Re-balancing ... Crash the galactic economy, and make game achievements require maintenance?

Another measure that hasn't been included in the proposed economy revamp would be actual inflaion as outlined by some replies in this thread which were explaining the difference between economic inflation (prices/costs increase), and the inflation of rewards effectively DEflating prices, so why don't ships and modules become more expensive as money becomes more abundant. Essentially if everyone has more mone, their expectations for remuneration for their time as an employee increases, this is a primary cost that filters into the cost of their employers products/services pricing model, and is echoed by every link in the supply chain.
Because not everyone has more money (and most people don't), so that sort of change hurts the poorer players most (and asset-rich players less than cash-rich players)

Take four players:
1) Veteran player, one of every A-rated ship, a billion in spare cash.
2) Veteran player, ten or so A-rated ships, then a few billions in spare cash to equal the total assets of player 1
3) Recent starter, started about a month ago, didn't read the "how to make money fastest" guides, has an Asp, a few smaller ships, and about 100 million in cash, saving up for a Krait
4) Complete beginner, loaned Sidewinder, 1000 credits, started today

If Frontier then multiply every cost in the game by, say, 5:
- player 1 doesn't notice at all until the next time Frontier release a new ship.
- player 2 is largely unaffected on their existing ships, but will have to think seriously about buying that Cutter now as it'll cost most of their spare cash
- player 3 goes from "can afford a Krait soon" to "will have to wait a few more months for it"
- player 4 has everything get considerably more difficult for them and even maintaining their Sidewinder may be a challenge to start with.

The majority of players are in categories 3 and 4. The majority of forum members are probably in categories 1 and 2, but that's a very different matter.
 
borderlands economy would work fine in this game.

Cost of items has a floor, once your income gets over a certain amount, the cost of all items for you scales with your income. This retains the balance of relative cost without having to care about absolute cost (and not having glitches/exploits in the rng of income sources create problems).

Simple fix for infinite money economies like this game has. Hurts nobody and is no less realistic than the current economy in terms of in-game lore.
 
Well, let me quote Artie once more.
Remember, the quote refers only to cmdrs updating their profiles on inara, and it reflects only cash and not assets and it was valid at the end of August 2019, before carriers were announced to be released in December. As a result of that announcement, in the following 2 months i jumped from position 3 (7% +) to bottom down (0.2% +)


Before somebody will get a "great" idea of mass-scraping Inara and get skewed data anyway (due users privacy settings):

I was asked for some numbers of Inara commanders credits earlier and there is the output. I think somebody put it here on the forum earlier, too.

Disclaimer: These data are just and only from Inara commanders updating their profiles and may not represent the actual game state at all. The sample size is around 100k commanders, the numbers are covering just the credits achieved (not the overall assets value) till end of August 2019.
  • ~ 82% commanders are having less than 1 billion in credits
  • ~ 18% are having more than 1 billion in credits
  • ~ 7% are having more than 2 billions in credits
  • ~ 2% are having more than 5 billions
  • ~ 0.7% are having more than 10 billions
  • ~ 0.2% are having more than 20 billions
I hope this helps. ;)
 
As mentioned earlier, it's not new - however it's not necessarily "fun" either.

Very much this.

Sounds like a recipe for turning the game into a second job - if any real-time related costs were implemented or degradation of ranks - which would have a detrimental effect on those who play the game occasionally.

Indeed. This thread is a very convoluted and work intensive way of shutting down the games servers. I might be an oddity, but i work during my worktime and play games to have fun. I wonder what you can learn about players who want their games to actually be work...
 
borderlands economy would work fine in this game.

Cost of items has a floor, once your income gets over a certain amount, the cost of all items for you scales with your income. This retains the balance of relative cost without having to care about absolute cost (and not having glitches/exploits in the rng of income sources create problems).

Simple fix for infinite money economies like this game has. Hurts nobody and is no less realistic than the current economy in terms of in-game lore.
Yeah that's not how the Borderlands economy even works. The biggest investments in that game are the SDUs, which have static pricing.
 
.. I'm not sure but Frontier may already be doing it in their Zoo/Fairground games ...

They do in Jurassic World, have to refill the feeder every hour, just micro-managing annoying. Read the threads from the other games to see how much fun micro-managing in a game like these are, they just get in the way of the game and actually doing stuff. Some people get genuinely stressed out by the constant upkeep getting in the way.
 
Yeah that's not how the Borderlands economy even works. The biggest investments in that game are the SDUs, which have static pricing.


Ammo/consumables/guns/shields/etc, respawning (insurance rebuy) do work that way as a mixture of rank + bank account scaling. The point is, it's not hard to keep relative cost maintained and thus, the function of using credits as a balance mechanism without harming poor players or punishing players who rake in much more. Maintaining the relevancy of credits as a balance mechanic is integral. The current method fdev is using doesn't do that ...at all.
 
They do in Jurassic World, have to refill the feeder every hour, just micro-managing annoying. Read the threads from the other games to see how much fun micro-managing in a game like these are, they just get in the way of the game and actually doing stuff. Some people get genuinely stressed out by the constant upkeep getting in the way.

After they patched it and added extended feeders. At release you had to refill them about ever 5 minutes I think.

JWE has the magic of Jurassic Park, but the gameplay of a F2P mobile game. Wait 2min for the expedition team to return, wait 50sec to extract DNA from the fossil, wait 10min for the dinosaur to hatch, wait 5min to research a new modification, your income is X, wait Y minutes to be able to buy Z.

You can't automate stuff like feeders so you have at least something to do while you wait.
 
JWE has the magic of Jurassic Park, but the gameplay of a F2P mobile game. Wait 2min for the expedition team to return, wait 50sec to extract DNA from the fossil, wait 10min for the dinosaur to hatch, wait 5min to research a new modification, your income is X, wait Y minutes to be able to buy Z.

You can't automate stuff like feeders so you have at least something to do while you wait.

The F2P example, spot on. For me this is one of the main 'formula' for games, its just a matter of how long you wait for 'the expedition to return', how long you wait for the 'dinosaur to hatch' and how long your 'research' takes. A lot of games have this X, Y, Z format. Its a successful format, the player gets rewarded for achievements or time invested or getting more skilful and so the player is always involved (is the idea).

F2P usually do it on a miniscule timescale, at least at first, something to click or collect every 15s - 2mins. Because theres no real 'depth' to the game, it plays more like a fruit machine (one armed bandit, gambling/gaming machine) lots of immediate responses and signals to keep the brain involved. That's why Candy Crush et al are so addictive, they act on the brain in the same way as gambling does and its not accidental.

Other games are completely different. A football is just a ball, a pack of playing cards are just 52 different pictures and numbers. With these games you make your own rules and do whatever the heck you want and everybody plays differently or you can sit there and look at it and say theres no gameplay because 'theres nothing to do, its a mile wide an inch deep'. These are the sandbox games. JW has a version and hoorah you can turn on 'auto-fill feeders'.

Elite 1984 was a sandbox, pure and simple. It changed the rules and is still doing it today, its the game other games aspire to be. Elite Dangerous they have added some more content but its still a sandbox. If you don't want to play a sandbox game that has worked since 1984 then there are literally millions of other games out there. They aren't building a game, they are building a simulated living, breathing galaxy that we can be a part of.

Football - Playing Cards - Elite. 2 of them have lasted for centuries because theyre a sandbox, one has only lasted 35 years so far....
 
Nice post.
The 'loot-box-type'/gambling-addiction that has infiltrated the game since Horizons still grates.
Interested to see how far it will pervade future content.
Seems to have become a standard ED mechanic.
I guess for good (commercial) reasons?
 
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