Guild Wars 2

Its been said that the evidence of a thriving economy is a healthy middle class.

So where do you think the socioeconomic levels in our gaming population are?

Something like this?

0-75g – poor
76-500g – middle class
501g+ rich

I realize there are some generalizations and oversimplifications being made here given terms like “poor” IRL are used to describe folks barely making ends meet, but even folks considered “rich” can live paycheck to paycheck. For the sake of the gaming world, lets consider poor as being barely able to afford exotics, middle class to be able to get everything they need and a few really nice things and the rich being able to afford the best things in game. For material purposes, because most folks gauge wealth beyond liquid assets, we can say property poor have few assets, middle class have a good mix of most things and property rich have to buy collection expanders, bank slots and mule character bag slots to hold all their assets.

Right now, I’m money poor and property middle, but I had some fun purchases and general disagreements with Zoromos on the definition of what a reasonable return on investment is.

From the feedback I’ve read in game and seen online, a lot of folks seem poor due to a general lack of, what they consider, a fun/rewarding endgame (aka – the level of effort required to make money outstrips their tolerance for grinding content to earn it). A smaller group of “middles” seem to have a good amount of time to invest in the game every day and know a few of the tricks to making it big (win some lose some). The tiny group of wealthy seem to either have the most time in game to do things, the most friends willing to do those things with (that require groups, like dungeons) and have used their wealth to make more wealth, taking advantage of most every trick in game they can get away with.

Does this seem about right to you, or would you draw the lines differently? Would you draw these lines about the same in WoW (PvE endgame with many varied group and solo options for money making), or would you consider this closer to EvE (resembling a real world market-so focus on where the money is and shutup)? Do you think someone playing PvP or WvW all day should have the same gains as a dungeon runner? Do you believe that Anet should take a different approach to money making in game so that more people can afford more things while playing end game focused content, or do you believe this will just lower the value of currency and cause inflation?

Oh and I enjoy a good flame war as much as the next guy, but lets please keep this economical… be frugal with your hate and don’t waste it here. (note: There’s a guy three threads down that posted something personally revealing about your mom and then kicked a box of kittens…. and I don’t think he’s your dad. You might want to see to that…)

Too much of the game is based on the trading post. It focuses the game around gold acquisition vs adventuring. Imo it is the worst aspect of the game.

super rich: 100000g+
rich : 10000g-100000g
middle : 1000g-10000g
poor: 0-1000g

Essence Snow.3194:

Too much of the game is based on the trading post. It focuses the game around gold acquisition vs adventuring. Imo it is the worst aspect of the game.

This^^

Also, @OP: I think you severely underestimate the amount of gold some people have.

Some people are playing just to get gold; like a high score in pacman. I can assure you that gold in GW2 has an intrinsic value of zero.

Everything in GW2 is property of Arenanet. You own nothing.

The hot new business model in today’s games is making them grindy. So much so that some people would be willing to pay real money to reduce the time it takes to grind.

Imagine that. Make your game suck so bad and so boring that you give your players a convenience option in exchange for money.

…and it works.

Essence Snow.3194:

Too much of the game is based on the trading post. It focuses the game around gold acquisition vs adventuring. Imo it is the worst aspect of the game.

I tend to agree. I would also agree that games basing their economies off Real World™ economics are probably asking for trouble, given the fact so many folks IRL have tried to regulate the “human nature” out of their economies end up either stifling people’s abilities to use it as intended or succumbing to its deliciously forbidden natural fruit flavor.

super rich: 100000g+
rich : 10000g-100000g
middle : 1000g-10000g
poor: 0-1000g

oohkay…. by that comparison most of the American middle class are multi-millionaires. Don’t think we’re quite there yet… but…. If lets say… 80% of each server populations had about 5000g total earned over their time played, I would probably be more inclined to agree with you. That’s… not even close… at least from what I can tell on my server. You can blame folks for laziness or being casual or whatever, but… its just a game. A casual gamer will never make what a casual lifer will, but in a game with very little vertical progression, should the gap be quite this big?

This^^
Also, @OP: I think you severely underestimate the amount of gold some people have.

You are probably correct about my underestimation, but in the same right, a handful of people owning 90% of the wealth in game wouldn’t “bump up” the middle class, which is defined more by a sated “middle ground”, where folks are able to have more than enough for most things without having everything they ever wanted. If your middle class is just the ‘median earners’ and its only twice the number of people as the super rich, that isn’t exactly “thriving”.

Here’s a good example of where we could be headed with the TP in game:
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/blog/10974978/

I know I know… its Blizzard, but they kinda have a point, no?

Calae.1738:

Some people are playing just to get gold; like a high score in pacman. I can assure you that gold in GW2 has an intrinsic value of zero.

Everything in GW2 is property of Arenanet. You own nothing.

The hot new business model in today’s games is making them grindy. So much so that some people would be willing to pay real money to reduce the time it takes to grind.

Imagine that. Make your game suck so bad and so boring that you give your players a convenience option in exchange for money.

…and it works.

To thee I say ahem

LALALALALALALALALALALALALA I CAN"T HEAR YOU LAALALALALALALALALA

bah, who’m I kidding.. ::runs whimpering to his bed to fill his pillow with tears::

Seriously though, thats the whole human nature thing I went to mentioning before… the real trick then is making it so that folks don’t THINK you’re kitten them in the butt when you are, indeed, shamelessly busy kitten them in the butt. If you play the game normally and feel this incessant kitten creep up on you, that… that actually might be your problem… or you might need a different computer chair.

or…medical attention. (kitten you taco bell)

This could be an interesting topic, and I’d like to offer a few remarks from my very limited understanding and experience.

First, to get to 75g in combined money, gems and assets one needs anywhere between 5 and 75 hours of active play, not counting more valuable drops or playing with TP. Therefore getting 75g is a very easy goal to achieve for any player, and by the definition you provided majority of the active player base falls in the rich category.

Second, the truly rich in this game are TP flippers and manipulators. They have by far the highest margin of profit compared to any other kind of activity. Of course, playing the TP is considered by the vast majority as incredibly dull, complex and time consuming so thankfully there aren’t that many of those around (or at least I hope so xd).

Third, I completely agree that basing game economy on RL economy extremes is not the right way to go. In RL we can see both positive and negative examples of either complete control or complete deregulation, but almost all of the “success stories” lie somewhere in between.
IMHO, GW2 does just that, and sticks with the system of regulating the market, nudging it slightly when deemed necessary. For example, on TP there’s a flat tax that serves as a gold sing meant to reduce the inflation, there’s binding of items that can be gained through other kind of currency, for the same reason, there are updates to crafting tables whether through changed recipes for refinement or new exotic items requiring materials that are in excessive supply and lastly there is modifying loot tables.

In conclusion, I think that you should change the numbers and indeed, as suggested, add an additional category to your tables representing the people who play the game through TP. To compare it with your example those would be the magnates of US monopolies. Oh, and speaking of which, I think that you compare GW2 economy to any number of healthier economies then US’s. While the top money makers numbers might be similar the comparison loses meaning after income drops below 6 digits in RL or several thousands of ingame gold worth. I’d suggest using any of the Scandinavian economies since they are considered among the healthiest world economies at this moment.

The trading post is overpowered when it comes to making money. Some people make more money per month with the TP than you could possibly make in thousands of hours of hardcore farming (lets say 10g per hour to be generous).
All this as a poor excuse for having the trading post as a gold sink, whereas there could be dozens of other ways to sink gold away.
But I guess you cant expect anything else from a game made in the most capitalistic country of the world.

Oh that’s right, blame America (there’s a musical number in there somewhere).

They made a simply trading post for players to buy wanted and sell unwanted goods. They take a cut of the transaction as well as a posting fee in the name of reducing inflation. And then let upwards of millions use it. It’s a very simplistic market. That said it also means it’s full of economic inefficiencies which also means it leaves open to players looking to bank on those inefficiencies.

I’m sorry that you don’t see that as simply another meta game.

The perfect game doesnt have a meta game, because everything would be equally viable. Can I go do dungeons and make 10000 gold in a few days? Unlikely unless I get several high value precusor drops, which are so rare that I didnt find a precursor in 4500 hours of playtime.

Malediktus.9250:

The perfect game doesnt have a meta game, because everything would be equally viable. Can I go do dungeons and make 10000 gold in a few days? Unlikely unless I get several high value precusor drops, which are so rare that I didnt find a precursor in 4500 hours of playtime.

This game does have multiple ways to play. Meta builds are the most used because it’s usually the one that takes the least amount of skill to use. When you look at other “viable” builds, they require you to play a certain way for them to be just as effective. This is why skilled players don’t follow the Metas you usually see.

most capitalistic and most powerful country in the world. sounds like something is working right.

but OT, I would say middle class is 2k-5k just my 2 cents.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

This game does have multiple ways to play. Meta builds are the most used because it’s usually the one that takes the least amount of skill to use. When you look at other “viable” builds, they require you to play a certain way for them to be just as effective. This is why skilled players don’t follow the Metas you usually see.

What are you talking about? This isn’t even true in PvP, let alone PvE.

0-200g – Poor (50%)
200g-1500g – Average/Middle Class (25%)
1500g-3000g – Wealthy (15%)
3000g-10000g – Rich (9%)
10000g+ – upper 1%

(Note: We aren’t just discussing forum population which is a very small fraction of actual in game players… I am taking into account EVERYONE from the person who has just put their first hour into gw2 to someone who has put 5k hours in)

Guardian.5142:

Its been said that the evidence of a thriving economy is a healthy middle class.

I don’t think defining “middle class” as a certain amount of gold in the bank makes any sense. For me having 100g in the bank is pointless – I would have bought other things I wanted long before I let it accrue that high. Unless you’re saving up for something why let it sit there? You don’t get interest on it.

I’m gold poor, but I have lots of nice stuff. I’ve got characters fully kitted out in gear that is effective for the things I like to do, I’ve got the skins I want on most of my characters and I’ve got the dyes I want. I even spent some gold (maybe too much) discovering every cooking recipe so that even when my collection tabs are full my discovery pane is empty (don’t laugh I had a lot of fun with that :P). I don’t feel poor even though I don’t have a big pile of gold. I feel solidly middle class.

You don’t need a big pile of gold to enjoy the game, any more than you need to be at the top of the leader boards. Some folks have the goal of having a lot of gold or making it to the top of the leader boards or of having multiple legendaries, which is fine, but that doesn’t mean it is the yardstick that should be used to measure the entire player population.

Poor/middle class/rich are “standard of living” concepts, not amounts of money concepts (even though the subdivisions are typically based on income). My understanding of it is that the classifications are really a function of what percentage of your income you have to spend on necessary things (food, shelter, transportation to your job) versus things that make life better (entertainment, conveniences, vacations) and what quality of those items you can afford (do you have to live in a slum, or do you live in a house in the suburbs).

There is nothing you need to buy, you can easily gear up for 50g or so, so there is no such thing as poor. The grand majority of players can buy absolutely everything they need without much effort. Saying the game revolves around the trading post is absolutely ludicrous, hell you don’t even need to touch the trading post if you don’t feel like it. You can easily gear up using karma/laurels/dungeon tokens/wvwvw badges if you want.

you should make a poll to find out how many gold everyone has

when not than its jsut speculation and useless

get 200+ people to vote and you know what you wanna know^^

In a game without any meaning or purpose, I suppose it makes sense that players try to find meaning in other things. But gold? Really?

Of all the things you could possibly find meaning for, gold apparently has enough value for it to mean something.

How much do I have? How much do you have? I wonder if someone has more or less than me?

How pathetic.

Romek.4201:

you should make a poll to find out how many gold everyone has
when not than its jsut speculation and useless
get 200+ people to vote and you know what you wanna know^^

A poll would be worse than useless, because it would mislead folks into thinking that the numbers actually meant something.

There are lots of problems with improperly conceived and executed online surveys, for example, “under-coverage” and “self-selection”.

The only way to get an accurate idea of the distribution of gold across the player base would be to beg John to gather up the data for us. I don’t think he should waste his time though unless it’s the total amount of gold earned normalized by the number of hours someone has played. Even that has problems because it doesn’t take into account the value of things that have dropped – like the folks that got a precursor weapon out of the forge but didn’t sell it.

Gold stockpiled in the bank is not how player wealth should be measured.

Firstly this is a futile attempt to get a grasp on the wealth “classes” in Tyria. Only John Smith will be able to give you this information, provided he has access.

Secondly, what Pandemoniac said:

Pandemoniac.4739:

Gold stockpiled in the bank is not how player wealth should be measured.

You should be looking at “Net Worth” not Gold.

Net Worth = current market value of the valuable items you have (rares, mats, exotics, minis, legendaries, tonics) + liquid gold in hand + invested gold in the TP / stockpiled item that you have for speculation.

Which to get a generalized version for the player base we have is, you guessed it, almost impossible

I have been playing for about 6 months now (but not religiously) and I only have about 23 gold. Considering that the game has been out only a bit over twice that time, I was shocked to find out that some people have thousands of gold. Now, I only have 1 level 80, but I still think that I must be playing in the cheapest way possible. Is there something that other players are doing that I’m not? What am I doing wrong? I’d like to avoid having to farm, because that takes the fun out of the game for me, but I’d appreciate any help.

Torinn.5210:

I have been playing for about 6 months now (but not religiously) and I only have about 23 gold. Considering that the game has been out only a bit over twice that time, I was shocked to find out that some people have thousands of gold. Now, I only have 1 level 80, but I still think that I must be playing in the cheapest way possible. Is there something that other players are doing that I’m not? What am I doing wrong? I’d like to avoid having to farm, because that takes the fun out of the game for me, but I’d appreciate any help.

The people with thousands of gold are playing the tp and reinvesting for the most part.

If I can get 20% return on 1000g I’ll make far more money than a guy will make through any ingame method that isn’t tp. Just find a method that scales up with gold owned and you can compound your investments.

Guardian.5142:

Its been said that the evidence of a thriving economy is a healthy middle class.

So where do you think the socioeconomic levels in our gaming population are?

Something like this?

0-75g – poor
76-500g – middle class
501g+ rich

I realize there are some generalizations and oversimplifications being made here given terms like “poor” IRL are used to describe folks barely making ends meet, but even folks considered “rich” can live paycheck to paycheck. For the sake of the gaming world, lets consider poor as being barely able to afford exotics, middle class to be able to get everything they need and a few really nice things and the rich being able to afford the best things in game. For material purposes, because most folks gauge wealth beyond liquid assets, we can say property poor have few assets, middle class have a good mix of most things and property rich have to buy collection expanders, bank slots and mule character bag slots to hold all their assets.

Right now, I’m money poor and property middle, but I had some fun purchases and general disagreements with Zoromos on the definition of what a reasonable return on investment is.

From the feedback I’ve read in game and seen online, a lot of folks seem poor due to a general lack of, what they consider, a fun/rewarding endgame (aka – the level of effort required to make money outstrips their tolerance for grinding content to earn it). A smaller group of “middles” seem to have a good amount of time to invest in the game every day and know a few of the tricks to making it big (win some lose some). The tiny group of wealthy seem to either have the most time in game to do things, the most friends willing to do those things with (that require groups, like dungeons) and have used their wealth to make more wealth, taking advantage of most every trick in game they can get away with.

Does this seem about right to you, or would you draw the lines differently? Would you draw these lines about the same in WoW (PvE endgame with many varied group and solo options for money making), or would you consider this closer to EvE (resembling a real world market-so focus on where the money is and shutup)? Do you think someone playing PvP or WvW all day should have the same gains as a dungeon runner? Do you believe that Anet should take a different approach to money making in game so that more people can afford more things while playing end game focused content, or do you believe this will just lower the value of currency and cause inflation?

Oh and I enjoy a good flame war as much as the next guy, but lets please keep this economical… be frugal with your hate and don’t waste it here. (note: There’s a guy three threads down that posted something personally revealing about your mom and then kicked a box of kittens…. and I don’t think he’s your dad. You might want to see to that…)

Most people I know are dead poor, piling all usable cash back into better gear and siege…

Smooth Penguin.5294:

This game does have multiple ways to play. Meta builds are the most used because it’s usually the one that takes the least amount of skill to use. When you look at other “viable” builds, they require you to play a certain way for them to be just as effective. This is why skilled players don’t follow the Metas you usually see.

Really Penguin, I hope that was a troll post because it doesn’t make much sense. Most people play the most garbage AH cleric guardian builds because they can’t stay alive in anything else (Talking PVE of course). A bad player would never survive in Zerk gear.

I’m running around 230-240 gold and that’s converting 1% of it everyday, except 5% on prepatch Monday, into gems (roughly 80-90g a month). Big believer in cost averaging. Was up to the mid 250s but used up a bit exoticing out my thief and starting a person guild for the bank space. I consider myself comfortable using the 9 months or so I had less than 100 gold.

There is a fundamental question everyone seems to be missing here:
How is wealth defined in this game??

Is it just gold on hand, or gold plus stored mats/items?
It is only thing you can sell or do you include account/soulbound things like purchased cultural/faction items, and MF crafted items?

Is a player with The Emperor title and 50g less wealthy than a player with 500g and no cultural items??

I had about 30 gold and spent it on cooking a few levels.

I think most of you have the right idea here. My question was to ask where the middle class was, to both determine how the TP market should be AND to get experience from many on how they believe the market IS through their using it. Your responses have done just that, but they also show there’s a growing gap where the middle class SHOULD be (not to mention a general lack of personal awareness to what/how others see the game as being).

To reassert my original point, gold in game should be set up in such a way that lazy folks don’t get much, normal players are rewarded well for their efforts in playing end game events/bosses/champs/etc and dedicated players who do more events are rewarded with the most gold. Your normal “median” players should be your middle class.

They should want to aim the content towards the bulk of their players to set them up for the middle class. Those who don’t see the need to do much in game can and will be poor. Remember, we’re using the ACTUAL GAME for the base here. You don’t need much money to just “complete the game” to 80 and gear up. In fact, you should be able to get one good solid character all geared out stat wise and possibly skinned with low end exotic and lower skins.

That is where the game ends being straightforward for a lot of people. If they continue doing what they did to level, gathering, farming mobs, completing maps… they won’t get very far compared to someone who has the inside secrets and plays the TP.

What we are seeing here, is folks turning the TP into a vertical endgame, where bigger numbers lead to higher gains. It promotes higher and higher values for items and gear in game that middle class people may want, but cannot afford by just “playing the game”. The folks who are willing to do whatever it takes to gain the money they want, are able to afford most of what they want and wonder why more folks aren’t willing to do the same.

This…is kinda whats happened to the American economy. Instead of asking, is this right or does this really work for most people, it becomes its own game, where folks are moving money and assets to make more money and assets, and the folks who are actually productive of those monies and assets who are “just playing the game” get poorer and poorer as the market trends higher and higher. Its the sign of an economy that is losing its middle class.

Guardian.5142:

This…is kinda whats happened to the American economy. Instead of asking, is this right or does this really work for most people, it becomes its own game, where folks are moving money and assets to make more money and assets, and the folks who are actually productive of those monies and assets who are “just playing the game” get poorer and poorer as the market trends higher and higher. Its the sign of an economy that is losing its middle class.

Capitalism is what happened to the American economy. As for the alternative… don’t hold your breath. The TP was created to be under the direct control of the players and is working as intended. Anet is not likely to seize everyone’s assets and redistribute them according to the time spent in game or some other measurement.

The biggest difference between real world and game economics: in the game gold is literally pulled out of thin air. Anyone can spend a week doing 4-6 world bosses per day, sell the loot they get, and reinvest the money from those sales in the TP. Anyone. The only reason why people don’t have more than enough money for everything they want is that they won’t put the effort into acquiring the money.

Guardian.5142:

That is where the game ends being straightforward for a lot of people. If they continue doing what they did to level, gathering, farming mobs, completing maps… they won’t get very far compared to someone who has the inside secrets and plays the TP.

What do you mean by “won’t get very far”? I can do all of the content in the game without playing the TP aggressively or grinding for gold. You don’t “win” by having a lot of gold in the bank. If someone chooses amassing gold as a goal, it would be silly for them to not pay attention to what things are worth on the TP. You don’t have to have inside secrets or flip items to make money on the TP – you just have to know what things are profitable to farm and sell. I’ll give you a hint – it’s not what the majority of players in the game are farming. High supply generally means low prices.

You’re assuming that giving everyone more gold is somehow independent of what things cost. What do you think will happen to the price of legendaries if gold is twice as easy to get? I’d bet that the price will about double.

I dont’ know but you could turn 100 gold into 1000 gold if you invest in the right stuff.

I’m sitting at 2000 gold. and maybe another 1500 gold worth of things.

I wish I havn’t sold things like monocle etc. those things went up in price.

I stopped playing and came back and all my stuff raise in price. I guess I should come back in a few years and maybe all my stuff will become priceless.

tolunart.2095:

Guardian.5142:

This…is kinda whats happened to the American economy. Instead of asking, is this right or does this really work for most people, it becomes its own game, where folks are moving money and assets to make more money and assets, and the folks who are actually productive of those monies and assets who are “just playing the game” get poorer and poorer as the market trends higher and higher. Its the sign of an economy that is losing its middle class.

Capitalism is what happened to the American economy. As for the alternative… don’t hold your breath. The TP was created to be under the direct control of the players and is working as intended. Anet is not likely to seize everyone’s assets and redistribute them according to the time spent in game or some other measurement.

The biggest difference between real world and game economics: in the game gold is literally pulled out of thin air. Anyone can spend a week doing 4-6 world bosses per day, sell the loot they get, and reinvest the money from those sales in the TP. Anyone. The only reason why people don’t have more than enough money for everything they want is that they won’t put the effort into acquiring the money.

Well put, but I wasn’t talking about socialism or communism. Just market limitations to keep them healthy and flowing for everyone rather than just the folks who know how (and prefer) to manipulate the values of items and money. As for “working as intended”, that’s a funny phrase that seems to capture the essence of both “I meant to screw up” and “Just deal with it” wrapped up with shiny paper and a bow that says in a drunk and fatherly voice “that’s the kinda love I have for ya, little kittener”. That being said, I truly hope everyone’s holiday season was “working as intended”.

Thinking further about this, I think there’s a possible fix to this dilemma.
——————————————————————————————-
1. Let sell orders last a week and then “eject” into your pickup bin.

- Everything on the market will come down in order for sellers to “move stock” and maintain good profit to avoid having to re-list and pay the tax again.
- A week allows most folks to still keep stock on the TP for short term sales and commodities. So folks who like playing the market can still do so.
- The precursor market comes down to the prices people are more willing to pay. The legendary SELLING market either disappears or diminishes down to lower end legendaries and BUY orders are empowered to be what people can expect to sell one for.
- It may actually pull the mass quantity and commodity markets down a bit in line with something more reasonable, which would make Ascended/Legendary paths more in line with “playing the game”.

In summary – this actually puts pressure on the top end of the market to keep people’s greed in check with actual demand and what people would be willing to pay for it.

-or-

2 – timers on Precursors and Legendaries. 30 day timer from drop/creation and it will auto-account-bind. This guarantees that the most valuable items on the market are moved within a reasonable amount of time for those who want profit and buy orders are filled for what gold people are willing to put down to buy one. It means the sellers are at the mercy of the buyers for high end purchases, not the other way around.

Either way, to keep the market from over inflating, while keeping people “playing the game” instead of just grinding content and playing the TP, we need a top end “pressure” to keep folks honest in their ideas of what profit they should make from an item. This works without adding more money to the economy and still “making the game fun” without turning everyone into “gold seekers” to get the gear/look they want. Timers on orders are pretty standard faire in most MMOs for a reason… they work to maintain the top end of the market and keep in game currency in line with enjoyably playing the game.

I say “working as intended” because it is.

The TP was created to allow the players as a whole, not Anet, to control the market. And they do. What you, among others, want is for Anet to step in and manipulate the market so that it works for you personally and not according to the actions of the players in general.

The TP is cross-server and millions of items flow into and out of it every day. It is not under the control of a particular group of players. What you are actually asking is that Anet place it under the control of a small group of players (yourself and others who want what you want) at the expense of the player base as a whole.

Fortunately, the only response from JS (if he responds at all) is a little snarky humor and reassurances that the TP is not being manipulated by the Tin Hat cabal.

Which, of course, we all know isn’t true.

I think the fluctuation of items is way over the top due to “event limit item” and “over focus on (gathering material) crafting/legendary”.

There are other mmorpg out there, but item fluctuate way more in GW2 compare to other online RPG games.

tolunart.2095:

I say “working as intended” because it is.

The TP was created to allow the players as a whole, not Anet, to control the market. And they do. What you, among others, want is for Anet to step in and manipulate the market so that it works for you personally and not according to the actions of the players in general.

The TP is cross-server and millions of items flow into and out of it every day. It is not under the control of a particular group of players. What you are actually asking is that Anet place it under the control of a small group of players (yourself and others who want what you want) at the expense of the player base as a whole.

Fortunately, the only response from JS (if he responds at all) is a little snarky humor and reassurances that the TP is not being manipulated by the Tin Hat cabal.

Which, of course, we all know isn’t true.

OK… think I was misunderstood.

What happens now:

Someone lists dusk for 800g. That’s their price. They don’t have to touch it and it retains that “imbued” price until someone can buy it or the lister decides to take a hit and lower it, which they really have no need to do. It requires NOTHING on the part of the seller to just keep it there. It forces everyone who wants dusk for twilight to jump through whatever hoops are necessary to afford it, not by game design, but by player greed.

What I propose is a timer to keep pressure on the top end, so that sellers don’t get comfortable just picking prices they feel others should be able to afford, but rather keeping prices competitive with what the sellers believe they can get for items in a short period of time. It brings the top end supply down to meet where player demand is.

Now:
Sell order for dusk: 800G, buy order 500G

Sellers have no reason to drop the price, because they believe folks will pony up 300 more to hit “their mark” of 800 and buyers have no negotiating power so long as no one is willing to hit their buy order. Its a seller dominated market.

Proposed:
Sell order for dusk 600G, buy order 500G. If dusk sell order isn’t bought in a week, the item must be relisted and re-taxed by the TP. 6 days in, that buy order is looking MUCH more attractive.

Then… maybe with precursor crafting, that buy order of dusk comes down to a more reasonable 400G. Sell orders have to follow suit and drop to 500G or else risk not selling. The buyers keep the sellers honest by boycotting unreasonable pricing. If someone tries to bump up Dusk to 1k, they better have the money to keep it there for a while if the potential buyers decide they don’t REALLY have to have Twilight this week.

Its actually a step towards a far more equitable and reasonable system of using the TP for NEGOTIATING prices instead of sellers setting the bar and everyone else has to buck up or cry elsewhere.

No misunderstanding, the same thing has been proposed many times before.

The problem, though, is that while you think that 800 gold is too much, it is not. This is because the item sells to someone who has 800 gold and gives it to the seller. You are, in effect saying “Anet, punish this player for asking more than I’m willing to pay!”

They can ask 800 gold for Dusk because someone will pay 800 gold for Dusk. If the seller gets too greedy others will come along and undercut him while his item sits on the TP gathering dust. Then he loses his 5% listing fee when he takes the item down and relists it at a price that will sell.

This was how the TP was designed, it didn’t happen by accident and Anet is not going to step in and punish those “greedy” sellers who won’t lower their prices for you. They do it to themselves when they price themselves out of the market.

What is preventing another owner of Dusk from offering it at less than 800g. He knows people are willing to pay 500g. He could come along and offer it at say 600g and see if someone is willing to pony up the extra 100g over their 500g bid. Because in theory the guy with the 800g Dust wants it to sell, they didn’t post it as a tease to all us poor people.

And I actually think this is happening and we simply never have a chance to see it. Right now GW2TP samples roughly every 20 minutes, GW2Spidy even less frequently. There could be a lot of transactions of high price items that we never notice because they happen in the sampling gaps and what we end up seeing is the too high offer and too low bid persisting.

Also:

1: Precursor and Legendaries are a specialized market that consists of a few dozen items in a TP with millions of items changing hands constantly. While I agree that it was a mistake to make them sellable in the first place, they are stuck with them (until the next round of Legendaries, at least). But it would be an even bigger mistake to restructure the entire TP around a tiny corner of the overall market. What about all the items that sell for vendor price + 1 copper? You’re already losing money listing them once, if people keep relisting them every week, eventually it costs you more to sell it than you get from the sale.

2: An alternate method of acquiring precursors is coming. If you don’t like the prices of the ones on the TP, wait for it and work on the other parts of your Legendary instead. Once there is a non-RNG method of getting a precursor, the prices for those on the TP will fall due to a drop in demand. So you will either get a precursor through the new method or purchase one when the prices come down.

3: You underestimate the number of items sold every week. Buy orders are filled, if they are reasonable, and as the market fluctuates this reasonable price rises and falls. Patience is required, but it is certainly possible to get a precursor for the price you want.

Pandemoniac.4739:

Guardian.5142:

Its been said that the evidence of a thriving economy is a healthy middle class.

I don’t think defining “middle class” as a certain amount of gold in the bank makes any sense. For me having 100g in the bank is pointless – I would have bought other things I wanted long before I let it accrue that high. Unless you’re saving up for something why let it sit there? You don’t get interest on it.

I’m gold poor, but I have lots of nice stuff. I’ve got characters fully kitted out in gear that is effective for the things I like to do, I’ve got the skins I want on most of my characters and I’ve got the dyes I want. I even spent some gold (maybe too much) discovering every cooking recipe so that even when my collection tabs are full my discovery pane is empty (don’t laugh I had a lot of fun with that :P). I don’t feel poor even though I don’t have a big pile of gold. I feel solidly middle class.

You don’t need a big pile of gold to enjoy the game, any more than you need to be at the top of the leader boards. Some folks have the goal of having a lot of gold or making it to the top of the leader boards or of having multiple legendaries, which is fine, but that doesn’t mean it is the yardstick that should be used to measure the entire player population.

Poor/middle class/rich are “standard of living” concepts, not amounts of money concepts (even though the subdivisions are typically based on income). My understanding of it is that the classifications are really a function of what percentage of your income you have to spend on necessary things (food, shelter, transportation to your job) versus things that make life better (entertainment, conveniences, vacations) and what quality of those items you can afford (do you have to live in a slum, or do you live in a house in the suburbs).

I have to agree with this. I never have more than, say, 20-100 GP (other than when I was shooting for the “Golden” title) because I am always either buying gear, bribing for influence (2-person guild), or re-investing it.

I DO occasionally get ticked off when I blow a bunch of cash on like leveling a character via crafting and the market goes haywire like it did a couple weeks ago and I’m outta expendable income

Money’s supposed to be a tool, so I use it. This is not real life – there’s a foreseeable end to this game within, what, 5-10 years? When the game rolls up the sidewalks in the future (not doom’ing here, it always happens), I’d rather I had a good time with the cash than to have ground out millions just to have it go “poof” in the bank.

tolunart.2095:

Guardian.5142:

…
The biggest difference between real world and game economics: in the game gold is literally pulled out of thin air. …

Where does fiat currency come from?

insert Morpheus “you think that’s air” meme here

:D

Real life money comes out of thin air too. A central bank purchase financial asset, send out loans, interest rates affect the money supply.

But I get it, GW2 generate much more money and try to make them disappear using tax.

@Tolunart – You’re right. You don’t misunderstand me. You just disagree. I can deal with that.

@KarateKid – Exactly. +1 Cookies for the reference.

@laokoko – close. They can print money in a fiat system, but that devalues the total value of money they put into circulation. The Fed wields a double edged sword.

Guardian.5142:

@laokoko – close. They can print money in a fiat system, but that devalues the total value of money they put into circulation. The Fed wields a double edged sword.

That’s not actually accurate, and even with what you’re probably trying to say is no different from what occurs with other fiat currencies (such as the one we’re discussing).

“Printing money” doesn’t “devale the total value of money” in circulation. In fact, it has no effect upon the total value of money in circulation, which is why it has inflationary pressure. Issuing additional currency causes the exact same amount of value (that is to say, the measurable of utility of all goods in the market) to be spread amongst a larger pool of money, causing the value of each individual unit of currency to decrease. It may seem like a pedantic distinction, but it’s the difference between a clear mathematical effect and some sort of magical change because experts say so.

“Printing money” doesn’t “devale the total value of money” in circulation. In fact, it has no effect upon the total value of money in circulation, which is why it has inflationary pressure. Issuing additional currency causes the exact same amount of value (that is to say, the measurable of utility of all goods in the market) to be spread amongst a larger pool of money, causing the value of each individual unit of currency to decrease. It may seem like a pedantic distinction, but it’s the difference between a clear mathematical effect and some sort of magical change because experts say so.

When new money is created, it has little or no inflationary effect to the people who touch it first. Once that new money circulates daily and demand for goods and services reach equilibrium (without any increase in productivity); prices of food and energy start to rise. That is real inflation, not the kittened CPI that exists today.

Didn’t JS once post that the vast majority of players in game own less than 10g? (Of course, this was half a year ago and before the massive wealth injections that was the Crown Pavilion and Champ trains came along.)

I don’t have much to add to the economic discussion (aside from finding it very interesting), but I’d rate the wealth base of the GW2 population as follows:

0-100g: Poor (although even this segment can equip themselves with Exotics in a couple of weeks through Champ trains, dungeon runs or just selling currently overpriced mats)
100-1000g: Middle-class (wealthy enough to purchase the odd luxury goods like Black Lion Ticket weapons or expensive Mystic Forge weapons)
1000g-5000g: Wealthy (this is about the wealth range you’d need in order to make or purchase a Legendary, which remains my milestone for deciding if someone is wealthy)
5000g+: TP Baron

I fluctuate between 100-3k gold often. Gold isn’t a good measure of wealth. Property wise, I have 25k+ gold with maybe 10k+ of that liquidatable.

I think there are a lot of people who overestimate how much gold some people have. It’s belieable for me to see someone with up to 50k gold, but in an older and now locked post a dev basically said it’s a straight up false claim for 100k+. They could claim 100k of property and liquid along with gold, but if everyone dumped all their materials the next day to check and price were to average out I suspect it not to be as high when the market gets flooded with all the hoarders.

Yeah, gold is not really a good measure of wealth. I imagine a lot of players think themselves poor by looking at their coin savings, but they probably have a considerable nest egg in the form of accumulated mats stored in their bank. And of course, TP traders would have most of their wealth tied up in buy/sell orders at any particular time.

If there was no gem to gold exchange then we could look upon gold as a status symbol. Now it’s too easy to drop some pocket change on say 4000 gems and buy whatever you want. (yes it’s pocket change to me)

I sit around about 200g usually. Isn’t that hard to maintain. I simply stop spending on anything when my gold goes below 180.