the removal of referral abuse cm items are less common as the player base as a whole has fewer cartel coins to spend. That primarily drives the prices up, combine that with the fact that players have been making more and more credits without much to spend them on and its pretty simple to see why we have ended up where we are.

 

As you don't want to devalue players spending irl cash on cm the devs are likely to simply adjust the amount of credit that your average players get and help promote different ways for players to spend credits which, with time, will help the economy. CM items will continue to be more expensive than they were before with the referral abuse now being gone, but as those are just cosmetic items that aren't a major issue.

 

it's pretty simple really but the presence of cartel coins/cartel market makes it understandably easy to confuse and overcomplicate the issue, in the end its all just more credit sinks and less credit gains will solve the problem

Edited September 23, 2021 by RikuvonDrake