[jenova_9]

They said no auctionhouses so this is great, I know have a good feeling what they are planning that will benefit everyone (except the greedy people that wanted to exploit AHs again.)


Buying and selling will be more NPC based (like the classic FFs that are pure without corrupt economies.)
and of course mixed in with player selling. And of course NPCs would have infinite gil to prevent the following system from steering in a bad direction (mmorpgs can't afford that.)

A more NPC controlled market would prevent the disasters of FFXI's economy. And people who wanna sell rares would still get full pay for selling it to an NPC. This also goes hand in hand making it more possible for solo/casual players to make good money without other players ruining it for them. And even more dedicated players would benefit from it as well.


*Like say someone sells a rare weapon to a NPC weapon shop.

The shop list would now have that rare weapon for sale at the same price the NPC bought it for
(players don't set the price, the NPCs do. Just like in the classic FFs. that way greedy people can't make too much and people won't receive too little for their items/gear.).

The NPC shops could also have a stock system where like it will only have as many rare items depending how many many they bought from the player community. So the more players sell to NPCs shops, the more rares the shops have in stock (so it would kind of be like AH in the aspect that items are put up for sale)

The shops would always have gear and supplies that players need, that never go out of stock.
as well as supplies that crafters can make money supplying NPC shops with their own creations. Business through the NPCs themselves would instantly make money for the sellers, and benefit the buyers without prices shifting up and down.

it's an example, but It really could work wonderfully. Of course players can still do direct business between each other, but the prices set by the NPC shops would set in stone what's fair, and what's highway robbery out there. This system would eliminate a lot of the corruption that went on with totally player driven economies.

Giving NPCs are more solid role in the market would keep things even. And everyone would still make decent money.
Anyone who would be against that, just wants a system they can exploit and tip to their favor and their favor only.
"Screw the rest" as those crooks would say. Even though an mmorpg is driven by its players, NPCs should be treated as
people too and the real masters that control the reigns of the economy.

[Armando]

So this is, what, the 5th time you post this idea?

[Kailea]

no auctionhouses?


good god would people please stop jumping to concussions, off a half assed interview?

The guy from SE said there would be no auction houses, but somthing else......

this is like every other cryptic half secretive answer SE gives....

[Pwnagraphic]

She's not jumping to a conclussion. She's just stating a theory she had for how it'll work. It's just an idea.

[Malacite]

I must have missed it but when/where did SE state there would be no AH?

I don't like the notion of getting rid of it because the AH simplifies things a great deal by having centralized markets as opposed to running around the world searching for vendors.

[Armando]

In the interview thread.

Is the Economic situation of FFXIV going to be mainly player based with Auction Houses or non-player based with NPC ran stores?

We can't go into details about this just yet. We're very sorry about that. This question is better suited to be asked in a couple of months time. However, it's going to be not the same as with auctionhouses, but something very interesting.

Also, this time the weapons are going to be worn out, a durability system. So you will have to repair them and it will cost money.

Of course, I don't see any mention of revolutionary, fair, NPC-driven, or utopian economies either.

[TheGrandMom]

Sorry but I changed the title. You are speculating and the title makes it sound like you have some inside information or something. So please, when making assumptions, be sure to let people know these are your thoughts and not fact.

[Aksannyi]

As long as it's player driven, I wouldn't count on it ever being a fair economy. It's strangely similar to real life. The government (SE) could step in and regulate it, but how much can they do before people cry foul?

I'm not really expecting it to be groundbreakingly fair. In fact, I'd be surprised if people don't absolutely destroy it in a matter of weeks.

[Takelli]

I never really thought about that... Maybe there will be a system like what Ryzom has...

You can sell items to the NPCs, any item it doesn't matter, and you can set the price of the item to be sold at. The NPC has a stock of their own type of item, and they will sell their items along with what other players sell their items.

When the player sells an item through the NPC, the player is given the gil for what the NPC would normally buy it for, and when some one buys the item, they are given the rest of the gil. Except... If no one buys the item, its added to the NPCs stock, and the player gets nothing for it, and the NPC sells it for the basic NPC price.

But, thats just a speculation

---------- Post added at 09:18 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:17 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Aksannyi

I'm not really expecting it to be groundbreakingly fair. In fact, I'd be surprised if people don't absolutely destroy it in a matter of weeks

Well... With games that don't have an auction house, its kind of hard to fuck up the economy. Unless some one makes hundreds of accounts, and actually tried to fuck it up.

[Aksannyi]

I just expect overpriced shout trades and mega spam in the public chat channels.

[ChocoboBunny]

Well if SE would take the money we spend per month and spread it out into other areas, such as a real economist. That might makes things work out properly. EVE online has real economists dealing with all of the trading, and economy. It might not be perfect, but we at least know it is not player driven if an actual person crunches the numbers. However, this is SE, and i doubt they will go as far as EVE Online.

[Cometgreen]

Could someone explain why a player driven economy leads to "unfair" prices and "exploitation"? What are these "disasters of FFXI's economy" and why are they the fault of the AH system?

[Cyprius]

The AH system had loopholes.

For examlple.. Prices would be based on the history of that said item. One could buy all of the stock up, sell it back to themself on a different character at an inflated price, and relist..

[Icemage]

I've made mention that one of the major failings of the FFXI economy was the permanence of items, and this supports that view I think.

One of the fundamental flaws with how FFXI approaches the player economy, and crafting in general, is that items more or less last forever. Only very late in the design did Square-Enix discover a way for crafters to have a renewable resource (Warp Cudgels, for instance). My guess is that once you get past the early ranks of skill progression or whatnot, it will cost increasing amounts of money for NPCs to repair your gear - and having players do so will cost less.

The Auction House design definitely has its flaws, and I'm happy to see it go away forever. The one thing it did do very very well was shut down trading spam. I think when FFXI was designed, they took a look at things like the trading channels in EverQuest and Diablo II and decided that there needed to be an accessible way for players to interact without talking to one another.

You can still see the aversion that S-E has for this. When player-run "casinos" showed up, they were banhammered hard. When Teleport service spam got a little too out of hand, the Outpost system was created. The only thing you ever really hear shouts for is mission help these days, and frankly, I think that's quite an amazing feat.

Hopefully whatever they come up with will serve a similar purpose in shutting down chat spam while addressing the many weaknesses of the Auction House.


Icemage

[Pwnagraphic]

Whatever it is, I hope they fix the problem. Maybe instead of the player deciding how much it is, you can set the item up for sale and the computer sets the price for you.