Accept trading in-game gp with real dollars

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drinn

drinn

Grandmaster
These days players are trading real money to donation coins, which they then change to in-game money (gp).

But it does not happen vice versa, why?

You are lucky enough to get a rare item in-game, but you are deciding, if you want it to be sold for in-game money, or real money. When at Europa OSI people were allowed to sell in-game stuff in real life for real money. My friend sold some epic necklace for something like $400. Getting real money from games like Ultima Online... could be nice!

The fact is that today UO Forever is the largest shard out there and even / much bigger than any those official OSIs. Also we should face the fact that UO is an old game from year 1997. How do we keep this alive forever?

We all know that economy is a *****. In real life, or in-game. Its changing all the time even just in-game like, if we check donation coins. Not a moment ago they were going at 150-185k, but now suddenly at 190-200k? It's investing, if trading is done vice versa.

This would be interesting to see how economy runs between digital and real life.

EDIT: We could test this first with skill & power scrolls as if WoW got those boost packs.
 
G

Grizard

Adept
Didn't Diablo test this out a while ago? What you would find is that the low income country's with gold miners would start mining gold / champs etc and absolutely ruin the server.
 
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drinn

drinn

Grandmaster
Grizard said:
Didn't Diablo test this out a while ago? What you would find is that the chinese would start mining gold / champs etc and absolutely ruin the server.
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http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-32232608

Real money trade hits World of Warcraft game

The exchange rate for dollars fell by almost a third on the first day that Blizzard let people swap real cash for game gold.

At launch, players could spend $20 (£13) to get 30,000 gold coins to spend on gear in the fantasy game world. But 24 hours later the same amount of cash netted players about 20,000. Before now the only way that World of Warcraft players could artificially boost the fortunes of their characters was by visiting a grey-market site and surreptitiously buying gold from unlicensed vendors.

"It doesn't spell doom," he said. "Blizzard is trialling something new. They went in high to see what would happen, and there's going to be a whole lot of fluctuation as a game with a population of several million adapts to it.

"I'm sure the long-term plan is simply to bring more transactions within Blizzard's purview, and in doing so potentially reduce the influence of gold farmers and keep people playing for longer," he added.
 
Karl Sagan

Karl Sagan

Grandmaster
Can't compare a subscription game with a free to play one. The UOF business model revolves around dono coin purchases, and the result is the product and paid staff. Business wise it makes total sense.

I remember selling craploads of houses for dono coins, I'm certain this policy drives investment in the server.
 
Smokey McCallum

Smokey McCallum

Grandmaster
Would it be legal to have real world money exchanging hands for in game gold officially on UOF? The game isnt owned by the server and is probably also the reason that money we give to the shard is in the form of "donations" and not subscription charges or pay to play.
 
thriftyuoplayer

thriftyuoplayer

Grandmaster
Lord Hampton Royce said:
why they gotta be chinese?
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From a documentary I've seen before.

"Gold Farmers is a documentary that investigates the real money trade in the virtual world of online games(such as World of Warcraft), and portraits groups of Chinese young men who are making a living by playing online games. These young men are called gold farmers in the online games, and the in-game goods they produce are sold for real dollar to American gamers who need a short cut to success in the games. In this documentary, gold farmers describe how it feels to live at the border between the virtual and real, to mix play and work, and to interact with foreign gamers who they would never have the chance to meet if not for this globalized virtual world. We also hear conflicting views from various American gamers who are affected by this particular entanglement of the virtual and the real."

 
halygon

halygon

Grandmaster
drinni said:
These days players are trading real money to donation coins, which they then change to in-game money (gp).

But it does not happen vice versa, why?

You are lucky enough to get a rare item in-game, but you are deciding, if you want it to be sold for in-game money, or real money. When at Europa OSI people were allowed to sell in-game stuff in real life for real money. My friend sold some epic necklace for something like $400. Getting real money from games like Ultima Online... could be nice!

The fact is that today UO Forever is the largest shard out there and even / much bigger than any those official OSIs. Also we should face the fact that UO is an old game from year 1997. How do we keep this alive forever?

We all know that economy is a *****. In real life, or in-game. Its changing all the time even just in-game like, if we check donation coins. Not a moment ago they were going at 150-185k, but now suddenly at 190-200k? It's investing, if trading is done vice versa.

This would be interesting to see how economy runs between digital and real life.

EDIT: We could test this first with skill & power scrolls as if WoW got those boost packs.
Click to expand...
As said above, there is a difference between subscription and free-to-play games, so they cannot be compared too well for this.

Short answer:

When you have RL $$ go in one direction but not both, the in-game economy stays intact, but have it go both directions, the economy is adversely affected.
 
Weland

Weland

Grandmaster
Smokey McCallum said:
Would it be legal to have real world money exchanging hands for in game gold officially on UOF? The game isnt owned by the server and is probably also the reason that money we give to the shard is in the form of "donations" and not subscription charges or pay to play.
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Yea but if you like the server why not just donate and sell the donation coins? If this was allowed the people who buy dono strictly for that purpose, which I'm sure is a lot would just pay a player less $ for more gold because the people will sell gold for less than dono trades just for the sake of being competitive. With less donations comes a slower sever and I'm sure you can see the trickle effect.
 
Lazenby

Lazenby

Adept
Weland said:
Yea but if you like the server why not just donate and sell the donation coins? If this was allowed the people who buy dono strictly for that purpose, which I'm sure is a lot would just pay a player less $ for more gold because the people will sell gold for less than dono trades just for the sake of being competitive. With less donations comes a slower sever and I'm sure you can see the trickle effect.
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In other words, anything that might cause people to donate less is bad. They are here to pinch every penny out of players possible, no other reason for the server. Look at the donation tiers, and the high end don items that have no place in a ftp game. It's too bad, but the server is not here for fun or for people to enjoy UO, but just to make profit. Which makes sense, it is the real world...Just too bad it wasn't more like I expected, just a bunch of UO fans that want people to enjoy the game. That is what I thought when I came, but it is just about don coins and the bottom line.

Ps- On Lake Superior, my buddy sold his keep for 2500$ in 2004! I know people will sell their accounts when they are ready to quit, and at the point what do they care. I know one guy from TBA that sold account, then new guy logged on and first thing he did was lootethe guild.
I am sure if this wasn't a problem, we wouldn't have seen a huge post last week on this from the owner.
 
Weland

Weland

Grandmaster
Lazenby said:
In other words, anything that might cause people to donate less is bad. They are here to pinch every penny out of players possible, no other reason for the server. Look at the donation tiers, and the high end don items that have no place in a ftp game. It's too bad, but the server is not here for fun or for people to enjoy UO, but just to make profit. Which makes sense, it is the real world...Just too bad it wasn't more like I expected, just a bunch of UO fans that want people to enjoy the game. That is what I thought when I came, but it is just about don coins and the bottom line.

Ps- On Lake Superior, my buddy sold his keep for 2500$ in 2004! I know people will sell their accounts when they are ready to quit, and at the point what do they care. I know one guy from TBA that sold account, then new guy logged on and first thing he did was lootethe guild.
I am sure if this wasn't a problem, we wouldn't have seen a huge post last week on this from the owner.
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Servers aren't cheap. Donations drive the content upgrades and server costs. Yes it is a business in the long run but that business have offered a stable place to play UO for a long time without corruption or failing. It has a strong but whiny community, not directed at your previous comment I mean in general.

Also you are comparing your buddy with a subscription based game, OSI. So yes some one sold something in the game however the server and content was covered by the subscription. Shit has to get paid for man. I mean if you are rolling in money then make this server you speak of were people play for free and sell stuff for cash and you bare all the burden.
 
halygon

halygon

Grandmaster
Lazenby said:
In other words, anything that might cause people to donate less is bad. They are here to pinch every penny out of players possible, no other reason for the server. Look at the donation tiers, and the high end don items that have no place in a ftp game. It's too bad, but the server is not here for fun or for people to enjoy UO, but just to make profit. Which makes sense, it is the real world...Just too bad it wasn't more like I expected, just a bunch of UO fans that want people to enjoy the game. That is what I thought when I came, but it is just about don coins and the bottom line.

Ps- On Lake Superior, my buddy sold his keep for 2500$ in 2004! I know people will sell their accounts when they are ready to quit, and at the point what do they care. I know one guy from TBA that sold account, then new guy logged on and first thing he did was lootethe guild.
I am sure if this wasn't a problem, we wouldn't have seen a huge post last week on this from the owner.
Click to expand...
So you are saying that because we do not want to allow the shard's economy to go to the crapper by letting folks sell gold/dono/warez for RL money, the shard is only out to screw players out of money?

This shard is free to play - many players have never donated a dime, but have still enjoyed the same game as any other player. We have paid staff, and put in new content. We actively advertise and market UOF so that new players come, and most of all, the staff works tirelessly to bring a free game to the players so that they can experience what we feel is the best game ever made. Donation coins only help keep that all together by removing the worry of the hardware/resource costs out of the equation.

We do not agree that selling anything from UOF for RL money is beneficial to the shard, so it is not allowed.
 
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