Inflation

Inflation

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Posted by: Marndeis.7815

Marndeis.7815

I want to start off by making it known I’m not trying to complain, this is more of a questions.

I am a casual player…. I get maybe 5-10 hours a week and I try and be efficient but I know that my logged hours are low compared to an ACTIVE player. I remember how long it took me to get my first gold and yet now that I have around 200g in my bank, I somehow feel MORE POOR than when I had just 1g.

I realize that ANET is trying to leave the economy alone as much as possible but due to past gold farm events and the evolution of the Economy as a means to make money, inflation has gone off the deep end with far to much infusion of gold INTO the game and not enough gold sinks to bring it back out of the economy. I read the new patch notes and I guess there is a LITTLE gold sink content coming but it seems not enough to stabilize the future of the economy.

My Question is, has ANET officially (or unofficially) posted about ways its trying to remove gold from the game or are we doomed to see 10k gold Legendays in the next few months.

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Posted by: Vol.7601

Vol.7601

There is a difference between price inflation and demand inflation.

The former is the one economists should concern themselves about. The latter not so much.

The latter is the case in this game, and it’s not a concern.

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Posted by: Trice.4598

Trice.4598

To be fair I think Anet is making a great job at keeping the market stable.
Even with all the change they made to “farm’able spot” in the first 3-6 months of a game, inflation is normal, but if you look at GW2 in the last year, price haven’t changed that much.

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Posted by: Illconceived Was Na.9781

Illconceived Was Na.9781

The biggest gold sink in the game is the 15% the TP takes from sellers. That’s among the reasons the GW2 economy is relatively stable.

If you look at highly coveted skins (and materials required to make them), you’ll see price spikes. But if you look at bread & butter items (no pun intended), there’s mostly only gradual increases.

As a game matures, there are more people joining and earning wealth, many who have less and less to spend on. That means big coin reserves, which they can plunk down more indiscriminately, thus raising the gold value on precursors, BL Weapon Skins, and gems.

The price of precursors spiked a lot when the wardrobe was announced: that created an artificial and suddenly increase in demand, since the skin could be re-used on any character (and on any future weapons). Unless there’s some other calamitous event like that, we’ll continue to see gradual increases in prices. And many items have dropped drastically in price, depending on other factors.

BTW If you make a custom offer now, you can probably get some of the precursors for pre-Wardrobe prices — I put in a bid for The Legend in late May for the price I wanted to spend in February (but couldn’t afford) — I got it, even though I’ve never actually seen the other buy offers dip that low on the TP (or on Spidy and other such sites).

John Smith: “you should kill monsters, because killing monsters is awesome.”

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Posted by: Duke Nukem.6783

Duke Nukem.6783

im always in favor of more gold sinks….how about a skill that lets us build our own instanced house that takes TONS of materials to build rooms filled with chairs and furniture and bookcases that give tomes of knowledge once per day and giant marble fireplaces that i can throw more logs into to get buffs for myself and an in house combat arena for dueling and armor/weapon stands to sink all ur weapon sets into so you dont immediatley throw them into the exchange. and a dungeon where you could buy monsters to keep down there for combat events with your friends…..all of this would be SUPER EXPENSIVE of course….

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Posted by: Nusku.3941

Nusku.3941

To be fair I think Anet is making a great job at keeping the market stable.
Even with all the change they made to “farm’able spot” in the first 3-6 months of a game, inflation is normal, but if you look at GW2 in the last year, price haven’t changed that much.

Are you crazy? Nobody wants to forge for a precursor, and that significantly impacted a huge money making method, now the only thing left to do is flip, and that takes god awfully long.

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Posted by: Trice.4598

Trice.4598

To be fair I think Anet is making a great job at keeping the market stable.
Even with all the change they made to “farm’able spot” in the first 3-6 months of a game, inflation is normal, but if you look at GW2 in the last year, price haven’t changed that much.

Are you crazy? Nobody wants to forge for a precursor, and that significantly impacted a huge money making method, now the only thing left to do is flip, and that takes god awfully long.

That’s not what I meant, I meant Dusk was 800 gold 1 year ago, it’s 1000 gold now, and I average about the same amount of gold per day as I did 1 year ago, but I mostly do dungeon.

But I see your point and I hope Anet change their mind on “farming” as it is the part I enjoy about MMO.

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Posted by: Behellagh.1468

Behellagh.1468

I average two to three gold a day and I don’t do dungeons, boss trains, farm or play the TP. This is from going around killing things and selling their drops. What are you doing so wrong Trice?

We are heroes. This is what we do!

RIP City of Heroes

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Posted by: Trice.4598

Trice.4598

I average two to three gold a day and I don’t do dungeons, boss trains, farm or play the TP. This is from going around killing things and selling their drops. What are you doing so wrong Trice?

I make 50-75 gold just from my PvE content, just like I made last year even with all the nerf, and market price are about the same for most of the things.

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Posted by: LordByron.8369

LordByron.8369

No prices are not the same.
-T6 skyrocketed
-Ecto increased
-Precursors increased by a lot (crashed recently when unbinding was datamined and many 1h precursors magically appeared in the TP).
-T5 are possibly highest than ever were.
-Runes and sigils are extremely expensive

That makes basically 99% of top traded items by most players.

PvE nerfs reduced materials supply, not gold.

What i like the most is i hear economy complaints in game every few minutes in possibly any chat.
That means this broken system can’t go on like this for much longer, despite whatever you’ll say.

GW2 balance:
A PvE player is supposed to avoid a 1-2 second 1 shotting aoe.
A WWW player is considered uncapable of avoiding a 5,75 second aoe for half his health.

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Posted by: Wanze.8410

Wanze.8410

What i like the most is i hear economy complaints in game every few minutes in possibly any chat.
That means this broken system can’t go on like this for much longer, despite whatever you’ll say.

So are you saying the TP is breaking down soon?

Tin Foil [HATS]-Hardcore BLTC-PvP Guild
Bloin – Running around, tagging Keeps, getting whack on Scoobie Snacks.

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Posted by: LordByron.8369

LordByron.8369

I m saying that despite all you might say here, despite all the data that cannot be shown, despite all economists and stuff:

Something will change once the population start dropping enough or if devs are smart, once they start noticing the evident discontent of non tp players.

Sometimes ago, most players simply ignored the cause and just complained about the grind.
Now most of them start seeing what is the cause of unnecessary grind.

GW2 balance:
A PvE player is supposed to avoid a 1-2 second 1 shotting aoe.
A WWW player is considered uncapable of avoiding a 5,75 second aoe for half his health.

(edited by LordByron.8369)

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Posted by: Trice.4598

Trice.4598

No prices are not the same.
-T6 skyrocketed
-Ecto increased
-Precursors increased by a lot (crashed recently when unbinding was datamined and many 1h precursors magically appeared in the TP).
-T5 are possibly highest than ever were.
-Runes and sigils are extremely expensive

That makes basically 99% of top traded items by most players.

PvE nerfs reduced materials supply, not gold.

What i like the most is i hear economy complaints in game every few minutes in possibly any chat.
That means this broken system can’t go on like this for much longer, despite whatever you’ll say.

Lol, T6’s Skyrocketed? some of them were ridiculously cheap, Anet fixed it but getting them to the same level of the other T6s, Blood were 35-40 silvers really early in the game, they are 45 – 55 silver now. some fo them went from 20 to 30 I don’t call that skyrocket. Don’t forget that early in the game, only a small portion of players were actually aiming for legendaries, now everyone is, which explain the demand for T6.

T5 went from 1.5s to 2.1s, it’s an expected increase with T6’s increases.

Rune and sigil have always been extremely expensive, 18 months ago I bought rune of divinity for 12 gold, and bloodlust for 7 gold.

Of course price have increase what I’m saying is it’s pretty stable for a mmo, and PvE nerf affected both Material supply and Gold ( champs bag going from 10+ silvers to 1 silver )

There only thing wrong right now in the game is the prestige item extreme RNG.

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Posted by: Ensign.2189

Ensign.2189

The biggest gold sink in the game is the 15% the TP takes from sellers. That’s among the reasons the GW2 economy is relatively stable.

The 15% TP fee and equipment binding do all the heavy lifting; everything else is fluff.

Prices get shocked by patches, and we get spells of inflation and deflation as farming and spending patterns change, but there’s no background inflation or deflation; in the long run aggregates are flat, if noisy.

The price of precursors spiked a lot when the wardrobe was announced: that created an artificial and suddenly increase in demand, since the skin could be re-used on any character (and on any future weapons).

There’s nothing artificial about increased precursor demand due to the wardrobe – it was a very real increase in demand from increased utility that we have every reason to believe is permanent.

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Posted by: Shufflepants.9785

Shufflepants.9785

Repeat after me:
“Inflation is a measure of overall buying power of a currency and is not measured by the cost of a single good but is measured based on an average over an entire economy including every item”.

If one item goes up in price, that doesn’t mean anything as far as inflation is concerned.
If virtually everything costs more, then you have inflation.
If you think this definition isn’t what you were talking about, then you weren’t talking about inflation, you were talking about something else.

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Posted by: Wanze.8410

Wanze.8410

I m saying that despite all you might say here, despite all the data that cannot be shown, despite all economists and stuff:

Something will change once the population start dropping enough or if devs are smart, once they start noticing the evident discontent of non tp players.

Sometimes ago, most players simply ignored the cause and just complained about the grind.
Now most of them start seeing what is the cause of unnecessary grind.

You keep saying that for over a year now. And the economy is constantly changing.

Tin Foil [HATS]-Hardcore BLTC-PvP Guild
Bloin – Running around, tagging Keeps, getting whack on Scoobie Snacks.

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Posted by: LordByron.8369

LordByron.8369

Repeat after me:
“Inflation is a measure of overall buying power of a currency and is not measured by the cost of a single good but is measured based on an average over an entire economy including every item”.

If one item goes up in price, that doesn’t mean anything as far as inflation is concerned.
If virtually everything costs more, then you have inflation.
If you think this definition isn’t what you were talking about, then you weren’t talking about inflation, you were talking about something else.

You are wrong.
There are some reasons why inflation coesn t take in account value of alpacas in France.

For the same reason should not take in account all the stuff that has almost no (real) demand.

While T6, Precursors, lodestones, gems, etc etc etc should be the best indicators.

@Wanze… i won t answer since i don t find most of your comments “useful”.

GW2 balance:
A PvE player is supposed to avoid a 1-2 second 1 shotting aoe.
A WWW player is considered uncapable of avoiding a 5,75 second aoe for half his health.

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Posted by: John Smith.4610

John Smith.4610

Next

You are wrong.
There are some reasons why inflation coesn t take in account value of alpacas in France.

For the same reason should not take in account all the stuff that has almost no (real) demand.

While T6, Precursors, lodestones, gems, etc etc etc should be the best indicators.

@Wanze… i won t answer since i don t find most of your comments “useful”.

First off, there is a huge amount of demand for alpacas, they’re pretty awesome.

Short and sweet:
If you think inflation is a major issue in Guild Wars 2, you should do more research on MMO economies and general economics.

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Posted by: pdavis.8031

pdavis.8031

^^^

OH snap!

“You know what the chain of command is?
It’s the chain I beat you with until you
recognize my command!”

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Posted by: Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

I think I just witnessed a John Smith “cold burn” in real time. It was magnificent. AND a pdavis Oh snap! in real time. Amazing.

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Posted by: pdavis.8031

pdavis.8031

I think I just witnessed a John Smith “cold burn” in real time. It was magnificent. AND a pdavis Oh snap! in real time. Amazing.

Thats awesome!

“You know what the chain of command is?
It’s the chain I beat you with until you
recognize my command!”

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Posted by: Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

On a side note I have no knowledge of economics or how economies work beyond a lay person “supply and demand” view.

But from what I’ve seen on here:

Highly useful/ sought after items are raising in price reflecting the higher volume of people who require them.

Less useful/ unwanted are low in price due to their over abundance that stems from no body wanting/ finding a use for them.

In regards to the earlier post by Byron, yeah runes / sigils are expensive. CERTAIN runes, and CERTAIN, sigils are expensive. I can buy a whole set of 6 Superior quality runes for less than 20s. It may not be the one set to rule them all but I can use them to make a build on the cheap.
That certain runes/ sigils are more expensive is again just an indication that the demand for said runes/ sigils is higher than say Superior Rune of Gives Your Enemy Full HP. The perceived rareness IMHO comes from the higher number of people pulling from that market.

I fail to see how this is indicative of a market in decline. Certainly I don’t believe that precursors should be as high as they are now, but at the same time its also understandable.

Tl;DR: I wish Prec were a kitteneaper or more attainable but I understand why they are the way they are. Things people need will always be more expensive then things they don’t want. Rarity" in this game is a perception that stems from the amount of people demanding an item, certain items feel more “rare” because more people pull them from the TP and the economy where as others seem more “common” because people don’t want them and they just pool on the TP for ages.

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Posted by: KOPPER.1458

KOPPER.1458

And certain items are rare because AN has made them so.

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Posted by: silvermember.8941

silvermember.8941

And certain items are rare because AN has made them so.

And your point being?

As u know im pro. ~Tomonobu Itagaki

This is an mmo forum, if someone isn’t whining chances are the game is dead.

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Posted by: Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

im always in favor of more gold sinks….how about a skill that lets us build our own instanced house that takes TONS of materials to build rooms filled with chairs and furniture and bookcases that give tomes of knowledge once per day and giant marble fireplaces that i can throw more logs into to get buffs for myself and an in house combat arena for dueling and armor/weapon stands to sink all ur weapon sets into so you dont immediatley throw them into the exchange. and a dungeon where you could buy monsters to keep down there for combat events with your friends…..all of this would be SUPER EXPENSIVE of course….

Okay I missed this freiken beautiful post. I’m sorry Duke. I missed it:(. Anyway.
Totes would buy stupid kitten extra crafting license for a new crafting ability for making housing structures. Would carry on main toon ALL the time.

We have the materials! Even if it was just an npc that charged Gold/ Mats for parts or plans for housing I would die for it. That being said I would LOVE to be a carpenter in GW2. Hell you could even charge Taxes on your land depending on the number of nifty things you have in it. Taxes for luxury items like buff fires/ crafting areas etc would be logical and a gold sink. Don’t pay your taxes ? Just can’t access your stuff till you do. I can’t even put into words how great this would be, would give bored players something to do besides hunt mats for a legendary.

Mats would have more uses, certain would could have certain textures giving them a market to increase demand based on something other than levels and stats. Same for metals/ precious metals and gems etc. Just UGH! Do. Do now.

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Posted by: Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

And certain items are rare because AN has made them so.

Yea, but with a global market the rarity of an item is almost a moot point. yeah there will be less rare items floating around for anyone to just pick up, but if NOONE wanted Precs for legendaries, if we all were just happy with Exotic Wars 2, they wouldn’t be so kitten ed expensive. They’re expensive because they sell for that much frequently enough to warrant putting them up at that price. I used to hate this games economy because of all the rich people I saw and I thought my Legendary would just be legend. But theres so many ways to make gold its silly, you just have to put things people want in their hands and they’ll shovel gold at you.

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Posted by: KOPPER.1458

KOPPER.1458

And your point being?

Be less defensive. There isn’t always a point to be made but rather an observation.

you just have to put things people want in their hands and they’ll shovel gold at you.

And to be fair you don’t even have to do that…

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Posted by: laokoko.7403

laokoko.7403

I honestly don’t know that much about economic or do I care.

All I know is I need to farm much more to get the things I want.

Many people probably felt the same way, that is why they are complaining.

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Posted by: Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

And your point being?

Be less defensive. There isn’t always a point to be made but rather an observation.

you just have to put things people want in their hands and they’ll shovel gold at you.

And to be fair you don’t even have to do that…

You’re right! The TP does all the hand putting inning for me. I’m just saying, theres a market for a lot of things out there, knowledge lead to gold in this game, and sometimes loss, but mostly gold, except when you’re wrong. But yeah I get Anet determines the rarity of an item. If you put in 2 oranges a lemon and some dust in the forge and it rained Eternities 2 things would happen:
1. A lot of people would cry
2. A lot of people who have high account wealth would take a sharp kick to the nuts and then they would cry.

bonus 2. A lot of people would likely die, as that is a large sword and umbrellas can not save you from them.

Anywhosels, I think the economy is fairly healthy atm, things that are rare are justifiably rare, and when they’re not they get a tweak in the right direction.

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Posted by: Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

Ve Salu Sigtyr.4807

I honestly don’t know that much about economic or do I care.

All I know is I need to farm much more to get the things I want.

Many people probably felt the same way, that is why they are complaining.

Farming is kinda moot here, I mean it can be done but its a moot point with a global loot table. Unless you mean just farm gold and buy. I just highly don’t recommend only farming or only grinding, break it up, or it’ll kill your funnies

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Posted by: laokoko.7403

laokoko.7403

I honestly don’t know that much about economic or do I care.

All I know is I need to farm much more to get the things I want.

Many people probably felt the same way, that is why they are complaining.

Farming is kinda moot here, I mean it can be done but its a moot point with a global loot table. Unless you mean just farm gold and buy. I just highly don’t recommend only farming or only grinding, break it up, or it’ll kill your funnies

That is very deep talk. I remember my guildmate trying to introducing the game to new people. And he says “Oh there is no grind in this game, just alot of farming”.

Anyway, I hardly ever farm any more. After giving up legendary, I really don’t need to farm that much, all I want is new character or bag slot so I’m fine for now.

Good thing I did all my farming 1 year ago, when things are still cheap.

(edited by laokoko.7403)

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Posted by: KOPPER.1458

KOPPER.1458

I was referring to farming and playing the game in general giving you tons of gold. But you point is valid.

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Posted by: laokoko.7403

laokoko.7403

I was referring to farming and playing the game in general giving you tons of gold. But you point is valid.

I’m doing map completion on my 17th character. And I can say I don’t get tons of gold.

Maybe I should start crafting legendary to sell.

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Posted by: KOPPER.1458

KOPPER.1458

doing map completion is only one aspect of the game, in order to make gold you need to do more than just that. That being said materials you get per zone completion can be very profitable. Are you farming as you go along? I’ve made plenty in this way.

Crafting legendaries to sell is very profitable, as much as that makes my skin crawl.

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Posted by: laokoko.7403

laokoko.7403

nah I’m not poor. I just did enough cof path 1 and AC13, I don’t want to do it any more.

Just saying people probably complain, because it takes longer for them to get the things they want because things are more expensive.

I look at the price of permanent bank license, and glad I bought it 1 year ago.

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Posted by: tolunart.2095

tolunart.2095

I think I just witnessed a John Smith “cold burn” in real time. It was magnificent. AND a pdavis Oh snap! in real time. Amazing.

This is the kind of thing that makes me wish I had grandkids, so I can tell them about it.

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Posted by: Rouven.7409

Rouven.7409

Invest in alpacas, got it – thanks John!

“Whose Kitten is this?” – “It’s a Charr baby.”
“Whose Charr is this?”- “Ted’s.”
“Who’s Ted?”- “Ted’s dead, baby. Ted’s dead.”

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Posted by: tolunart.2095

tolunart.2095

I honestly don’t know that much about economic or do I care.

All I know is I need to farm much more to get the things I want.

Many people probably felt the same way, that is why they are complaining.

Actually playing the game (aka moving from zone to zone, trying different content once in a while, doing things you enjoy) has the same effect (the accumulation of coin and items you can sell for coin) with two important benefits:

1: This is not subject to Anet’s diminishing returns because you are not doing the same thing or staying in the same place very long.

2: It’s a lot more fun.

I suggest trying it sometime.

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Posted by: laokoko.7403

laokoko.7403

I honestly don’t know that much about economic or do I care.

All I know is I need to farm much more to get the things I want.

Many people probably felt the same way, that is why they are complaining.

Actually playing the game (aka moving from zone to zone, trying different content once in a while, doing things you enjoy) has the same effect (the accumulation of coin and items you can sell for coin) with two important benefits:

1: This is not subject to Anet’s diminishing returns because you are not doing the same thing or staying in the same place very long.

2: It’s a lot more fun.

I suggest trying it sometime.

oh ya thanks. why do you think I only do map completion now. Because I’m moving zone to zone.

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Posted by: Bombsaway.7198

Bombsaway.7198

John:

Let me respectfully call you out on your answer as being well intentioned but IMHO misguided. Without getting into a credentialing match, I think both of us have had our share of economics, analytics and theoretical modeling. I am shall we say amazed by your answer.

I struggle with your answers as if somehow an MMO can be looked at as an economy when there are no actual limitations (you can simply change them on a moment’s notice by whatever delta of change your choose). Hence, the economy is less economic and more of a loyalty tool (a sophisticated CRM if you will).

Indeed, CRM/loyalty is the only purpose of that “economy”.

This is why I find your posts utterly frustrating, because they warp the economics of a real resource constrained system with a game that has no such restrictions. In doing so, you focus on somewhat senseless charts versus gamer expectation, perception and ultimately interest which is a far better measure of if the “economy” is working.

In short, this quest for “efficiency” is meaningless despite its “correlation” to economic theory IF it doesn’t accomplish the goal of loyalty/fun/name it what you will. The only thing the economic model can do (if well marketed) is create a “sense” of fairness.

The perception of inflation is more important than the reality in an MMO. The segmentation of that perception of inflation if it leads to a frustration or a “I can’t progress” attitude won’t change because your charts say it is wrong. The net result is the same.

If the goal is to create a sense or perception of fairness, but increasingly there is a trouble or “sense” that the “economy” is “off” even if only to one or more key customer segmentations, the mission is a failure despite pie charts and line graphs.

You keep trying to prove things are not as they seem to the customer. I wish you would quit telling posters to “learn economics”. Trust someone who clearly has, you are chasing the wrong issue. You are using an unfamiliar language to most of your consumers of the game to mask a very simple consumer issue:

To many it simply feels, right or wrong, that the economy is “boxing them out”. “Proof” is not going to replace the need to fix the perception. I dare say the customer and OP is far more “right” than you are. In an MMO, it matters not if you are economically disenfranchised, it only matters if you feel disenfranchised.

In short, I would be very hesitant to jump in and alter the conversation that the OP had. The value is the discussion over whether the “economy” “feels fair or different” rather than overwhelming the poor OP telling him to learn economics which may truly stifle the very conversation as a consumerologist I would suggest ANET would definitely want.

You mean well. I hope you realize I do too with this post.

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Posted by: John Smith.4610

Previous

John Smith.4610

I very much don’t agree with several of the concepts you’ve posted here. Overall though, remember the medium and that “proof” is more to show evidence that a biased sample doesn’t necessarily represent the entirety of the population.

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Posted by: Smooth Penguin.5294

Smooth Penguin.5294

~~~snip ~~~

To be fair, it’s not John’s job to teach players how virtual MMO economies work. Just like it’s not any Anet Dev’s job to teach players how to be good at WvW or SPvP. These skills are self taught, through trail and error, or studying guides and videos.

In GW2, Trading Post plays you!

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Posted by: laokoko.7403

laokoko.7403

I dont’ know how anyone can write an essay base on John Smith one or two sentence reply.

Because quite honestly most of the time I have no idea what he’s talking about base on his one or two sentence reply.

I believe most economy do have inflation, but at the same time, people’s salary kept on rising. I think I can earn more money now in GW2 compare to before. But the rate of price going up far exceeding the earning capacity, especially Anet kept on nerfing good ways to earn money.

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Posted by: serapheles.5409

serapheles.5409

So a number of people feel the economy is off (I feel t6 prices are rising a bit faster than ideal, due to the champ train nerfs, but otherwise I think things are about where I would expect). Does anyone have a suggestion to ‘fix’ it?
(The house creation system is noted).

The Random Number Gods are nothing if not predictable.
Crafting is designed for gear accessibility, not profit.

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Posted by: Smooth Penguin.5294

Smooth Penguin.5294

If Anet allows way too profitable farms to exist, the value of the currency will drop. Take a look at D3, and how poor their economy was. Money was too abundant, and in turn, made it near worthless on the market. So while I can’t make as much money anymore, I can forgive them for stealing my farms.

In GW2, Trading Post plays you!

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Posted by: eekzie.5640

eekzie.5640

~Snip~

I remember in the beginning of the game people were complaining about precursors being way too expensive. 50 – 100 gold for one. It was an unrealistic goal and pretty much everything you summed up applied back then as it does now.

Certain things were easier to obtain, not only because there was less demand but because of them being too easy to farm or too little use for them.
For instance, the T6 materials are now used for account bound legendaries.
Ascended items are now also account bound.
Thus, people have way more incentive to go for them. Thus increasing the demand after the supply has been put on a fair place. This is simply just a swing in the supply/demand curve. Not that there’s too much money coming into the game.
Same thing applies for precursors.

Like John said, it is much more your personal perspective rather than a wide perspective by everyone in the game. As he also said, this is what the charts also indicate.

Inflation

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Posted by: eithinan.9841

eithinan.9841

If Anet allows way too profitable farms to exist, the value of the currency will drop. Take a look at D3, and how poor their economy was. Money was too abundant, and in turn, made it near worthless on the market. So while I can’t make as much money anymore, I can forgive them for stealing my farms.

Do you remember the D2 “Eye of Jordan” ring based economy. lawl

Inflation

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Posted by: Wanze.8410

Wanze.8410

In short, I would be very hesitant to jump in and alter the conversation that the OP had. The value is the discussion over whether the “economy” “feels fair or different” rather than overwhelming the poor OP telling him to learn economics which may truly stifle the very conversation as a consumerologist I would suggest ANET would definitely want.

You mean well. I hope you realize I do too with this post.

John didnt respond to the OP but to another user who argued that only prices for “in demand items” should be used as an indicator for inflation.

Tin Foil [HATS]-Hardcore BLTC-PvP Guild
Bloin – Running around, tagging Keeps, getting whack on Scoobie Snacks.

Inflation

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Posted by: Southern.8973

Southern.8973

I honestly don’t know that much about economic or do I care.

All I know is I need to farm much more to get the things I want.

Many people probably felt the same way, that is why they are complaining.

Actually playing the game (aka moving from zone to zone, trying different content once in a while, doing things you enjoy) has the same effect (the accumulation of coin and items you can sell for coin) with two important benefits:

1: This is not subject to Anet’s diminishing returns because you are not doing the same thing or staying in the same place very long.

2: It’s a lot more fun.

I suggest trying it sometime.

Tol,

You do realize that no 2 people are alike, right?

Some people love to PvP.
Some people hate to PvP.
Some people love WvW.
Some people hate WvW.
Some people love map completion.
Some people hate map completion (especially for the 10th time).
Some people love dungeons.
Some people hate dungeons.
Some people hate to farm.
Some people LOVE to farm.

And the list could go on, and on, and on.

But that’s right – some people actually LOVE to farm. Just like some people love to fish and some people can’t stand it because you sit in 1 place for 6 hours and cast that pole 2,000 times. And there’s not a darn thing wrong with that, as long as that’s what the person enjoys doing. Just because you might think “playing the game” involves playing it exactly the way YOU want to doesn’t make your opinion any more valid than someone else’s who might want to “Play the game” an entirely different way.

Inflation

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Posted by: Essence Snow.3194

Essence Snow.3194

John:

Let me respectfully call you out on your answer as being well intentioned but IMHO misguided. Without getting into a credentialing match, I think both of us have had our share of economics, analytics and theoretical modeling. I am shall we say amazed by your answer.

I struggle with your answers as if somehow an MMO can be looked at as an economy when there are no actual limitations (you can simply change them on a moment’s notice by whatever delta of change your choose). Hence, the economy is less economic and more of a loyalty tool (a sophisticated CRM if you will).

Indeed, CRM/loyalty is the only purpose of that “economy”.

This is why I find your posts utterly frustrating, because they warp the economics of a real resource constrained system with a game that has no such restrictions. In doing so, you focus on somewhat senseless charts versus gamer expectation, perception and ultimately interest which is a far better measure of if the “economy” is working.

In short, this quest for “efficiency” is meaningless despite its “correlation” to economic theory IF it doesn’t accomplish the goal of loyalty/fun/name it what you will. The only thing the economic model can do (if well marketed) is create a “sense” of fairness.

The perception of inflation is more important than the reality in an MMO. The segmentation of that perception of inflation if it leads to a frustration or a “I can’t progress” attitude won’t change because your charts say it is wrong. The net result is the same.

If the goal is to create a sense or perception of fairness, but increasingly there is a trouble or “sense” that the “economy” is “off” even if only to one or more key customer segmentations, the mission is a failure despite pie charts and line graphs.

You keep trying to prove things are not as they seem to the customer. I wish you would quit telling posters to “learn economics”. Trust someone who clearly has, you are chasing the wrong issue. You are using an unfamiliar language to most of your consumers of the game to mask a very simple consumer issue:

To many it simply feels, right or wrong, that the economy is “boxing them out”. “Proof” is not going to replace the need to fix the perception. I dare say the customer and OP is far more “right” than you are. In an MMO, it matters not if you are economically disenfranchised, it only matters if you feel disenfranchised.

In short, I would be very hesitant to jump in and alter the conversation that the OP had. The value is the discussion over whether the “economy” “feels fair or different” rather than overwhelming the poor OP telling him to learn economics which may truly stifle the very conversation as a consumerologist I would suggest ANET would definitely want.

You mean well. I hope you realize I do too with this post.

Spot on.

Unfortunately JS’s reply shows precisely why this is so accurate.

Serenity now~Insanity later