[DESIGN] Re: Economic & Currency Solutions (was RE: [Mud-Dev] Broken currencies)

[Derek Licciardi]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> Marian Griffith
> Sent: Saturday, April 07, 2001 5:41 PM
> To: Mud Dev Mailing list
> Subject: [DESIGN] Re: Economic & Currency Solutions (was RE: [Mud-Dev]
> Broken currencies)

> In <URL:/archives/meow?group+local.muddev> on Thu 05 Apr, Derek Licciardi wrote:

>> Using that value when you spawn a monster, it is possible to
>> determine just how much money the mob can 'request' from the game
>> treasury.  If there is not enough in the treasury, the mob only
>> gets what it can.  Keep in mind that spawning of monsters should in
>> some way also increase the available gold in the game treasury.
>> The thought here is that mobs use currency in their own everyday
>> lives before being beat upon by players.  The use of money tends to
>> make more money available as a whole.

> What will happen if you do this is either nothing changes. The
> amount of money in the gameworld climbs extremely fast.  Or the
> monters very soon cease to carry any gold at all because the players
> have looted every last bit of the available money, and are sitting
> on it.  The best thing to do in a mud is not to implement money at
> all, and let the players work out their currency, as they will
> anyway. You can not have money before you have trade.  Money
> basically allows you to trade with somebody who either has what you
> want, or wants what you have, without the reverse necessarily being
> true.  Mud gold is a poor way to do this, mostly because once you
> get past the newbie stages of the game there is not enough worthwile
> to purchase.  Those who have the things that -you- want, will want
> to have things in return that are useful to -them-, which you can
> not obtain.  I.e. you would like to have the sword of slaying, but
> the player who has it only wants to give it up for something better,
> like the sword of ultimate doom.  If you could deliver that you
> obviously would not need the sword of slaying in the first place.

> So trade only happens at the highest level, and only if there is
> suf- ficient distinction between pieces of equipment that exchanging
> them is worthwile. If there is an ultimate collection then players
> are go- ing to want that and nothing else.  If you have a lot of
> class or job specific equipment, preferably of a type that only
> those not of that class or job can easily obtain then, yes, you will
> see trade. Other- wise the only type of trade you are going to see
> is "aid". One player helps another player to fight a particularly
> difficult or dangerous monsters, in exchange for some piece of
> equipment. That is trade also but not of a type that requires gold
> or mud currency.

Not sure that I agree with you entirely.  You have reduced the
dynamics of trade, currency and economy to a single dimension system
where everything revolves around items.  Players need money in a game
for various reasons as designed by the developers of the game.  I
believe someone brought up the true reason why players trade items
instead of money in the later stages of their game lives.  The primary
reason for this is a function of inflation.  If a player sells an item
for gold and inflation keeps rising at the rates we see in most muds,
then the gold they hold today won't be worth as much when they want to
buy something to replace what was sold.  Since items are more
inflation proof, rampant inflation tends to lead to items being used
as the basis for trade due to their increased financial stability.

The availability of money only adds to the inflation trend much in the
same way as it does in the real world.  If the feds print money like
the Mexicans did in the 90s, then we would see the dollar plummet in
value much in the same way as the peso declined then.

Given even these two variables we can see that the system has to be
more dynamic(there are many more variables).  The more dynamic you
make the system, the larger the requirement is for being able to
administer that system and keep it operating in a healthy manner.  My
suggestion about using some sort of index to monitor the health of the
world would need to be implemented along with the appropriate tools to
adjust the rate of money creation as needed to correct the economy.
>From that standpoint, the index is nothing more than a mud
administrators tool and an overal guage on the health of the economy.

Given the state of affairs in many muds today, this has to be
something of a step forward because most muds do not report a single
thing on their economy and the current/historical state of it.  They
can tell you complete logs of commands, mobs fought, combat, and a
slew of other things, but how to beat the inflation rate is usually a
fact that is accepted as unalterable.  I guess I don't agree and am
looking to figure out how to manage it.

Derek Licciardi

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