[MUD-Dev] Re:(fwd) Re: Multiple currencies

[J C Lawrence]

On Wed, 3 Jun 1998 18:00:13 -0500 
Michael Willey<Michael.Willey at abnamro.com> wrote:

>> From: mwilley at my-dejanews.com

> Hey!  That's me! :)

Oops.

> [SNIP stuff about Dreamshadow's economy]

> Honestly, I'm glad you like the idea, and I'll tell Dainia you said
> so.

> It's by no means a perfect system, and in many ways more abstract
> and artificial than some of the systems I've seen discussed here in
> the past few weeks.  The only advantage we have here is that we're
> using multiple currency types and that the only real way to judge
> their value within the confines of the game is relative to each
> other.  That seems to create the illusion of a 'real' economy, which
> for our purposes is as good as having the real thing.

It is not actually a player currency -- there are no values created,
maintained, and manipulated by players.  Instead the system maintains
and manipulates token values, and allows players to intercept some of
those machinations.  This is a faucet->drain economy where tokens
magically appear at in-game production sites, wander thru various
mechanisms in the game world, and then magically dissappear later in
some token-consumer.  Which is of course how nearly all "economies" in
current MUDs work.

Constrast the use of special heads in Habitat.  Heads actually formed
a player-based and valued currency whose manipulation was entirely
within the the closed system of the game.  They were competed for,
highly values, trade, status, and display items, very much like the
Egg, but with the caveat that there was only one Egg and there were
many heads.  Similarly for Legend's "strings", or the guild hall
bolt-ons that Lambert recently referenced.  Those are real currencies,
and exist outside of any notion of script, coinage, or mechanical
models enforced in the game world by the Imps.  Instead they are
player constructed and valued constructs whose value exists in the
significance the players attach to them, and not in the in-game
mechanical model that supports them.

<delete LETSystem rousing cheer>

--
J C Lawrence                               Internet: claw at null.net
(Contractor)                               Internet: coder at ibm.net
---------(*)                     Internet: claw at under.engr.sgi.com
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