Guild Wars 2

A lot of what I see as complaints are where people feel they are unfairly disadvantaged due to things like “market manipulation” and general monetary flow issues.

What if there was no currency in game for items on the trading post and you simply listed what you had to offer and people took what they needed to accomplish their goals? With the limited banking ability in the game, even someone attempting to horde everything would run out of space to put it (or buy more crystals to use to expand their banking options).

You would certainly get rid of the gold farmers de facto. Crafting would become relevant again as getting what you need to stock the variety of craftable goods would be painless. Certain perks, like titles for most contribution to the TP, could provide incentive to farm for others’ use or to craft for others’ needs.

What would be the necessary protections in the game to prevent griefing from people taking from the surplus simply to destroy it? What would be the next complaint from those who couldn’t get what they needed or wanted? Would an in-game economy freed from a need for cash be viable and be more desirable?

No, this sort of economy would be stupid.

What you suggest would be for a true barter system.

You see something you like, you have certain items to trade for it. The owner then accepts whether or not they’ll accept your trade.

This is the reason currency was created. Too many people wanted to sell their goods, but others weren’t offering what they needed, so trades got complicated and involved a group of people in order to get everyone what they wanted.

It would more of a headache than it’s worth. Take this example for instance.

Player 1 has Item A and wants Item B
Player 2 has Item C and wants Item D
Player 3 has Item E and wants Item F
Player 4 has Item B and wants Item C
Player 5 has Item D and wants Item E
Player 6 has Item F and wants Item A

So, for this to work….

Player 6 trades his Item F for Player 3’s Item E, then trades Item E for Player 5’s Item D, then trades Item D for Player 2’s Item C, then trades Item C for Player 4’s Item B, then trades Player 1 for Item A.

Wow!!!! That’s exhausting!!!

Instead….give everyone a universal currency. Now….Player 6 can just buy Item A that he wants from Player 1 straight away and sell his Item F to Player 3 who wants to buy it. MUCH more efficient.

^OP isn’t even proposing a barter system. He’s talking about people simply putting up items for no reward aside from “titles” and others simply taking it for free.

Ursan.7846:

^OP isn’t even proposing a barter system. He’s talking about people, simply putting up items for no reward aside from “titles” and others simply taking it for free.

Oh god!!! I totally missed that the first time through (obviously). I guess I gave the OP the benefit of the doubt that he was suggesting a barter system.

What I explained is bad…..but…..no. The OP’s idea definitely would not work.

MMO players, in general, are too selfish and without a way to flex their kitten, a game such as this would be devoid of players.

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

Charismatic Harm.9683:

The OP’s idea definitely would not work.

MMO players, in general, are too selfish and without a way to flex their kitten, a game such as this would be devoid of players.

Really? You only play to get gold?

Vol.5241:

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

How is it any more complicated? If anything, the lack of a need to compare everything to some standard currency is less complicated. What’s so rewarding about the current system? I see plenty of people complaining in this forum that suggests they don’t see it quite so rewarding.

Fikfain.5849:

Vol.5241:

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

How is it any more complicated? If anything, the lack of a need to compare everything to some standard currency is less complicated. What’s so rewarding about the current system? I see plenty of people complaining in this forum that suggests they don’t see it quite so rewarding.

The same reason why we don’t have a barter system in the real world right now. It’s hard to find people with matching needs. And it’s even harder to trade smaller value items for a very valuable item.

In the real world, what exactly would you trade me for my yacht? 5000 cows? 15 cars?

In this game, what exactly would you trade me for my Sunrise? 5000 ruby orbs? Why would I want it to do that for a measley achievement?

And I won’t comment about the people complaining here, I’ll just get infracted and banned again :\

Vol.5241:

Fikfain.5849:

Vol.5241:

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

How is it any more complicated? If anything, the lack of a need to compare everything to some standard currency is less complicated. What’s so rewarding about the current system? I see plenty of people complaining in this forum that suggests they don’t see it quite so rewarding.

The same reason why we don’t have a barter system in the real world right now. It’s hard to find people with matching needs. And it’s even harder to trade smaller value items for a very valuable item.

In the real world, what exactly would you trade me for my yacht? 5000 cows? 15 cars?

In this game, what exactly would you trade me for my Sunrise? 5000 ruby orbs? Why would I want it to do that for a measley achievement?

And I won’t comment about the people complaining here, I’ll just get infracted and banned again :\

^ Again, I’d like to point out the OP isn’t even proposing a barter system. He is proposing a system in which players put items up on the tp for “a title,” and others freely take what they need.

A barter system, while unwieldy, will still be able to set economic value on commodities. In this system, what decides who gets the rare items? What sets the market value of goods?

Fikfain.5849:

Vol.5241:

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

How is it any more complicated? If anything, the lack of a need to compare everything to some standard currency is less complicated. What’s so rewarding about the current system? I see plenty of people complaining in this forum that suggests they don’t see it quite so rewarding.

The complaints you see on the forums come from the vocal minority. There are MANY people that are extremely happy with the game, yet don’t come onto the forums to tell people so.

I am VERY happy with GW2 and enjoy playing it immensely. I do NOT play only for gold….but I do need gold in order to get some of the things I want from the game.

Are there things that could use some fixing? Sure!! Is the removal of gold as a currency one of them? No….absolutely not. Is the change to an “honor system” a necessary change? No.

As I stated before…..

MMO players, in general (this does NOT mean ALL MMO players), are selfish. Even I’m selfish as an MMO player. I have my own goals….my own desires. Those goals and desires are why we play the game. They make it fun for us.

Charismatic Harm.9683:

MMO players, in general (this does NOT mean ALL MMO players), are selfish. Even I’m selfish as an MMO player. I have my own goals….my own desires. Those goals and desires are why we play the game. They make it fun for us.

So, your problem is that there’s no incentive to be the supplier? I think people get plenty of things they neither need or want as they play this game. Giving them a “trash can” as part of the interface that basically goes to the TP instead would probably provide more than enough for everyone else to get what they need from those “discards”. But more incentive than in-game recognition might be in order. I’m sure someone interested in being imaginative could come up with something.

Ursan.7846:

Vol.5241:

Fikfain.5849:

Vol.5241:

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

How is it any more complicated? If anything, the lack of a need to compare everything to some standard currency is less complicated. What’s so rewarding about the current system? I see plenty of people complaining in this forum that suggests they don’t see it quite so rewarding.

The same reason why we don’t have a barter system in the real world right now. It’s hard to find people with matching needs. And it’s even harder to trade smaller value items for a very valuable item.

In the real world, what exactly would you trade me for my yacht? 5000 cows? 15 cars?

In this game, what exactly would you trade me for my Sunrise? 5000 ruby orbs? Why would I want it to do that for a measley achievement?

And I won’t comment about the people complaining here, I’ll just get infracted and banned again :\

^ Again, I’d like to point out the OP isn’t even proposing a barter system. He is proposing a system in which players put items up on the tp for “a title,” and others freely take what they need.

A barter system, while unwieldy, will still be able to set economic value on commodities. In this system, what decides who gets the rare items? What sets the market value of goods?

Rarity is first-come, first-serve. You would probably need to make some things, like pre-cursors, into “one per character” or something to prevent griefing via hoarding. Market value is meaningless without a currency to base it on. The programmers would simply need to balance drop rates with usage/destruction rates such that they were happy with how much/how often things were showing up on the TP.

I’d go for it, just because I like unique monetary systems: not having money at all is certainly a unique one.

Ursan.7846:

Vol.5241:

Fikfain.5849:

Vol.5241:

Your system is too complicated and unrewarding.

The current gold system is fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having currencies.

How is it any more complicated? If anything, the lack of a need to compare everything to some standard currency is less complicated. What’s so rewarding about the current system? I see plenty of people complaining in this forum that suggests they don’t see it quite so rewarding.

The same reason why we don’t have a barter system in the real world right now. It’s hard to find people with matching needs. And it’s even harder to trade smaller value items for a very valuable item.

In the real world, what exactly would you trade me for my yacht? 5000 cows? 15 cars?

In this game, what exactly would you trade me for my Sunrise? 5000 ruby orbs? Why would I want it to do that for a measley achievement?

And I won’t comment about the people complaining here, I’ll just get infracted and banned again :\

^ Again, I’d like to point out the OP isn’t even proposing a barter system. He is proposing a system in which players put items up on the tp for “a title,” and others freely take what they need.

A barter system, while unwieldy, will still be able to set economic value on commodities. In this system, what decides who gets the rare items? What sets the market value of goods?

So you are saying that if someone wants to get rid of their item they will just put it up on TP and anyone that wants it can get it for free? It is hard to find nice people that would do something like that because there will always be someone in the community that wants to hoard everything and not share with anyone else. I’m okay with the current system. It is not as bad as real life where you have to have money to live whether you like it or not (which pretty much sucks). Just like the quote: “There is no such thing as free lunch.”

All other issues aside this would fail unless they also remove all possible ability to trade between characters. This would include guild storage. Without removing those it just turn into a bartering system and people spamming WTB/WTS/WTT in LA.

Your proposal is an inconvenient system which provides the most benefits to people who want to get things without doing any work.

People already give away things they don’t need/want except it’s generally restricted to friends or people they know are genuinely in need of these things.

Why not go a step further? Without a currency you wouldn’t need the TP. Just have a NPC at each major town where you can collect the materials you need. We could add another one where you could choose the weapon you desire, and a third one where you could get the armor you fancy. We could have extra special armor that would only be obtainable just outside the dungeons.
In guild wars 1 I lost count of the amount of rare skins that went straight to the vendor cause I refused to stand in Kaineng shouting WTS XYZ. The best thing they included in GW2 was the TP. I can sell my unwanted stuff quickly, and can get stuff I need imediately. I benefit as a buyer and as a seller.

This is probably tangential to the topic, but there is a free mmorpg out there that does not have your standard currency system. It’s called Path of Exile. And my god buying/selling things on that game is horrendous.

Butter would become the new currency.
People will always find a new way

Well, that would get rid of the majority of the gold spammers/farmers =D

Elektrohund.5086:

Butter would become the new currency.
People will always find a new way

Level 1 helmets are the new bottlecaps.

eisberg.2379:

Well, that would get rid of the majority of the gold spammers/farmers =D

Perfectly true. If you get rid of most of the game’s players… by extension…