Phoenix Down: Artisan Class Restriction.

Ah, but while I don't disagree with you, then you get BDO, and this is a problem for everyone.

When everyone WANTS to be able to make everything, and try to play solo, demand is zero.

By refusing to specialize, a playerbase creates a scenario in which their own effort is 'worthless' for making money through crafting. Now, a solo player doing this HAS to make all the alts. But they don't all do so.

So you get this weird middle ground where everyone who tries to do everything suffers from reduced demand on the things they try to make, or low profit margins, and those who specialize into niches with higher or just more stable demand, do much better.

The former FEELS like they're doing well, and depending on their personal goals or 'Economic RP' or whatever, they are.

But an Econ player doesn't think "I should make things myself" because it just leads to degradation of markets themselves and a ruined game/economy where you CAN'T just 'rely on things' except buying from the poor fools who don't do this.

And there are a lot of them, I assure you, or BDO would not get away with the design choices it makes.

Post by Summpwner on 2022-10-18 20:18:38

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Post by Azherae on 2022-10-18 20:23:28

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But my point is that I study the WAY they make those decisions, and use that to determine how much players understand these things.

They do not.

For example, on Console they have recently changed EXACTLY the thin you were talking about.

They raised the max sell price for gatherables.

Doubled, in fact. And then somehow, in their infinite wisdom, did NOT also raise the max sell price for the PRODUCTS you make with those gatherables.

What would you expect the result to be, if someone doubled costs on an item needed to make a product (because it is always in Zero supply) but did NOT raise the sale price of the product itself, which was previously a razor-thin margin for nearly everyone?

I'd EXPECT an uproar, immediate complaints to the point where they had to fix it, and instant drying up of the supply of Product.

Opposite happened. "Pure LifeSkillers" are a demographic that are VERY difficult to understand in games from an economic perspective, you can't plan your game around the way they do things, and in a very roundabout way, that's why we don't care about it, because the person who thinks "I'll just make everything myself" is EQUIVALENT in mental processes to a 'pure LifeSkiller', NOT to an Economic Player.

Post by worddog on 2022-10-18 20:33:10

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Post by Summpwner on 2022-10-18 20:35:37

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Post by Azherae on 2022-10-18 20:36:16

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Right, and the thing is, no matter what restrictions are placed, YOU are the type that will do this.

Countering YOU is not the goal of such a system. Countering 'the tendency for ME to turn INTO You', is.

Given the current system, there is a 'barrier' that prevents Me() from becoming You(). I can tell you that the Barrier is working and I welcome it. But the fact that it is working indicates that not everyone will 'become You() if they are trying to make money.

They do it because of whatever (I don't know exactly what) causes you to be that way, and that player type will surpass all but the most ridiculous barriers to do so, so there's no point in going that far.

Post by Azherae on 2022-10-18 20:38:46

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I think I got off on the wrong foot here with you, so I'll just disengage.

I don't feel it's productive to try to discuss things if I'm just bring 'anecdotal experience' and you (quite reasonably) just reject it, so let's just not.

Post by Diamaht on 2022-10-18 20:39:08

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Post by worddog on 2022-10-18 20:51:36

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Post by CROW3 on 2022-10-18 20:56:43

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Post by Azherae on 2022-10-18 20:58:48

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Think of it as "Intrepid Paying you $15 (this is on the assumption for some reason that you have two computers or can run two instances on one system undetected)" to NOT use twice the time, to use up only the 'amount of time a single instance of the Ashes Client makes available to you'.

You might not be the type to make a whole second account just so you can be self-sufficient in Crafting if they went that far.

But many will, so Alts are a way to HELP with this in a specific way. It's just more 'small barriers'.

"I could be more efficient and self sufficient but it would cost me $15 and it wouldn't be MORE effective than that competitor who just uses Alts so meh".

Post by worddog on 2022-10-18 21:00:24

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Post by worddog on 2022-10-18 21:03:27

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Post by Diamaht on 2022-10-18 21:05:00

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Post by Azherae on 2022-10-18 21:05:59

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I think I failed to explain before why doing it isn't an advantage. I don't expect to manage to make the point to you either, but I'll repeat it for... idk, data.

Hardcore players doing this are not making MORE money by filling every Market Niche unless they NEVER do anything else really, and even then.

And I don't think you really want to try to stop those people because they will break down ALL barriers because of the way their minds work. But the idea of 'competitive advantage by doing it' is a sign of a poor economy, the arrow of causation for THAT, I don't THINK goes in the direction of 'People can Make Alts to do everything >> Bad Economy".

In my personal experience it explicitly goes the other way. The Competitive Advantage you speak of must exist, but 'just spending more time' isn't usually that type of advantage (just the more time is, technically using it on this is somewhat wasting it, if you have other interests in the game).

But as I said prior. Anecdotal. Rejectable. Just my data.

Post by worddog on 2022-10-18 21:13:18

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Post by Ludullu on 2022-10-18 21:21:03

Azherae wrote: »

But as I said prior. Anecdotal. Rejectable. Just my data.

Just to support that bit of data from a game with free trading. On a ton of L2's private servers people would usually try to be as self-sufficient as possible, because those servers would usually have higher lvling rates so making a gatherer alt was easy (even several at different lvl points). And because of that the game's market would either be barren or the prices on items would be so damn high that no casual/non-guild player could ever farm that much in a reasonable amount of time.

And at the opposite side of the spectrum, on low rate servers the market would always have a shitton of resources and the overall amount of crafter items was usually higher and at cheaper prices (relative to rates of course). And that was mainly because farming some money at high lvl was a much better way to "get resources" than leveling a whole damn alt to go and try gathering a few items here and there. And that alt would have some problems too, because there was a much higher competition for the resources, because way more people would just gather them, instead of leveling up to high, because it was quite profitable.

And on top of that, any new player who just picked up a few lucky rare mats along their leveling way could then sell them on the market for a good price and get themselves some gear upgrades (because again, the crafter stuff was cheaper).

In other words, the economy was way healthier when there were designated gathering players and just high lvlers. The fact that those high lvl players always had stuff to do (namely grind) also helped out the whole situation, so I do hope that Ashes provides players with enough beneficial activities that would outweigh the allure of "doing it all yourself".

Post by worddog on 2022-10-18 21:28:44

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Post by Azherae on 2022-10-18 22:39:56

NiKr wrote: »

Azherae wrote: »

But as I said prior. Anecdotal. Rejectable. Just my data.

Just to support that bit of data from a game with free trading. On a ton of L2's private servers people would usually try to be as self-sufficient as possible, because those servers would usually have higher lvling rates so making a gatherer alt was easy (even several at different lvl points). And because of that the game's market would either be barren or the prices on items would be so damn high that no casual/non-guild player could ever farm that much in a reasonable amount of time.

And at the opposite side of the spectrum, on low rate servers the market would always have a shitton of resources and the overall amount of crafter items was usually higher and at cheaper prices (relative to rates of course). And that was mainly because farming some money at high lvl was a much better way to "get resources" than leveling a whole damn alt to go and try gathering a few items here and there. And that alt would have some problems too, because there was a much higher competition for the resources, because way more people would just gather them, instead of leveling up to high, because it was quite profitable.

And on top of that, any new player who just picked up a few lucky rare mats along their leveling way could then sell them on the market for a good price and get themselves some gear upgrades (because again, the crafter stuff was cheaper).

In other words, the economy was way healthier when there were designated gathering players and just high lvlers. The fact that those high lvl players always had stuff to do (namely grind) also helped out the whole situation, so I do hope that Ashes provides players with enough beneficial activities that would outweigh the allure of "doing it all yourself".

This isn't just a beneficial activity thing though, this is a 'limited open world supply' thing.

Which isn't common in games these days, but...

If an area has enough items for 3 gatherers at a time, in rotation it might support 30 per day. If the game ALSO has less than 30 people including alts that wish to do this gathering, then it is in your best interest to always make alts.

As soon as it goes past this number, it is now no longer in ANYONE'S interest to make alts or even to risk gathering without specialization.

The reason a person can be self sufficient AND profit in games is because the world has too many resources available, because players LIKE to do everything and therefore demand from devs that 'I want to gather, I don't want to go out there and find nothing because so many people are already gathering'.

And inexperienced Devs go 'ok let's increase the amount of gatherables to make players happy gathering'. And then someone like me notices and 'makes a gathering Alt' to deal with the low volume time when all the Fair Weather Gatherers aren't doing it.

Or you can just 'be self sufficient' and not care about the opportunity cost.

Post by Ludullu on 2022-10-18 23:02:30

Azherae wrote: »

This isn't just a beneficial activity thing though, this is a 'limited open world supply' thing.

Which isn't common in games these days, but...

If an area has enough items for 3 gatherers at a time, in rotation it might support 30 per day. If the game ALSO has less than 30 people including alts that wish to do this gathering, then it is in your best interest to always make alts.

As soon as it goes past this number, it is now no longer in ANYONE'S interest to make alts or even to risk gathering without specialization.

Yeah I mentioned this in a previous post too. And when you add owpvp to the equation, there's even less resources per person because someone will always be stronger than you and will be ready to fight over the limited resources.

Can't quite be "self-sufficient" if you're not just by yourself.