February 2004
- Solutions for smarter NPCs (long) Robert Zubek
- TECH: newbie, mud over jabber im cr88192
- Randomness Alex Chacha
- Randomness David Kennerly
- Randomness Alex Chacha
- UI Design Adam
- MCP/GUIs (was: MUD client popularity) Bruce Mitchener
- [DGN] A comparison of adolescent and adult online computer game players Luca Girardo
- Discussion groups at the MDC Brian 'Psychochild' Green
- Different Style of Online Games Stewart Berntson
- Too much magic? Brian Hook
- Too much magic? Michael "Flury" Chui
- Too much magic? John Buehler
- Too much magic? Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- Too much magic? John Buehler
- Too much magic? Corey Crawford
- Too much magic? cruise
- Too much magic? Brian Hook
- Too much magic? Richard A. Bartle
- Too much magic? Brian Hook
- Too much magic? Paul Canniff
- Too much magic? cruise
- Too much magic? Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Too much magic? Ben Hawes
- Too much magic? Miroslav Silovic
- Weather simulations Nathan Black
- Weather simulations Spot
- Weather simulations Shane P. Lee
- Weather simulations Valerio Santinelli
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Dan Larsen
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Brian Hook
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Koster, Raph
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Brian Hook
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Jay Carlson
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Damion Schubert
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Jim Purbrick
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Jim Purbrick
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Sean Middleditch
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Lars Duening
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Ben Garney
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Acius
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Richard A. Bartle
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Patrick Dughi
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? gbtmud
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? Kwon J. Ekstrom
- How much should be offloaded to Scripting? James Pepe
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers J C Lawrence
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers ext.Christer.Enfors@tietoenator.com
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Koster, Raph
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Daniel James
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Fred Snyder
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Michael Sellers
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Tom Hunter
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Luca Girardo
- Media: Women over 40 biggest online gamers Luca Girardo
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. rjw
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Paul Schwanz
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Paul Schwanz
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Paul Schwanz
- Character Restraint & Capture. Damion Schubert
- Character Restraint & Capture. Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Paul Schwanz
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Matt Mihaly
- Character Restraint & Capture. Damion Schubert
- Character Restraint & Capture. Byron Ellacott
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Damion Schubert
- Character Restraint & Capture. Marian Griffith
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Brian 'Psychochild' Green
- Character Restraint & Capture. cruise
- Character Restraint & Capture. Paul Schwanz
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Valerio Santinelli
- Character Restraint & Capture. Craig H Fry
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jim Purbrick
- Character Restraint & Capture. Michael Sellers
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. cruise
- Character Restraint & Capture. Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture. Tess Snider
- Character Restraint & Capture. Eric Random
- Player generated quests wcoles@reflectionsinteractive.com
- Player generated quests cruise
- Player generated quests Artur Biesiadowski
- Player generated quests Alex Chacha
- Player generated quests Mike Shaver
- Player generated quests Talanithus Tarant
- Quick question SSL Christopher Allen
- Quick question SSL ceo
- Quick question SSL sziisoft
- Quick question SSL Jo Dillon
- Quick question SSL Matthew D. Fuller
- Quick question SSL ceo
- Quick question SSL szii@sziisoft.com
- Quick question SSL Travis Casey
- Quick question SSL Tamzen Cannoy
- Quick question SSL ceo
- Quick question SSL Byron Ellacott
- Quick question SSL Alex Chacha
- Quick question SSL Sean Middleditch
- Mythica Cancelled.. dienw
- Mythica Cancelled.. Kerry Fraser-Robinson
- Mythica Cancelled.. David H. Loeser Jr
- Mythica Cancelled.. Vincent Archer
- Mythica Cancelled.. Vincent Archer
- Mythica Cancelled.. Michael Sellers
- Mythica Cancelled.. Scott Jennings
- Mythica Cancelled.. szii@sziisoft.com
- Mythica Cancelled.. Valerio Santinelli
- Mythica Cancelled.. Damion Schubert
- Mythica Cancelled.. Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- Mythica Cancelled.. Bill Slease
- Mythica Cancelled.. Freeman, Jeff
- Mythica Cancelled.. Tom "cro" Gordon
- [Design] Meta-physics Engine cruise
- RE:Character Restraint & Capture. Chris Duesing
- Economic model.. Brian Thyer
- Economic model.. Mike Lescault
- Economic model.. Robert Kovalchick
- Economic model.. Brian Thyer
- Economic model.. Matt Mihaly
- Economic model.. brian@thyer.net
- Economic model.. Matt Mihaly
- Economic model.. Matt
- Economic model.. Brian Thyer
- Economic model.. cruise
- Economic model.. brian@thyer.net
- Economic model.. cruise
- Economic model.. Thomas Clive Richards
- Economic model.. Michael Sellers
- Economic model.. Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Economic model.. Michael Sellers
- Economic model.. Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Economic model.. Brian Thyer
- Economic model.. Marian Griffith
- Economic model.. Brian Thyer
- Economic model.. Francisco Gutierrez
- Economic model.. Brian Thyer
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Brian Hook
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Roy Sutton
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Chris Duesing
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Byron Ellacott
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) szii@sziisoft.com
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) John Buehler
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Byron Ellacott
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Jester
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Byron Ellacott
- Character Restraint & Capture (bounty hunting) Jester
- Economic model (long) Jester
Brian wrote:
> I'm working as the economic designer for a mud me and a group of
> people are putting together.
I have also recently (over the last year) been working on the
economics for a very player driven market. All the below are my
views and opinions only, and economies are very specific to
implementations any way so take what you like & ignore the rest :)
> The first thing I wanted to do was avoid the pitfall of
> hyperinflation.
This is by far the hardest thing to avoid, the very act of new
characters joining the world (presuming they don't start naked or
with equipment or zero value) will have a trickle effect of
introducing items that previously didn't exist into your world (that
appears from your description to have semi-fixed resources).
Also with some systems a character's progression can tip the balance
towards H.I. As a character's ability to kill 'low' level creatures
more quickly and with less rest between kills increases, their
potential for harvesting resources (furs, teeth, bones etc.)
increases. You have to ensure that the reward curve for loot or
resources is appropriate to the 'level' of the character otherwise
you will get mid level characters (farming) wiping out the newbie
hunting grounds because it earns them more in the same amount of
time and with less risk than hunting creatures more suited to their
level.
This not only adds to the problem of H.I. but if you have finite
resources it may mean that new players entering your world have
nothing to hunt!
> a lot of players *could* hunt a local species into extinction
!
> as gold (and by gold I mean any resource minted into coinage) goes
> through fluxuations in availability (one gold vein used up, a
> month real time before anyone else finds a good new one) the
> amount of coin and its value (buying power) would fluxuate as
> well.
I think this is a nice idea, but IHMO I think it is adding
unnecessary complexity. If the value of coinage is going to
fluctuate over time it is going to be VERY hard to establish a
baseline for vendors to buy and sell goods.
Also this mechanism relies on the fact that your players DO find a
new gold vein (within the timeframe you need to prevent the economy
from screwing up). Also whoever does find this nice new sparkly
source of wealth would be foolish in the extreme to openly mint it,
as doing do would decrease it's value if the demand was high. Far
better to mine most of the ore out, sling it into a vault and mint
it in very small amounts over time thus keeping the value high and
amassing a fortune.
A player or small group could with these sorts of financial
resources completely monopolise gold (or other coin based metals)
and if they minted all their collected gold ore at once could
cripple your entire economy in one fell swoop. You may want to
reconsider giving your players this much influence over your economy
:)
> The idea I got was to make it less of a coinage based system, and
> more of a trade based system.
Trade based systems also have their use but can suffer from other
problems, if you are allowing individual shop owners to set
conversion / trade rates you may well get arbitrage within the same
town and this could lead to glutting of one particular shop with a
resource that because of its high volume will be devalued.
You also have the problem of finding someone to trade with; who has
something you want, who wants something you have, at a rate that
both of you consider fair :)
> Coinage still has its uses, it's the base value on which all other
> items are compared;
If the value of coinage fluctuates AND an item's value fluctuates
with natural supply and demand through trade then you are going to
have huge problems establishing any kind of base rate for anything.
> I hope to keep each separate town/village/city/kingdom economy
> just that, separate.
Once again I think you are making life difficult for yourself,
having a distinct economy for each village is going to make it much
harder to control without obvious intervention and you run the risk
of localised hyperinflation that could bankrupt small areas creating
financial ghost towns. Having a national and 'regional' economies
should suffice to make interesting and rewarding arbitrage for
players who enjoy that type of challenge.
I hope I have been of some help, and there are other very important
things I haven't even mentioned like sinks and I could add pages
more advice on this topic but the other list members probably
wouldn't thank me for it :)
So if you'd like me to go into any more depth drop me an email
direct: jester@futuremmorpg.org and I'll be glad to help steer you
past all the pitfalls I stumbled into first time round ;)
Jester
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