[MUD-Dev] Blacksnow revisted

[shren]

On Tue, 7 May 2002, Damion Schubert wrote:
>> shren wrote:
  
>> If I have a million dollar house next to two other million dollar
>> houses, and I sell my house to some guy on the street for 10
>> bucks and a cup of coffee, then the odds are that my old
>> neighbors are not going to be happy with thier new neighbor.  It
>> might be possible that the new resident will respect the house in
>> proportion to the value inherant in it.  It's just as likely that
>> the new resident will have wild parties at all hours and push
>> walls over just to hear the crashing sound they make.

> But the new resident did have to give something of value for it -
> he had to do some incredibly time-costly thing for you.  He has
> time but no money.
 
> People who buy characters for $300 do place a value on their
> characters.  Pretty explicitly, I might add.  Maybe they aren't
> the guys that organize the in-game bake sale, but they might be,
> and most people who spend $300 bucks for a character aren't likely
> to do something that will get them banned.

$300 is neither a high end or a low end figure.  If one were ever to
explicitly allow account sales prices would run much lower.

I offer this instance for your consideration.  Say I own a computer
game store.  I keep casual track of the MMORPG purchases of my
players.  Whenever a player who has bought an MMORPG before comes in
to buy a new one, I offer to give that player the new MMORPG for
half price if he'll trade in the account information on the old
MMORPG.

So, ya, I'm out a little on sales, but now I have accounts.  Dozens
of them.  I can become the worst troublemaker on the planet.  I can
use the TOS's "don't do this" as a checklist of things to try.  I
can kill, slay, steal, insult, and torment - when a game company
representitive shows up, I can get up in thier face, as well,
because I really don't care.  If they ban this account, I have a
dozen more in the wings, and more where they come from.

When considering allowing account transfer, like any other kind of
game mechanic, you have to consider not what the average player will
do, but what the worse players will do.  After all, the worst are
full of passionate intensity, you know.

--

 x                http://www.shren.net
 xxx
  x               "The Ancients were pretty clever with counterweights."

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