Player Economy 3.10 - Player Time ROI

BUTUZ · Aug 10, 2020

Yeh I remember when people were buying UEC with real money and I was thinking this is a REALLY bad idea as it would be so easy for the UEC to be devalued in game for economic reasons.

If you spend £1000 on ships it is always worth something to you or others as it has inherent value - a hull c will always be a good cargo ship and a vanguard will always be a good fighter.

Wheras, if you spent that £1000 on UEC and say - you got a million UEC for it (i cant remember the ratio they were selling) well you've got a really bad deal now, as UEC has already been devalued a lot, a million UEC will now get you a basic starter ship, not a vanguard and not a hull c!!!

Michael · Aug 10, 2020

Well currently there seems to be a big disparity between certain types of occupations. (plus the obvious bugs)

I agree that certain missions are not worth your time, especially if you have a advanced ship. And if you're in a "cheap" ship you might feel disappointed by the amount of UEC you actually make, compared to other players..

Todd Papy said they have a" rough value in mind how much players should achieve with certain kind of ships".
Also they want it to be "hard to earn your new ship".

Looks like they are aiming for this:
Starters: ~10-15k UEC/h -> box missions, other easy missions (Aurora, Mustang)
Advanced Starters: ~15-30k UEC/h -> easier combat missions (300s, Avenger)
Professional ships: ~ 30-100k UEC/H -> Mining, Trade, advanced combat missions (SH, Vanguard, Prospector)
High End: ~ 100k+ UEC/H -> Currently only Trade (and maybe mining?) (Mole?, Caterpillar)

Assuming this is right it will take you:
50 h to go from starter to advanced starter
80 h to go from advanced to professional
60 h to go from professional to High end (current high end)

This to me looks fine IF we had a full working persistent game.

But i think there is also more underlying issue:
- Currently there is still no real Multicrew experience
- There is no real reason todo certain stuff as a team and earn more money (beside some missions)
- we don't really have the ability to do spontanous Multicrew missions (server size) (outside of events)
- A lot missions are bugged so you won't recieve your full payment.
- having the ability to sell ingame earned ships (so you can grind your way up)
- There is no real risk/reward outside server stability
- There is no ...

I still hope that Tony Z and his Quantas will solve some of those problems we currently see by simply creating a request and demand system.
If no one does Box missions prices should go up. If everybody does them prices go down. (Same for mining, trade, BH, Salvaging etc)

I never understood people people argueing with UEC/real money comparision. If so every whale should by only Capital ships and melt the rest.

Deroth · Aug 10, 2020

There's so much wrong with the in-game economy right now it is staggering.
I'm really hoping that when they start adding new systems they do a massive overhaul of the economy as the way it currently is I don't see it scaling well.

Cugino83 · Aug 10, 2020

Hmm I've backed SC back in 2016, at that time thare was almost nothing to do, just some mission for reactivating the com arrary that pays you 100 aUAC, while an FPS weapon and a personal armor cost, more or less like they cost today. At that time my feeling ware of corse like "man this will take forever to gate that kind of money, is only grinding like every other MMO I've seen...."

Then CIG introduce a bit more mission and you could afford an armor and a FPS weapon quite easily, but still the ship modification cost way to much to be obtained, and back then when you lose a ship and reclaim it ALL of your invesment in it was gone... again the feeling was the same as before...

Then GIC introduce even more game loops, PvP bounty, claim jumper, mining... and now we can get enoght money to suite our ship in a reasonable amount of time....
Still there is also some feeling that "ogh it will tkae forever to get the money for a ship"...

Welltanks to the COVID situation I've played a LOT of SC in this monts, at mid of 3.8 I've start to grind to reach the 2.5 milions aUAC required for the Prospector in-game, it take me a LOT doing that, like 3 monts, but then I've bought it, and in a couple of monts I've been able to buy in-game a Sabre and a Vanguard and fully set then as I've like.

Now I totally agree that lots of mission are totally unbalance for the pay (I mean a claimjumper mission pay just a little more then a simple FTL long rage delivery, but with way more risk and expensive.... something not right...), still there is a pattern in there and I'm totally confident that CIG will introduce in the future a lot of way to allow new player to gring money quick enoght to not feel frustrated.

Just think at the possibility of the salvaginggame play: you'll just need a multi tool and some cargo space to be able to salvage some components from a crash site and make, with little to no afford, a good amount of money...

Starscribe · Aug 10, 2020

DirectorGunner said:
I normally do not take the time to comment on .....
What do you think?

Upvoted.

BUTUZ · Aug 10, 2020

Cugino83 said:
Welltanks to the COVID situation I've played a LOT of SC in this monts, at mid of 3.8 I've start to grind to reach the 2.5 milions aUAC required for the Prospector in-game, it take me a LOT doing that, like 3 monts, but then I've bought it, and in a couple of monts I've been able to buy in-game a Sabre and a Vanguard and fully set then as I've like.

Just be careful thinking you buy everything in game right now - there could still be wipes on major patches and thus your prospector, sabre and vanguard could dissapear. I really advise against grinding right now.

Cugino83 · Aug 10, 2020

BUTUZ said:
Just be careful thinking you buy everything in game right now - there could still be wipes on major patches and thus your prospector, sabre and vanguard could dissapear. I really advise against grinding right now.

I know, but there will be also a wipe before the beta release... so?
I'm still playing the game, enjoing it and get confident with the ships I plan to have in to future (in-game purchase)...
I don't expect to be a final situation, but since that is what it is right now I get what I can from it, I'm not plan to wait for years before enjoy the game at full, I do it right now for what it is...

Doyzer · Aug 10, 2020

Agree. I bought $150 aUEC years ago and that only buys an Aurora in game. Unfortunately, CS won't let you melt aUEC purchases. Win some, Lose some.

NaffNaffBobFace · Aug 10, 2020

I personally think as it's still Alpha there will be things they want players to test which they artificially make incentives for without neccicerily telling us what/why.

Look at it this way: When Scrap comes in, they will of course want players to test the mechanic to bits. But unless you are super-focused on that being your role in the final game, they are not going to get a huge number of takers, so how to encourage people to try it? Make scraper ships affordable and easily rentable, make the return on scrap crazy high, make the return on other things not scrap related stupid low.

If they spend three years making a mechanic and when the time comes for the players to test it everyone keeps doing missions and their favorite trade runs they are not getting out of the players what they let us access the alpha for.

And of course telling the player base "Can you test that please... but act natural" you'll get a lot of creative testing trying to break the mechanic, but it will be minus the hum-drum everyday which could be hiding an infrequent but game-breaking bug that could slip through to the final game.

I can't prove the above, but if I was running the show, that's how i'd try to be steering the herd of cats that is the playerbase to what I need testing.

Bambooza · Aug 10, 2020

I am confused. Why are so many complaining about the economy when so many loops that contribute to it are not even in the game yet nor will anything earned in the game carry over or even possibly survive the next patch.

The good news is they are collecting lots of player activities in the game and charting out how fast players are able to aquire wealth which when they start to balance this aspect of the game should allow them to scale correctly with their intended goals. I strongly feel is way to early to start complaining about how quickly you can earn UEC towards what ever ship purchase you are after. Once all of the game loops are in place or its in beta then would be the time to talk about the pace of wealth income along with the risk/reward aspects.

Bambooza · Aug 11, 2020

DirectorGunner said:
Great points,
to rehash
#1 I am biased against the ship to aUEC to purchased UEC disparity, I explained why
#2 which then compels me to say something when people say they are leaving this game and going back to Ark or whatever, or streamers I follow and people in their chats having the same mentality or at the very least the same major complaint.

So while sure I agree with you, there is a balance to achieve in keeping backers and would-be new backers in the community. We'll always lose some to attrition that may or may not come back, but when it becomes overwhelmingly apparent there is a problem, well... like I wrote, I don't know the outcome :P
It reminds me of Anthem with not valuing player time invested. Regardless of wipes.

I would say they should lower the current prices of ship and ship parts in the game in favor of testing but I fear what the players reaction would be when they were brought into line with the overall game time investment intent.

But even then there is a strong desire with in players to find some sort of metric that defines win and then strive towards it or get bitter when its comitmet is beyond their own effort/value ratio. Even in games like Star Citizen were there really is no point in having millions of aUEC its still the most talked about value and used to compare to each other.

Talonsbane · Aug 11, 2020

Personally, while I admit that all of you have interesting views & make respectable points, I'm doing my best just to deal with each little twist that CIG unveils as part of the "playable" alpha development. Are there things that I like & dislike more than others? Definitely. When I come across patches that cause me to feel that the game is currently unplayable, I report the issue & then spend my attention somewhere else until either I find a report that the problem has been fixed or for the next patch (large or small) to be released to try again. I feel that is the best I can handle the ebbs & flows of the SC development. This being said, of all the time, resources, care & effort that I've invested into SC, what means the most to me are the friendships & brotherhoods that I've made along the way. Most of them here in TEST Squadron.

Lorddarthvik · Aug 11, 2020

NaffNaffBobFace said:
I personally think as it's still Alpha there will be things they want players to test which they artificially make incentives for without neccicerily telling us what/why.

Look at it this way: When Scrap comes in, they will of course want players to test the mechanic to bits. But unless you are super-focused on that being your role in the final game, they are not going to get a huge number of takers, so how to encourage people to try it? Make scraper ships affordable and easily rentable, make the return on scrap crazy high, make the return on other things not scrap related stupid low.

If they spend three years making a mechanic and when the time comes for the players to test it everyone keeps doing missions and their favorite trade runs they are not getting out of the players what they let us access the alpha for.

And of course telling the player base "Can you test that please... but act natural" you'll get a lot of creative testing trying to break the mechanic, but it will be minus the hum-drum everyday which could be hiding an infrequent but game-breaking bug that could slip through to the final game.

I can't prove the above, but if I was running the show, that's how i'd try to be steering the herd of cats that is the playerbase to what I need testing.

This is exactly what they should have been doing. But they are not.
Case in point, it took 3 months of intensive grind to get a Prospector by @Cugino83 . I am on the same road, but with my much lesser free time, I am looking at a 5-6 month grind. This was the case when mining became testable, and they should have focused on players getting their hands on mining whips so they can gather bugs and data about it. But they didn't. They want the economy and time/gain to be tested as well, and thus don't provide stuff cheap.
This led to UEC purchases with real money being worthless, as ships cost way way more than your real-money UEC is worth in-game.

Imo th best solution would be to make a temporary voyager direct and allow players to buy ships for alpha-use only with the UEC they paid for. Non-meltable, non-refundable, 1 to 1 cost with the pledge store ship prices, and you loose the ship with every wipe so you can choose a new one. Oh, and once ship selling comes in, you should be allowed to sell it in-game and get the aUEC value in-game only, but not get the UEC-dollar value back for use in the online-store. Make the money stay in the game so it can be part of the economy testing.

Or just refund it into your store credit, put a multiplier on how mich aUEC you get for 1 dollah, and let you buy whatever you want.

Talonsbane · Sep 17, 2020

DirectorGunner said:
I tried to ask a direct, but open-ended question on Ask the Chairman Todays thread:
https://robertsspaceindustries.com/spectrum/community/SC/forum/50259/thread/ask-the-chairman/3381383

Votes would help since rules require the replies being upvoted,
Popularity contests are hard enough as it is... but who knows, maybe he'll answer why.

My apologies if I'm too late, but I just got home, saw this & gave it my up vote now my friend.

Talonsbane · Sep 18, 2020

DirectorGunner said:
@Talonsbane Never too late brother, thank you!

I'm always happy to help when & where I can brother @DirectorGunner

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Player Economy 3.10 - Player Time ROI

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