Salt on sale cheap in the Aetherplex.

Steingrim

Salt on sale cheap in the Aetherplex.

Clearly, a lot of people are puzzled when I ask them to consider the emergent behavior of their requests and to put forward specific and well thought out and details plans of implimentation.

For sometime the Admin notably @Estarra has been talking about commodies in shops decaying.

In some way I do not understand presumably this would be a ‘good thingTM’ for the game.

So after calls on the market to sell salt, I have put some up on the market. I have priced these at 1000 gold and I am unsure if they’re over or under priced.

Ourina has some up for the same price before me.

Now, some of you may be doing some math and trying to figure out what you think is fair and I assume many of you think 1k is crazy.

But here’s the thing. How much does it even cost me to produce salt if excess gems in a shop decay?

How much will it cost me in the future if people are cutting gems and throwing away gemstones and power stones just to produce more salt?

Is this an intended consequence of these sort of changes or are they simply emergent behavior?

If I do not have ready on hand commodites for other crafted items (because I can’t really keep a good backstock) then am I more or less likely to produce extra items to sell.

If I switch over to jeweler to make a cube and I more or less likely to make other items if I can simply run to my shop and pick up the commodities I need than if I have to sit there cutting gems some of which I will (given past history of gem sales) probably have to toss?  

Am I more or less likely to make random craft items if the prices of comms are all over the place and I have to use a spreadsheet to figure out my costs? And should I even bother if the price on those comms are going to bottom out or go though the roof?

>>>

It used to be that one could ride out these price and scarcity issues by planning ahead and looking for deals on comms. Decay of comms in shops kills this.

Now, I wonder if it is a mistake for me to have those 1000 salt up for sale for 1000 gold each. I wonder if I will regret just not keeping them for my own use and let all the other players fend for themselves.

Lycidas

I can be wrong, but I think the aim was to make the commodity shops in the orgs have a decay, not personal shops, and raw commodities at that. Though if my suggestion for the Timequakes go through, the Beauty Project will bypass the issue of lack of salt ,etc.

Steingrim

Estarra said:

We can certainly look at adjusting valuation and whatnot, but my tests seemed like it was pretty fair. I think 1000 commodities returned like ~80-90 charges which could then be broken down to gold and comms so the conversion was what I thought was a fair rate.

I'm sorry if you didn't like the idea! This was a pet project of mine and didn't distract from timequake coding at all (i.e., Orael didn't spend any time on it). I felt it was important as a commodity sink and part of balancing the economy which is what I've been looking at, as next I want to start capping commodity stores and decaying comms outside of rifts. I'm really not the one to work on coding mages if that's what your concern was. Our coding resources is basically Orael and he's focused on timequakes->artifacts->reports->mages in the near future, but that doesn't mean I'm incapable of doing side projects which, as I said, is focused on the economy.

Bolded relevant part by me.

Kethaera

Steingrim said:

Estarra said:

We can certainly look at adjusting valuation and whatnot, but my tests seemed like it was pretty fair. I think 1000 commodities returned like ~80-90 charges which could then be broken down to gold and comms so the conversion was what I thought was a fair rate.

I'm sorry if you didn't like the idea! This was a pet project of mine and didn't distract from timequake coding at all (i.e., Orael didn't spend any time on it). I felt it was important as a commodity sink and part of balancing the economy which is what I've been looking at, as next I want to start capping commodity stores and decaying comms outside of rifts. I'm really not the one to work on coding mages if that's what your concern was. Our coding resources is basically Orael and he's focused on timequakes->artifacts->reports->mages in the near future, but that doesn't mean I'm incapable of doing side projects which, as I said, is focused on the economy.

Bolded relevant part by me.

Hmm... I think I'm ok with that.

Steingrim

Kethaera said:

Steingrim said:

Estarra said:

We can certainly look at adjusting valuation and whatnot, but my tests seemed like it was pretty fair. I think 1000 commodities returned like ~80-90 charges which could then be broken down to gold and comms so the conversion was what I thought was a fair rate.

I'm sorry if you didn't like the idea! This was a pet project of mine and didn't distract from timequake coding at all (i.e., Orael didn't spend any time on it). I felt it was important as a commodity sink and part of balancing the economy which is what I've been looking at, as next I want to start capping commodity stores and decaying comms outside of rifts. I'm really not the one to work on coding mages if that's what your concern was. Our coding resources is basically Orael and he's focused on timequakes->artifacts->reports->mages in the near future, but that doesn't mean I'm incapable of doing side projects which, as I said, is focused on the economy.

Bolded relevant part by me.

Hmm... I think I'm ok with that.

Okay, why? What does it add?

Kethaera

Steingrim said:

Kethaera said:

Steingrim said:

Estarra said:

We can certainly look at adjusting valuation and whatnot, but my tests seemed like it was pretty fair. I think 1000 commodities returned like ~80-90 charges which could then be broken down to gold and comms so the conversion was what I thought was a fair rate.

I'm sorry if you didn't like the idea! This was a pet project of mine and didn't distract from timequake coding at all (i.e., Orael didn't spend any time on it). I felt it was important as a commodity sink and part of balancing the economy which is what I've been looking at, as next I want to start capping commodity stores and decaying comms outside of rifts. I'm really not the one to work on coding mages if that's what your concern was. Our coding resources is basically Orael and he's focused on timequakes->artifacts->reports->mages in the near future, but that doesn't mean I'm incapable of doing side projects which, as I said, is focused on the economy.

Bolded relevant part by me.

Hmm... I think I'm ok with that.

Okay, why? What does it add?

That it limits the amount of commodities that can be hoarded and creates scarcity. The problem I have at the moment is the ease of gathering certain commodities(gems) for these trades, and the surplus it creates in others(cut gems) that no one wants right now. At least if they decayed there would always be a practical limit on the amount(and a reason to turn them into other products). But, it's hard to say at the moment, with salt prices the way they are and all the gem mining. I don't know yet, I'll give it a few days.

Lycidas

You bolded exactly what I'm talking about as well. Personal shops are going to be fine, THEY USE SHOP RIFTS. So unless you're chucking your riftables on the stockroom floor, you're not effected.

Steingrim

Kethaera said:

Steingrim said:

Okay, why? What does it add?

That it limits the amount of commodities that can be hoarded and creates scarcity. The problem I have at the moment is the ease of gathering certain commodities(gems) for these trades, and the surplus it creates in others(cut gems) that no one wants right now. At least if they decayed there would always be a practical limit on the amount(and a reason to turn them into other products). But, it's hard to say at the moment, with salt prices the way they are and all the gem mining. I don't know yet, I'll give it a few days.

Yes, it adds scarcity to the system that some thought broken before even this phase.

What's the emergent behavior from being inconvenienced. Certainly, some will wait, but, if the past is any indication some will just log out and move on.

Enough scarcity and you create hording. Why use up commodities if you need them for yourself? Already seen with some when it comes to salt.

One of the downsides of Lusternia's system is it doesn't allow substitutions. Beef to high, use chicken. No bloodstones, use ruby.

You know what else scarcity causes, speculation.

Cheap readily available commodities means it isn't worth it for most people to bother to manipulate the market. Introduce scarcity and it is suddenly far more worthwhile.

This is all apart from, hey, admin, how about you not screw over players who plan in advance and try to play their characters as if they're actual merchants.

@Estarra you shouldn't decay them. You should make a merchant and buy back at a fair price. But, I still suspect you're simply trading one set of trade problems for another set.

Kethaera

Steingrim said:

Enough scarcity and you create hording. Why use up commodities if you need them for yourself? Already seen with some when it comes to salt.

Just on this part: Because I don't want them to decay. With cut gems, specifically, it's time and effort gone down the drain when I could turn the excess into jewelry and then sell that. That's what I plan to do at the moment, anyway. 

Steingrim

Kethaera said:

Steingrim said:

Enough scarcity and you create hording. Why use up commodities if you need them for yourself? Already seen with some when it comes to salt.

Just on this part: Because I don't want them to decay. Witcut gems, specifically, it's time and effort gone down the drain when I could turn the excess into jewelry and then sell that. That's what I plan to do at the moment, anyway. 

Shops hold very few pieces of jewelery compared to gems. I personally have little interesting in spreadsheeting out designs to try to have a list of what designs use what gems with no guarantee those items would even sell.

The chore level of doing trades seem to be really shooting up.

Here's another emergent behavior for you. Do one not sell gems at all in their shop because they want to use the shop rift to hold reserves?

Ayisdra

Lycidas said:

You bolded exactly what I'm talking about as well. Personal shops are going to be fine, THEY USE SHOP RIFTS. So unless you're chucking your riftables on the stockroom floor, you're not effected.

This is what many people do with how quick a rift can fill up. For example, a stack of 10,000 comms (of the same comm) only counts as 1 item towards the stocklimit when on the stockroom floor (when grouped).  This would effect people because it is outside their shoprift.

Dys

@Estarra you shouldn't decay them. You should make a merchant and buy back at a fair price. 

This is what the gnomish aethertraders do, they take commodities out of the system by letting people swap them for aethergoop. The rate seems fair to me.

Kethaera

Steingrim said:

Kethaera said:

Steingrim said:

Enough scarcity and you create hording. Why use up commodities if you need them for yourself? Already seen with some when it comes to salt.

Just on this part: Because I don't want them to decay. Witcut gems, specifically, it's time and effort gone down the drain when I could turn the excess into jewelry and then sell that. That's what I plan to do at the moment, anyway. 

Shops hold very few pieces of jewelery compared to gems. I personally have little interesting in spreadsheeting out designs to try to have a list of what designs use what gems with no guarantee those items would even sell.

The chore level of doing trades seem to be really shooting up.

Here's another emergent behavior for you. Do one not sell gems at all in their shop because they want to use the shop rift to hold reserves?

No one said you had to. My plan was to use whatever was left over to make simple rings and enchant them. :shrug:

I don't understand the need to hoard reserves. We have comm shops and personal rifts. Anything I'm not using or planning to use in the next two weeks is fair game for selling.

Esoneyuna

Lycidas said:

You bolded exactly what I'm talking about as well. Personal shops are going to be fine, THEY USE SHOP RIFTS. So unless you're chucking your riftables on the stockroom floor, you're not effected.

Shop rift limits are far to low to effectively supply a good running store. Which often results in people dropping their crafting supply on floors until they can switch to the trade or find a tradesperson to slave away for them. Admitting it all depends on the decay time off comms but chasing away the few good storekeepers we have isn't really going to help the game.

I actually fear for things like Illuminati flesh which are commodity like, if they are going to include those in the decay be it intentional or accidental I think I'll just quit Lusternia altogether. (mainly cause this is already a needlessly idiotic high maintenance mechanic that adds no value to the game)

Now that the aethermerchant system is active for a few days I do anticipate one effect: People are going to design things specifically to min-max the system. Low quality design for cheap goop. How awesome!

I also fear the implementation for forgers, for steel heavy designs I already have to charge over 25k gold for a weapon (even though their is a shitload of steel!). Weapons are pretty basic need for warriors. Making steel more scarce will result in higher prices, in increasing the price even more. And while yes I can easily make 80k an hour without breaking a sweat, a novice/low level player can not and at increased prices I will no longer be interested in supplying free things to help others who might not stick around or change orgs because if the admins don't give a shit why should I.

Now all these things can obviously be preempted by first providing us reliable methods to generate all comms, including the metals by questing / influencing / hunting and you have to chose will I go for gold hunting, comm hunting or essence (offering) hunting. In fact I would even promote getting rid of comm tides to orgs if these were available also fixing one of the biggest issues of not owning villages. But like always there is no total plan beforehand and it is once again a lets wing it system being used implementing systems next to each other.

Steingrim

Dys said:

@Estarra you shouldn't decay them. You should make a merchant and buy back at a fair price. 

This is what the gnomish aethertraders do, they take commodities out of the system by letting people swap them for aethergoop. The rate seems fair to me.

The time doesn't. I'm trying to figure out how long it might take someone to go though a lot of comms in that manner. 

If it is easy to do, why mess with selling things in a shop, if hard to do then it becomes a chore.

Not a fan of do this chore else lose your comms and that doesn't even address the frustration level of how long you might wait hoping you'd get a trade in.

Dys

Time? I'm not sure I follow. It takes me refining six greatrobes to reach unique, so about 750 comms and half a minute to sew. Then I can refine them anywhere so wander around as normal and when I notice my power is recharged I can do another refinement step.

Finding a gnomish trader does need either speed or a quiet time, so there's that but you can stock up on highly refined items now and they won't decay for RL years or sell them to others.

The gnomish trade value seems to be based on comms so using a comm heavy base item means you need less refinement. Like jewellery crowns or tailoring robes.

Lycidas

Aethershop rifts can effectively go up to 8k in storage, not sure about prime shops but going to assume it can be upgraded beyond base 2k somehow. We have some solutions that already exist to these problems as well. We have items that halt decay timers, just place that massive hoard stash as a group into said item, now only taking 1 slot! These posts say decay, so even if we give a lowball value of what a newbie tutorial vial gives, that's 24 game months. I think we'll be okay and this scarcity...scare is just a bunch of hype from lack of information.

Kistan

Speaking as a jeweller, I think the price that gnomes charge is scandalously low. Could not comment on other professions

Most stuff for jewellery can be picked up for free doing village commodity quests (which also give me daily credits and I have to do 40 of each because I am a demigod) then I can use those comms and gems (with hammer and chisel) to make me a selection of crown. They also give me salt. So I am spending no gold to get 80 buttons which then give me 960 unbound goop and 4000 gold

Jolanthe

Esoneyuna said:

Now all these things can obviously be preempted by first providing us reliable methods to generate all comms, including the metals by questing / influencing / hunting and you have to chose will I go for gold hunting, comm hunting or essence (offering) hunting. In fact I would even promote getting rid of comm tides to orgs if these were available also fixing one of the biggest issues of not owning villages. But like always there is no total plan beforehand and it is once again a lets wing it system being used implementing systems next to each other.

This is my one particular concern too, and also what I am potentially looking forward to most. Even before this I generally prefer going out of my way to produce my own comms, but it's simply not feasible/viable for metals, fruit, vegetables, grain, marble.

Steingrim

Dys said:

Time? I'm not sure I follow. It takes me refining six greatrobes to reach unique, so about 750 comms and half a minute to sew. Then I can refine them anywhere so wander around as normal and when I notice my power is recharged I can do another refinement step.

Finding a gnomish trader does need either speed or a quiet time, so there's that but you can stock up on highly refined items now and they won't decay for RL years or sell them to others.

The gnomish trade value seems to be based on comms so using a comm heavy base item means you need less refinement. Like jewellery crowns or tailoring robes.

I mean time to make and unload. I don't see anyone being able to dump thousands of comms in that way in a short period of time.

Steingrim

Salt all sold. Obviously, priced too low.

Esoneyuna

Lycidas said:

Aethershop rifts can effectively go up to 8k in storage, not sure about prime shops but going to assume it can be upgraded beyond base 2k somehow. We have some solutions that already exist to these problems as well. We have items that halt decay timers, just place that massive hoard stash as a group into said item, now only taking 1 slot! These posts say decay, so even if we give a lowball value of what a newbie tutorial vial gives, that's 24 game months. I think we'll be okay and this scarcity...scare is just a bunch of hype from lack of information.

Comms outside the rift have 11 game months at this time.

Your solution to fixing a broken economy is making it rely even more on artifacts, and here I thought a lot of people disliked the buy in value lusternia has. Also who will upgrade a shop rift when a city/commune can just take it away from them at any time they (CL/Chancellor) want.

Kistan

Wow! I feel bad about paying @Rancoura 50. Will make it up to her! 

Jolanthe

Kistan said:

Speaking as a jeweller, I think the price that gnomes charge is scandalously low. Could not comment on other professions

Most stuff for jewellery can be picked up for free doing village commodity quests (which also give me daily credits and I have to do 40 of each because I am a demigod) then I can use those comms and gems (with hammer and chisel) to make me a selection of crown. They also give me salt. So I am spending no gold to get 80 buttons which then give me 960 unbound goop and 4000 gold

Having just tried it and compared it to others, jewellers with hammers will always come out waaaaay ahead of all other professions with how many gems can be produced via gemcutting (assuming your ultimate end goal is always to burn things down into goop).

Gems are also way easier to actively produce en masse relative to other trades. I shudder to think of anyone burning loads of metal comms in forging in this manner, should a forger type be released.

I have aethertraders off and just checked market history - rubie royale had been on Crumkindivia for over forty minutes and he was still there for me to trade with. I started refining around midnight, so I got two refreshes in while refining up to max value. 1000~ emeralds and power for 80 buttons. Cah-rayzhay.

Keahi

What I love is that this new system, and things like planned scuppering of any commodities, is of immense benefit to people in a few trades, and of nothing but detriment to people in others. Days before this wonderful aethertrading was introduced, I decided that I would go bookbinding, and I sank in a huge amount of lessons/credits to get to a point where I could make kirigami. Now, I have a trade that doesn't make aetherjunk that can be converted to aethergoop, and someone in Hallifax must have figured out that there's a cheap design involving leather, because the comm shop is pretty consistently ransacked of it. But even buying when I can, I'm pretty fast going to hit 2000 vellum, and 2000 leather, and while I don't have a shop I know from past experience that origami is one of the worst items in terms of comm/space ratio (3-4 vellum per, and depending on artis that's 1-4 leather). Then I can sell them for... what, 50-60 gold if I'm lucky? Meanwhile a jeweller can take gems, make cut gems that they can turn into crappy jewellery and then refine, or salt that they can sell for apparently greater than 1000gp -each-, and then the refined jewellery can be traded away for what sounds like close to 1000 goop. And how do I get more leather once the shop is empty? I can go cow hunting, I guess, but in my experience there's like 10 cows at any given time, and they're usually all following someone with a cowbell and a husky puppy. If I could, eventually, stock spare leather or vellum in a shop, I might eventually get ahead! But that's harmful to the economy somehow, so now I'm back to having a worthless trade that basically only exists for the RP value of playing a dog who likes origami. And it's not like the admin have built up a great deal of confidence that they have any clue what a functioning economy looks like in this game. While Estarra might be keen to royally screw things over in the short term, it's probably going to take coding to "fix" things, and we know that Orael's coding services are taken up on Timequakes/Mage rework/Something else that will be a bigger priority.

Rancoura

Kistan said:

Wow! I feel bad about paying @Rancoura 50. Will make it up to her! 

@Kistan don't worry about it! I didn't want to bother working out the actual value at the time and am fine with what I sold it for 

Lycidas

Esoneyuna said:

Comms outside the rift have 11 game months at this time.

Your solution to fixing a broken economy is making it rely even more on artifacts, and here I thought a lot of people disliked the buy in value lusternia has. Also who will upgrade a shop rift when a city/commune can just take it away from them at any time they (CL/Chancellor) want.

Good to know about comm decay timers, tossed out a number because well, I can't very well just go verify it. It wasn't my solution or advocating it, just that we -do- have things for people who wish to hoard away amounts beyond a rift. And sure, never said that you have to upgrade an org shop rift, just that you could. The main point of that statement was more for manse shops that only you control. If you need to store away more than 10k of a comm (2k personal 8k manse shop rift) then I don't think suggesting a non-decay container, which they probably already have, is much of a stretch.