[MUD-Dev] Dgn: Currency free game [was: Blog about GDC implies changes to MMORPG population]

[Vincent Archer]

According to jbarry:

> A Tale in the Desert did something like that.  There was no game
> supported universal currency.  However, there was a technology
> that once researched gave the players the ability to build mints
> that could print paper scrips.  That opened up lots of interesting

Each mint could print one specific and guaranteed unique script. You
picked your scrip name, and no mint built, before or after, could
have the same name - absolutely preventing counterfeiting.

> it worth, how do you redeem them, etc.  There were two main
> currencies that were recognized.  One was based off of a basket of
> common resources(so each iron, copper, etc basket turned in to the
> bank got you 100 doodads), and one attempted to be valued off of
> time spent (so if collecting iron took 1 minute, when you turned
> an iron in to the bank you'd get 60 foobars).

The two main competing currencies were the TN, from central egypt,
and i-dont-really-remember, from 7 lakes area.

The TN was ingenious. It was based on a basket of 1 of each 4
different items: canvas (used in buildings), iron (used in lots of
tools), ash and potash (glass, for advanced structures). You could
bring N of each, and go away with N TN notes. Each item was
potentially interesting to anyone, making the idea of redeeming the
TN for an item set worth considering, but having 4 items meant it
was not a very productive idea to do so, unless you had need of each
of the 4 items at the same time.  So the TN was redeemable in
theory, but rarely redeemed in practice.

It was still moderately hard to get TN. The idea was to have local
branches, who would do hand out TN and come trade in volume at the
central mint once a week or so, but that system needed a commission
system to work (you had to burn lots of valuable "waypoint time" to
do so) and that never really worked.

Almost all major merchants took TN in trade or gave out TN, but the
bulk of their business was still in barter.

The economy would have exploded if the Trade Post structure could
work as an offline trader (set items max amounts, buy and sell
prices), but they worked as chat channels instead.

--
	Vincent Archer			Email:	archer at frmug.org

All men are mortal.  Socrates was mortal.  Therefore, all men are Socrates.
							(Woody Allen)
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