PTS: Economic Balance Changes

[LadyAdmiral]

WOW thank you for the in-depth reply / numbers @JoeStramaglia , I wasn't expecting a filled out chart to be returned! Very useful to compare.

So about 8% tax for regular items on the GTN, so if I wanna give a Green Varactyl to someone as a gift (40mill on gtn ish), it will cost me 3 million, not 120 million like the original test - and giving medpacs and adrenals to my friends will be free. I'd still like to not be charged at all for giving gifts/prizes but I understand it will cause people to skirt the rules and 3 mill is way, way more manageable. 

[Balameb]

47 minutes ago, JoeStramaglia said:

 

Sure, I am happy to give some of these examples (though please do still check things out on the PTS server to verify and to help us find things that feel incorrect).

An important caveat with these is while each server has a slightly different economy these are using a median across the entire game. When the GTN overhaul happens it will depend strictly on your server. Also because these are static values until the overhaul that means in order for them to change, it will have to be with a patch. I cannot speak to when we would do that but whenever we have one, we will make sure to give it an update if necessary.

Special note on Advanced White-Black Crystal, they don't all sell for the same amounts so that is the current range with the least being Hawkeye and the most being Eviscerating.

For those asking, the values are based on successful sales - not listing prices.

Thanks for the question, I hope these help!

Those values seem good. Glad feedback is being considered this time.

I do have a question, that i know it may be to early for a definitive response but at least an orientative one would be nice:

49 minutes ago, JoeStramaglia said:

When the GTN overhaul happens

The GTN overhaul.... will it come with something extra to make it more apealing? I mean, all the new potential GTN features sound awesome; but if the crafting/gearing meta stays the same, what would be its purpose? Just to play wall street with CM items? We kind of need some overhaul in other systems to pair it with.

[Enomars]

1 hour ago, JoeStramaglia said:

For those asking, the values are based on successful sales - not listing prices.

Beautiful Very smart thinking!  

[optotiger]

While I understand people getting around the GTN tax, I really don't like the idea of such a large tax on moving player to player.  Case in point,  My brother enjoy playing to together and we routinely trade stuff with each other that we get from galactic seasons crates.  This weekend I got a galactic seasons Armour set box that had an outfit that i won't be using for any of my many alts, but my brother really liked it so I gave it to him.  It will really suck to not be able to do this.  I really don't like the idea of trying to put an item up on the general GTN for 1 credit and they have my brother buy it right after it is listed as we might lose the item.

One idea, that might be useful, is in LOTRO their version of the GTN works as an auction hall where you are able to put items up for bid with a buyout.  It does have the option of listing an item to your kinship only (ie the lotro version of a guild in swtor) so it would be a way for someone to give items to guildies or friends very low cost if they wanted but still is a convoluted way to go about it.

Also, I don't like how this change will affect guilds giving stuff to members.  I play on Star Forge, and am a part of some large guilds that routinely give stuff to members out of the guild bank, It those of us that donate are taxed giving an item away and or the recipient is taxed when they gain the item will negate many of the benefits of being in a large active guild.

[casirabit]

4 hours ago, DWho said:

I picked a week to make it affordable for smaller guilds. It would have to be pretty high to somewhat compensate for the fees that aren't collected (we are still trying to pull credits out of the economy after all) if it lasted a whole month. You could run a lot of stuff through a guild in a month and having to pay for "free trading" might cause a little hesitation for people setting up trading guilds designed specifically to circumvent the fees (which guilds are already discussing).

Yea, I noticed that people discussing ways to circumvent ways not to pay the tax.  I had forgotten how some people will find ways around things.   

[CrazyScruffy]

You really just made another account to post this @optotiger?

Seems like you are more worried about having to pay the tax than worried about trading with your brother. And I don't believe you could get around the tax by putting an item on the GTN for 1 credit. Because it will be based off the past sales made. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong there)

And large active guilds, will yes be taxed, but if they are large as you say, it won't really hurt them that bad since they should have a steady flow of credits coming in

[CrazyScruffy]

6 minutes ago, casirabit said:

Yea, I noticed that people discussing ways to circumvent ways not to pay the tax.  I had forgotten how some people will find ways around things.   

there has and always will be people who look to get outside of the "box" and unfortunately those few will cause further changes to happen that will be detrimental to others players and not necessarily themselves

[TalLura]

6 hours ago, Chryptyk said:

you underestimate the lengths people will go through to avoid taxes.  If intraguild trading is exempt from taxes, it leaves a huge hole for people to use.

if you tax guildbanks then your hurt a lot of small guilds,   my friends and I would no longer be able to share craft matss, augments and dyes and sometimes duplicate armour sets. 

 

whats the point of a guild bank if people are heavily taxed to use it? 

 

 

 

i dont think the majority will join guild just to trade, first of alll it would be risky as theyd have to donate money to guild and hope that guild leader gave them access to trade bank, to many chances for scams .

[TrixxieTriss]

5 hours ago, LadyAdmiral said:

WOW thank you for the in-depth reply / numbers @JoeStramaglia , I wasn't expecting a filled out chart to be returned! Very useful to compare.

So about 8% tax for regular items on the GTN, so if I wanna give a Green Varactyl to someone as a gift (40mill on gtn ish), it will cost me 3 million, not 120 million like the original test - and giving medpacs and adrenals to my friends will be free. I'd still like to not be charged at all for giving gifts/prizes but I understand it will cause people to skirt the rules and 3 mill is way, way more manageable. 

A solution to the gifting situation would be to make any gifts bound to legacy or character. That way they can’t be re-traded as a default currency or sold on the GTN. And you don’t need to pay a tax to help someone out. 

Then all the actual credit sales can just go through the GTN and you don’t need to have P2P trades of CM items. 

This approach would mean much less work coding for the dev team. Which would cost less money & time to implement. Resources that could be used to do other things for the game.

[optotiger]

On 5/11/2023 at 7:09 PM, CrazyScruffy said:

You really just made another account to post this @optotiger?

Seems like you are more worried about having to pay the tax than worried about trading with your brother. And I don't believe you could get around the tax by putting an item on the GTN for 1 credit. Because it will be based off the past sales made. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong there)

And large active guilds, will yes be taxed, but if they are large as you say, it won't really hurt them that bad since they should have a steady flow of credits coming in

Not a new account.  I am a long time player since open beta with way to many alts on Star Forge.  I just don't ever post on forums as I typically only monitor the dev tracker.  Play this game and LOTRO where I have been there for 16 years now and only have posted a time or two in all that time.  However if regards to this thread, I apologize if i said something someone else said as I skipped or skimmed over most of the previous posts other than the dev posts previously in this thread. 

What I was trying to explain with my previous post, was I don't like not being able to trade stuff or give stuff away for free and get taxed.  If  selling the item, then sure, that needs to be taxed, but if I am not making money on a transaction to have to pay potentially millions.  The listed chart that was filled in by the dev with tax fees ranging into the 40-50 ish million range is way overtuned.

The 1 credit refereed to the LOTRO version of a guild only sale, as a way to sell directly to guildies rather than the whole server.  It functions essentially as two different markets, one where the only people that can buy it are guildies or on the open market that everyone is able to purchase it.  Typically, when listing kinship/guild only, the seller will list as a much lower or minimal price as a way of helping guildies out.  Since the GTN is getting a rework maybe that option would be useful here.  Borrowing ideas from other games can be beneficial.  Just as long as they don't borrow the LOTRO auction hall UI as it is horrid, which is a theme in LOTRO when it comes to their system's UI in general. 

I feel that some of the large economic changes being discussed should be implemented a bit slower.  GTN prices on Star Forge have come down quite a bit with the limited changes already made., but we definitely need more end game credit sinks.  One option that I think would be nice to have again was a redone amplifier system.  Not what we had before because the RNG was terrible, but a new system that gave the same type of bonuses, but say would allow you to pick what ampliifre you wanted and at what tier. Of course the cost would increase by they type and by the level of the amplifier,  For example, I really miss the PVP valor boost as it was helpful grinding 2 toons to Valor level 100..  I would like to have those options again but not with the RNG component as in their previous iteration. 

I posted in this thread as opposed to LOTRO where devs ask for thoughts of players and then ignore them, creating problems they either have to roll back, or have to replace later, because at least here the devs seem to honestly use our feedback to guide their development or the game,.  This issue with increasing taxes can be very sticky and has the potential if implemented incorrectly to be damaging to the game, hence why I think the devs are getting the extra feedback for dealing with this issue. 

The previous concerns/opinions in my original post before bugged me enough to actually log on over here and post.  As far as me being someone else, I know that I am probably wasting my time as I am not going to be able to convince a random person that I am not someone else.  If the devs care, which I highly doubt, they can easily look up my account and verify that.  However trying to discredit my opinions by lumping me in with someone that you must not have agreed with earlier in the thread is disingenuous.   Your incorrect in assuming that posters in this thread that might disagree with you are really just one person.  It stands to reason that a large tax increase in game could be very unpopular so it is not surprising if multiple players would provide negative feedback.  In real life you might have guessed from my handle I am Eyecare professional,  While I enjoy where I live and practice, it is sadly a state with a high tax burden.  I feel I pay enough in taxes to the IRS and my state and don't enjoy that feeling in a video game, especially one that has used the same economic model since this game launched in 2011.  At least with the IRS in real life, charitable contributions are tax deducible which won't be the case in SWTOR.

[Lost-Savage-XIII]

On 5/10/2023 at 2:55 PM, JoeStramaglia said:

That all said, please continue to give us feedback on these changes. I greatly appreciate your time and opinions.
 

It's funny the steps you are taking are when you are designing an economy from scratch, this is part of how you could STOP it from getting outta hand. BUT that is not this situation, this economy is broken BECAUSE BW set up a system where the most important CRAFTING MATTS in the game are tied to CONTENT rather than the CRAFTING system. When OEM/RPM first came out they would sell for 500mill per. THIS IS THE CRUX of the issue. You cannot set up a system where one group has a huge advantage over another and expect supply and demand to not FORCE INFLATION! Please BW look at the numbers. What is the most sold item on the GTN, (OEM/RPM), EVEN NOW years later selling for 80-100 mill, so YOUR system allowed HIGH END raid groups and raiding guilds to get a HUGE head start, I made 40 BILLION selling OEM's and RPM's ONLY, they are the only thing I sell, but if you run 2,3 ops a day maybe 2 hours, and you get 2 at least that's 160-200 MILL A NIGHT! The 8% SALES tax which BTW history has shown hurts the Middle class and lower class far more than the rich, it's just facts. Guys they have the numbers like EVERY NUMBER, they KNOW what is causing it and how to fix it, BUT BW NEVER admits it is wrong or that they screwed up, 

Solution: ALL CRAFTING MATTS should be in the CRAFTING missions, or even BW sets the market for ALL CRAFTING MATTS! Simple end of inflation.

Edited May 13, 2023 by Lost-Savage-XIII
I'm stupid sometimes.

[HobbesToo]

On 5/10/2023 at 1:55 PM, JoeStramaglia said:

Guild transfers are something we will be monitoring very closely. It is possible we may impose some additional restrictions in the future, however, we would like to keep guild transfers tax free.

If you don't believe this loophole won't be abused on day 1 of 7.3 you are horribly naive. 

[panterina]

I feel like you will loose a lot of players and that this changes are overkill.
A lot of people I play with that are subbed said they will quit playing if this restrictions are implemented.
Not a single multiplayer game has this much trading restrictions as you are putting in now.
It feels like you are doing this because you want more money from subs or cartel coins purchases. 
A lot of people I know  also work in a way that they trade or emial the money to guild members and those that aren't guild members when farming some items or mats.
What is the problem if I want to gift someone I know or is in my guild some credits or stims ??!! Why the taxes on that?? Makes no sense. 
You are killing the community and game with this changes.
Many guilds will fall apart and people will stop playing because of this. 
I will most likely unsub if you apply this changes. Not a single multiplayer game I played had this kind of restrictions. 
You already have so many restrictions and now this? 
Instead of focusing on content and making more events or quests, you put in more restrictions??!! 
This is so sad... Instead of making the game better you are ruining player exp with changes like this.... 

[AbsolutGrndZero]

On 5/10/2023 at 1:55 PM, JoeStramaglia said:

Hello everyone! Thank you so much for the feedback - we will be taking action on the item tax values and I’d like to go into a bit more detail here.

Some of these values were out of sync due to some data issues and some methodology issues. Originally these were based on average GTN value and a conversion based on the Cartel Market that was applied to all relevant items even if they were severely divorced from their GTN Value. There was also an issue in regards to stackable items as it was taking the average price of the stack and applying it to a single item which is not at all intended.

To more closely match the intent, we’re changing these to be based on the median GTN value and only applying the conversion for Cartel Market items that were either not in the GTN data or traded near the cap and have a value that exceeds the cap. The conversion was also adjusted based on higher volume items that have a Cartel Coin value to more accurately represent the current economic environment in trade. This should end up looking a bit more fair as the tax won’t be as subject to the potential price volatility you see in the market and the conversion only affects the rarer items or items that have a Cartel Coin value but are low volume trades.

It is worth noting that in both cases, the previous data and the current data is limited by time frame and volume to ensure we’re not putting unnecessarily high values on items that seldom sell. That means however that there will be gaps in this iteration, less items will have a tax value. When the overhaul is put into place it will be completely GTN driven minus some exceptions like the one I am going into next.

An additional aspect that we’re going to adjust here is removing item trade/mail tax for some gameplay focused items such as Medpacs, Grenades, and so on. Please let us know if you encounter any taxes that feel out of place with this new PTS. We want to get this to a place that feels correct. We’ll be monitoring this change to ensure that this is not being abused, and may re-add the tax to some of the higher value items depending on an ongoing review on past behavior.

Guild transfers are something we will be monitoring very closely. It is possible we may impose some additional restrictions in the future, however, we would like to keep guild transfers tax free. This will allow folks who play together regularly to prepare for Operations, giving things to friends, and so on.

That all said, please continue to give us feedback on these changes. I greatly appreciate your time and opinions.
 

That's still an issue.   I have been known to just GIFT stuff to new players.  I love to go to Tython and give crafted pink magenta crystals to newbie players that want a pink lightsaber.   But I have to pay money to do that now? Sorry noobs, doesn't matter how rich I am, Bioware has decided you don't get free crystals from me anymore.

Edited May 29, 2023 by AbsolutGrndZero

[Traceguy]

On 5/15/2023 at 8:04 PM, HobbesToo said:

If you don't believe this loophole won't be abused on day 1 of 7.3 you are horribly naive. 

If you think people are just going to quit a guild and join another and then quit that guild and rejoin their original one just to make 1 trade, you might as well be naïve.

You know, when you first join a guild, you have to wait until next tuesday just to contribute to Conquest. They could do the same for trades. Even if they don't the person quiting guilds left and right is shooting themselves in the foot

Edited June 9, 2023 by Traceguy

[HobbesToo]

42 minutes ago, Traceguy said:

if you think people are just going to quit a guild and join another and then quit that guild and rejoin their original one just to make 1 trade, you might as well be naïve.

Why does someone have to utilize a character that is already in a guild, according to your convoluted example?

Edited June 9, 2023 by HobbesToo

[Traceguy]

11 minutes ago, HobbesToo said:

Why does someone have to utilize a character that is already in a guild, according to your convoluted example?

Doesn't explain part 2 to my comment

[kaymedic]

Lets create some trade guilds than

[fabsus]

some guilds even use separated guilds for rewards.
it is quite easy to manage and you have everything logged.
so it is transparant for everybody.

i also think that a trade guild could work fine. organized via
discord, maybe with some mods to set the roles for trading,
that nobody could steal anything. and maybe you get a small
fee for the service. also everything is logged, you can set up
the deal in the guild chat, logged again and do the trade.

if it is common, you also would want to join the guild,
even with no actual trade; just to be prepared. with an
1 character 1 account rule, you have place for 1000ppl.
this should be more than enough to trade personally,
or with the help of a trusted player already in there. 
 

 

Edited June 12, 2023 by fabsus

[Nee-Elder]

4 hours ago, kaymedic said:

Lets create some trade guilds than

Better do it by tonite , cuz tomorrow becomes this --> https://forums.swtor.com/topic/929791-timeline-update-on-73-old-wounds/#comment-9764103

( re:  from the 7.3 patch notes -->  " Upon joining a guild, players will not have access to the guild bank until they have been in the guild for 30 days. "  )