Star Citizen Thread v6

[Snarfbuckle]

maybe you need a pair of looking glasses, because they do.

They fluctuate but hardly in any significant and noticeable way.

I mean that if players blow up 500 Corvettes per day and the game can create 250 of them per day means that there would be market shortage where we would have a price increase until the market stabilize.

 

[govny]

They fluctuate but hardly in any significant and noticeable way.

I mean that if players blow up 500 Corvettes per day and the game can create 250 of them per day means that there would be market shortage where we would have a price increase until the market stabilize.

this is why ED economy is in the hands of NPC, like will be SC. So you have a taste of what SC economy will be.

 

[Ian Skippy]

They fluctuate but hardly in any significant and noticeable way.

I mean that if players blow up 500 Corvettes per day and the game can create 250 of them per day means that there would be market shortage where we would have a price increase until the market stabilize.

I agree, fluctuating ship prices would be cool. Not a fan of timelicks though (or spacejail, same stuff). Fully modeling an economy is a pipedream though. No game except x:r did it, and x:r's economy was a disaster at launch while it was pretty much the core of the game. After a year iy functioned okayish in a singleplayer setting.

Lets keep the goals and ambitiobs modest at first.

 

[MTBFritz]

I agree, fluctuating ship prices would be cool. Not a fan of timelicks though (or spacejail, same stuff). Fully modeling an economy is a pipedream though. No game except x:r did it, and x:r's economy was a disaster at launch while it was pretty much the core of the game. After a year iy functioned okayish in a singleplayer setting.

Lets keep the goals and ambitiobs modest at first.

Thats exactly the point....start small....go from there....improve, expand and at the very end you ll have a masterpiece.

Star Citizen takes the reverse route and tries to do the perfect ending right at the start.....I cannot see that working out, never has in RL either. Its all good if fans backpaddle and state "of course its gonna start out weak and improve over time" just that wasnt what was being advertsided praised, stated, promised and cashed on over the years now was it?

 

[McGlashan]

A critical difference compared with something like Eve is that it won't take the coordinated efforts of hundreds of players to pull off acts of sabotage and vandalism, it'll take one Major Tom in his underpants glitching through the hull of one of these expensive capital ships and ramming it repeatedly into a station for lulz, or simply stealing it. And of course there will never be hundreds of players in one instance to start with. I can already imagine the endless calls for server rollbacks from disgruntled orgs.

Even if they did successfully implement systems to prevent ships being infiltrated and stolen/destroyed, that rules out pretty much the only game play the PU has to offer. Every story you read from new players discovering what an awesome game SC currently is, revolves around that one mechanic.

 

[marx]

There was also an interesting game called Hardwar, a very close spiritual successor to Elite, that had a dynamic economy for many things, but strictly controlled. However, the game had rudimentary multiplayer support, and the possibility for players to manufacture some goods (or equipment) was also added. Even within the controlled economy, players could still grind economies to a halt. For a good while, the devs also released beta patches (and later stable releases), among which they experimented with a wholly dynamic economy: nothing would appear out of thin air, everything would have to be produced. In practice, small imbalances could spiral into large-scale troubles even in a single-player world, and in multiplayer things would quickly become chaotic, with wide-spread shortages.

Let me give an example. The world started with a set amount of police pilots spawned, but when any were destroyed, new NPCs wouldn't appear out of thin air, they would have needed a police ship to be produced. However, said ship was one of the best in-game, and as such, they were also expensive. Shipyards would also prioritise cheaper ships, due to how they determined they should produce from what materials they had available. Since the police forces were restricted to that one type of ship, and had troubles having them produced, over time the police force would actually go extinct - even without player intervention.

Don't get me wrong, Hardwar was a great game and quite ahead of its time. However, having seen how a dynamic economy with NPC agency would work there, and also how EVE's economy works, personally I think that dynamic economies in either Elite or Star Citizen would be a nightmare to balance well enough. And in SC's case, for ships it could be circumvented with real money anyway. (Unless you believe they really will stop selling ship packages after launch, which I personally find highly unlikely.) It's best to either go with a fully player-driven economy, or to go with a semi-dynamic one with strict controls. In a mixed environment, however, players can be smarter than the game's software, and they will find and exploit any errors in it.
Oh, and as noted by Maruun just below me for Elite, the game world's size would be too large for a fully player-driven economy.

 

[Maruun]

They fluctuate but hardly in any significant and noticeable way.

I mean that if players blow up 500 Corvettes per day and the game can create 250 of them per day means that there would be market shortage where we would have a price increase until the market stabilize.

Snarf i really hate to burst the bubble on this. Consider how many habitated systems there are, stations, citys ect. Do you really think "players" would have any realistic impact on the global market in such a gigantic ludicrous economy. And we are only talking about the places players can actually reach. Now consider all those giant citys on atmospheric planets ect.
Its a drop of water on a very hot stone. Just think about how many "shipyards" are out there where you can buy certain ships and you realize how strange that notion actually is.

EDIT:
Beside that what happens when you lose your ship? Do you have to wait to use it again? To get a spare from your insurance company? Playing the waiting game...when people complain about ED being waiting game already?
It wouldnt really work at all in ED this point, they would need to create a unrealistic artificial economy so that players have a "impact" on a economy that is technically REALLY hard to influence just because of the amount of production/ressources from several thousand entire solarsystems.

 

[Skizomeuh]

Snarf i really hate to burst the bubble on this. Consider how many habitated systems there are, stations, citys ect. Do you really think "players" would have any realistic impact on the global market in such a gigantic ludicrous economy. And we are only talking about the places players can actually reach. Now consider all those giant citys on atmospheric planets ect.
Its a drop of water on a very hot stone. Just think about how many "shipyards" are out there where you can buy certain ships and you realize how strange that notion actually is.

EDIT:
Beside that what happens when you lose your ship? Do you have to wait to use it again? To get a spare from your insurance company? Playing the waiting game...when people complain about ED being waiting game already?
It wouldnt really work at all in ED this point, they would need to create a unrealistic artificial economy so that players have a "impact" on a economy that is technically REALLY hard to influence just because of the amount of production/ressources from several thousand entire solarsystems.

Wise words. Totally applicable to SC. While it seems a good idea on the paper, CIG is good to shoot themselves in the foot multiple times with that.

And yes, start small and expand on that. Why not start with a reliable <<USE>>, or a "simple" buy box (haha) here/sell it there?

 

[Zetta]

EDIT:
Beside that what happens when you lose your ship? Do you have to wait to use it again? To get a spare from your insurance company? Playing the waiting game...when people complain about ED being waiting game already?

This is something that SC is doing and it will be interesting to see how it is received. Erin talked about people getting attached to their ships and how that was a key direction for the game, then they are going to deny you access to your ship if you get blown up. Sure, it simulates supply and demand but it's not very good for keeping a player engaged. What if you've spent $750 on a spaceship and have to wait a number of hours before you can fly again, that's going to be quite frustrating.

 

[Asp Explorer]

All those big expensive ships are going to be targeted as soon as they appear just for buckets of lulz

 

[Tippis]

Don't get me wrong, Hardwar was a great game and quite ahead of its time. However, having seen how a dynamic economy with NPC agency would work there, and also how EVE's economy works, personally I think that dynamic economies in either Elite or Star Citizen would be a nightmare to balance well enough. And in SC's case, for ships it could be circumvented with real money anyway. (Unless you believe they really will stop selling ship packages after launch, which I personally find highly unlikely.) It's best to either go with a fully player-driven economy, or to go with a semi-dynamic one with strict controls. In a mixed environment, however, players can be smarter than the game's software, and they will find and exploit any errors in it.
Oh, and as noted by Maruun just below me for Elite, the game world's size would be too large for a fully player-driven economy.

It is, and EVE remains the prime example here too. It took eight years before CCP dared to give up the last control mechanism for the fundamental value unit of EVE (the so-called “mineral basket” — minerals being the corner stone of ship building, which through a very simple insurance mechanism determined the minimal value of ISK). Over those years, they let one thing after another become free-floating and subject to player-economy self-regulation, but it was a very slow process. Because that is an equilibrium that has to find itself — it is not something you can impose (this, too, was something they learned early on, and then stayed very far away from).

But that's not even the bigger problem that SC is facing. It's possible that CIG could start making sensible decisions to start slow and carful too (stop laughing… I said “possible”, not “probable”) but the decision they've made that will forever ruin any semblance of economy is the ability to buy credits or ships. This crucial part of CIG's monetisation of the game means that they've rendered a balanced dynamic economy fundamentally impossible. It doesn't matter if it's player-run or NPC-controlled — those dynamics are made completely pointless by the fact that you can just bypass them. And the only way for CIG to fix that is to ensure that their one income stream will generate zero income, so they'll have to shut down the whole thing.

Supply and demand becomes pointless if you can create supply out of thin air by throwing RL cash at the problem. Super-duper Ship X isn't on the market because it's “unique” or “too rare” and takes weeks to build through in-game mechanics? No problem. $$$-> insta-ship. Oh, the process to build those ships is slow, and there are no in-game buyers in the end because they just buy one in from the online ship? No problem. $$$-> insta-credits. Now, any notion of players building and crafting items to supply other players is shot because they're competing with their limited time and production capacity against the instantaneous and infinite capacity of the shop to add stuff to the game universe at the click of a button. The only possible way to balance that is to make the cash route so hideously expensive that no-one in their right mind would ever use it… which means CIG loses its only income stream.

They have to choose one or the other: give up a ton of agency (and with it, a ton of professions and player interactions) that everyone is expecting out of the game, or give up their income stream.

 

[Stigbob]

All those big expensive ships are going to be targeted as soon as they appear just for buckets of lulz

Impossible the space poors won't be able to afford a ship to attack them with, they'll be busy swabbing the deck and mixing drinks at minimum wage.

 

[Snarfbuckle]

Snarf i really hate to burst the bubble on this. Consider how many habitated systems there are, stations, citys ect. Do you really think "players" would have any realistic impact on the global market in such a gigantic ludicrous economy.

While I used players as an example we can also add all killed NPC's from both players AND NPC's and that would have an impact, if we had an actual pipeline of production.

 

[Mu77ley]

While I used players as an example we can also add all killed NPC's from both players AND NPC's and that would have an impact, if we had an actual pipeline of production.

I'm sorry, but no, they wouldn't.

Just taking the system the player group (formed of Star Citizen backers) I'm a member of has as a base in a "nothing special" independent system on the outskirts of the bubble. That has a population of over 17 million. Then you have the extremes like Sol which has a population of almost 23 billion. If you think a small bunch of players can dramatically effect populations of that size then you're living in lala land.

 

[Viajero]

It is, and EVE remains the prime example here too. It took eight years before CCP dared to give up the last control mechanism for the fundamental value unit of EVE (the so-called “mineral basket” — minerals being the corner stone of ship building, which through a very simple insurance mechanism determined the minimal value of ISK). Over those years, they let one thing after another become free-floating and subject to player-economy self-regulation, but it was a very slow process. Because that is an equilibrium that has to find itself — it is not something you can impose (this, too, was something they learned early on, and then stayed very far away from).

But that's not even the bigger problem that SC is facing. It's possible that CIG could start making sensible decisions to start slow and carful too (stop laughing… I said “possible”, not “probable”) but the decision they've made that will forever ruin any semblance of economy is the ability to buy credits or ships. This crucial part of CIG's monetisation of the game means that they've rendered a balanced dynamic economy fundamentally impossible. It doesn't matter if it's player-run or NPC-controlled — those dynamics are made completely pointless by the fact that you can just bypass them. And the only way for CIG to fix that is to ensure that their one income stream will generate zero income, so they'll have to shut down the whole thing.

Supply and demand becomes pointless if you can create supply out of thin air by throwing RL cash at the problem. Super-duper Ship X isn't on the market because it's “unique” or “too rare” and takes weeks to build through in-game mechanics? No problem. $$$-> insta-ship. Oh, the process to build those ships is slow, and there are no in-game buyers in the end because they just buy one in from the online ship? No problem. $$$-> insta-credits. Now, any notion of players building and crafting items to supply other players is shot because they're competing with their limited time and production capacity against the instantaneous and infinite capacity of the shop to add stuff to the game universe at the click of a button. The only possible way to balance that is to make the cash route so hideously expensive that no-one in their right mind would ever use it… which means CIG loses its only income stream.

They have to choose one or the other: give up a ton of agency (and with it, a ton of professions and player interactions) that everyone is expecting out of the game, or give up their income stream.

Assuming CIG keeps its declared intention to not sell ships post go live (other than "starter" ones) and to limit in game credits purchases to a monthly limit cap, would your description still hold?

 

[Ian Skippy]

Assuming CIG keeps its declared intention to not sell ships post go live (other than "starter" ones) and to limit in game credits purchases to a monthly limit cap, would your description still hold?

The problem would be inflation. If there is a 'real simulated economy', and you can create 'magic money' every month, you either get massive inflation or there will have to be strong credit sinks. The latter will hit those without Magic Money strongest ofcourse. Look at ED: even *without* Magic Money credits have been created in-game at such a pace they have massively less 'value'. If ED had a real economy, a corvette would now cost many billions. And this is with a currency earn rate that many still call 'grindy' and 'too slow'.

Simply put: you cannot have a real economy, magic money and non-grindy gameplay accessible to everyone including those with only a 'starter pack'.

 

[Rolan]

All those big expensive ships are going to be targeted as soon as they appear just for buckets of lulz

I said this before, most of the big ships will be destroyed the first week.

And many will not even be able to use them without a lot of people or spending a lot of money in ammo, fuel and other stuff. In the end the big ones will be just a big thing in their hangars.

 

[Asp Explorer]

Indeed. It's going to be most entertaining for those players who like nothing better than finding a big ship belonging to some Org or other that needs crewed, blocking off the landing pads with ships embedded in the mesh, and stuffing it chock-full of vending machines and exploding underpanted space clowns.

Buy an Idris!

 

[Tippis]

Assuming CIG keeps its declared intention to not sell ships post go live (other than "starter" ones) and to limit in game credits purchases to a monthly limit cap, would your description still hold?

That would be the second case: they've given up their income stream. The question then becomes, how do they stay open? What are they selling instead?

Subscriptions? That would create almost as much backlash as ditching the whole industrial sector. It would be a very natural and suitable fit for the game type, but they've positioned themselves so strongly as a non-subscription game (never mind that they offer content subscriptions already… )

Other items? If so, then we're back to much the same problem: what purpose do those items serve to make people keep buying them? If it's something that affects the gameplay, then you have a cash-based skip of one kind or another, and that will invalidate gameplay they've designed and make it a waste of time and money.

Selling money is always a bad idea exactly because of what you're selling. Money tends to be one of those what-can-I-do limiters that determine progress and activity and the overall “action economy” if you like of the game (action economy is a classic game design issue, going back to classic boardgaming: if it takes X rounds to do activity A, is that an economically viable choice compared to spending Y rounds to do activity B?). All in-game activities will have some kind of opportunity cost — grind time, difficulty, resource cost, whathaveyou — and even if capped, the ability to buy credits for cash bypasses that cost and instantly creates money without any regard for those activity balancing factors. The clever thing that makes PLEX work in EVE is that it specifically avoids this — the grinding and difficulty and all that has already been a factor as some other player ground out the ISK they're trading for the PLEX. It doesn't generate new money out of thin air, but rather recycles money that is already in the system and subject to the money generation balance of the existing gameplay.

The only time this isn't the case is when money is a secondary, or better yet tertiary, concern next to, say, XP and some core resource that's actually difficult to get — if you need XP to level up, and also unobtanium to craft equipment for that new level, and money is just some token vendor trash that you will always have enough of anyway. But in such a situation, why would anyone buy it for cash? The whole point of it in such a case that it's not really worth anything. And of course, SC does not have XP and has so far made no mention of any other critical resource.

 

[GaryII]

I said this before, most of the big ships will be destroyed the first week.

And many will not even be able to use them without a lot of people or spending a lot of money in ammo, fuel and other stuff. In the end the big ones will be just a big thing in their hangars.

Depends on balancing CIG can make them extremely hard to kill to protect their investment...

In general I agree, people with cheap ships will go after big ships - greifing will be a thing in in SC and a lot of people will demand private servers or even Solo mode like its in Elite...