[MUD-Dev] Re: Black Snow Revisited

[Matt Mihaly]

On Fri, 29 Mar 2002, Norman Short wrote:

> Intuitively these policies sound downright anti-American, and anti
> business.  Not sure the government is going to be overly
> sympathetic.

How about we leave the jingoistic attitudes at the doorstep? This
list has members from many countries, and calling something
"anti-American" is hardly relevant or productive. Besides, there's
nothing wrong with being anti-American, and it's downright
anti-American to say there is. ;)

> I don't buy the "they'd have stayed longer if you didn't sell them
> an item" line.  Just as likely, and again would need to be
> determined in court, they would have quit earlier because they
> despaired of spending the time to acquire it.  You're like the
> studio industry when the VCR came about; trying to close legal
> loopholes and stop people from doing what they want and claiming
> the practice costs you money.  In fact the studios, despite
> themselves, found the Holy Grail of income from the home video
> market.  Matt Mihaly has already shown you the Grail in that you
> can make more money by selling the items yourself instead of just
> letting players fill the vacuum in providing a service they want
> and you wont provide.  Bad business on your part.

Well thank you, but there is also a fundamental difference in the
type of game that Achaea or Aetolia is, compared with EQ, DAoC,
etc. In those games, a very large portion of the gameplay is
oriented around the ole loot n' level mechanic. Since acquisition of
these items seems to be one of the major goals of the game, selling
them directly would result in a nastier effect than in Achaea, where
item acquisition is not really a goal for most players. You can't go
out and bash monsters and get all sorts of items. Only about 3 or 4
in the whole game even give you anything besides xp and gold when
you kill them. As Achaea and Aetolia are fundamentally PvP, the
power imbalances you get in the loot 'n level games aren't tenable.

The equivalent in Achaea might be something like selling political
offices to players, which would be outrageous. (Combat has a large
element of personal skill in it, and there's no way to sell people
that.) So, I think it's rather understandable that they haven't
chosen (yet) to sell some items. They will though, because our
business model rocks, and the natural evolution for them will be to
combine subscription and retail models. That's not going to
eliminate the problem of people selling things on Ebay though, as I
certainly don't see loot n' level games selling everything you could
previously get only by playing the game (or going to Ebay). Selling
success does not make for happy players.
 
> In the end, even if you guys were 100% right about your legal
> rights and your ability to tell people what they can do 24/7
> outside your service, you're still losers.

Take a deep breath and go to your happy place please.

> Plug a hole here, a dozen spout up somewhere else.  You're just
> trying to prevent players from doing something they can easily do
> and want to do.  Lets not forget you've never tried to assert
> these rights in court.  My guess is you're afraid to; afraid that
> the results might give players a right or two you'd like to deny
> them.

They've never had to assert their rights in court, because they've
never been sued over them. You don't just walk into court and
scream," HEY ACKNOWLEDGE MY RIGHTS, EVEN THOUGH NO ONE HAS
CHALLENGED THEM!"


--matt

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