Hi.

I suggest moving all guild recruitment on forum, in a special section and display a message about this change every time a player logs in for a few days.

On the forum, the guild recruitment could be something like ( I'm using some examples, not advertising an actual guild)

Guild name : Knights of Tulak Hord

Atmosphere : fun,social , so on

Recruiters : Johhny,Dani,Mary, Cindy, Steve

Guild message : if you don't find any recruiter online, get on our discord ( link)

Language : *insert language here*

That way the people looking for a guild can just log on forum, look at the recruitment section, pick the guild they want to join, contact recruiter(s) in game and that's it, no more squelching .

Eric, if you want to end gold farmers, de-monetize Credits by shutting down your CM-to-GTN money laundering loop.

The problem only exists because you're trying to profit from the way cash leaks into every core system of the game, via Credits.

Eric, if you want to end gold farmers, de-monetize Credits by shutting down your CM-to-GTN money laundering loop.

 

The problem only exists because you're trying to profit from the way cash leaks into every core system of the game, via Credits.

Hard disagree.

First of all, WoW had this problem before they even had a cash shop, so clearly the problem exists without there even being a CM at all, or WoW wouldn't have had this problem.

Second of all, I'd actually argue that the CM-to-GTN loop actually DECREASES this, because it gives players a way to "buy credits" without buying from unscrupulous sources. In fact, when I've wanted credits and was too lazy/tired/whatever to farm them myself, that's literally what I used to do: buy some cartel packs, sit on them for a day, then sell them on the GTN and voila! credits! WoW took this a step further with the WoW token (where you literally bought gold directly for cash through them), and while I haven't logged on in a while, I haven't really seen a gold spammer there since they did this.

Hard disagree.

 

First of all, WoW had this problem before they even had a cash shop, so clearly the problem exists without there even being a CM at all, or WoW wouldn't have had this problem.

 

Second of all, I'd actually argue that the CM-to-GTN loop actually DECREASES this, because it gives players a way to "buy credits" without buying from unscrupulous sources. In fact, when I've wanted credits and was too lazy/tired/whatever to farm them myself, that's literally what I used to do: buy some cartel packs, sit on them for a day, then sell them on the GTN and voila! credits! WoW took this a step further with the WoW token (where you literally bought gold directly for cash through them), and while I haven't logged on in a while, I haven't really seen a gold spammer there since they did this.

The comparison isn't apt, since the continued existence of the CM would create a hard cash wall around the most lucrative Credit sinks. Pre-Cash Shop WoW had gold farmers because lucrative items were in general circulation.

Ending the money laundering loop would, of course, create other problems, like bringing into sharp focus how un-'PREMIUM' our subscriptions have become. That, alas, is another, but related, story.

There's also another conversation to be had about what constitutes core gameplay, and should or shouldn't be sellable at all.

The comparison isn't apt, since the continued existence of the CM would create a hard cash wall around the most lucrative Credit sinks. Pre-Cash Shop WoW had gold farmers because lucrative items were in general circulation.

 

This, of course, creates other problems, like bringing into sharp focus how un-'PREMIUM' our subscriptions have become. That, alas, is another, but related, story.

...I literally saw gold spammers in WoW Classic during release week, when everybody was still lv20 or lower...

Eric, if you want to end gold farmers, de-monetize Credits by shutting down your CM-to-GTN money laundering loop.

 

The problem only exists because you're trying to profit from the way cash leaks into every core system of the game, via Credits.

I don't think eric gives a flying ..... about this issue, his one post was the very first one in 06.03.2015, and he hasn't replied to anything anyone said. We've many threads about credit spammers, and so far the only one effect or squelched seems to be people advertising their guild....

The only way they can combat spammers is to actively go after these people, but that would take resources, people power, etc, and we all know BW is on a skeleton crew at the moment :/

I don't think eric gives a flying ..... about this issue, his one post was the very first one in 06.03.2015, and he hasn't replied to anything anyone said. We've many threads about credit spammers, and so far the only one effect or squelched seems to be people advertising their guild....

 

The only way they can combat spammers is to actively go after these people, but that would take resources, people power, etc, and we all know BW is on a skeleton crew at the moment :/

EA absolutely cares. They want us laundering money through the Cash Shop; gold farmers are a revenue leak for them.

EA absolutely cares. They want us laundering money through the Cash Shop; gold farmers are a revenue leak for them.

That probably depends on the gold farmer in question. For what most people probably think of when they think of a gold farmer, I'm not sure EA cares either way, b/c a sub is a sub is a sub. Further, these would probably be the hardest to even identify, because at the end of the day they're players just like you or me. Mind you, I expect this only accounts for probably 20% or so of gold farmers.

For what I expect the majority of gold farmers are nowadays (I'd expect this to be 60%+), similar probably applies (that'd be bot farmers). They may care to an extent, but again, a sub is a sub is a sub. This one might be more of a tossup where they tend to negatively affect players with nodes, etc., but overall, I'm not sure EA cares.

That said, for the third type, those that steal accounts or use compromised CCs (this is where the organized crime comes in on the OP), you'd be absolutely correct, because they're literally destroying the game they're selling gold in, whether it's this game or any other. (The account thieves are the worst, because they create a whole slew of issues, but those with compromised CCs tend to hurt where it comes to financial fees and fraud costs).

Now, as a practice, again, you're absolutely correct: they definitely prefer for us to spend our money on the cash shop instead (and quite frankly, when games do like SWTOR does, that's exactly how I'd personally do it, because it (1) supports the company and (2) is risk-free).

> Don’t buy credits!!!

Oh sure, you make a game where everything costs outrageous amounts of money and then say "Don't buy credits"??? I'm not even going after crazy stuff, but the dollar cost of 2 billion credits is very low and very worth the in-game rewards. If you want to get rid of credit spam redesign your in-game economy.

> Don’t buy credits!!!

 

Oh sure, you make a game where everything costs outrageous amounts of money and then say "Don't buy credits"??? I'm not even going after crazy stuff, but the dollar cost of 2 billion credits is very low and very worth the in-game rewards. If you want to get rid of credit spam redesign your in-game economy.

Hi.

Credit buying has a lot of disadvantages and even if i (still) want some cool items ( the Amban JP riffle, Thana Vesh armor set and so on) I'm going to try to obtain them without breaking the game rules.

Here are (a few) things you risk by buying credits:

- your money could finance terrorist organizations, drug cartels, human trafficking and so on

- your personal info , including credit/debit card info could be stolen and used by very dangerous people

- you could lose all your money

- your game account can be banned, do you really want to risk losing everything ?

> Don’t buy credits!!!

 

Oh sure, you make a game where everything costs outrageous amounts of money and then say "Don't buy credits"??? I'm not even going after crazy stuff, but the dollar cost of 2 billion credits is very low and very worth the in-game rewards. If you want to get rid of credit spam redesign your in-game economy.

The in-game economy is pretty much player run, so it's not BW's fault.

If you want to make the money, you can... you just have to put in a bit of time and effort, but most players are too lazy for that.

OR, if you absolutely *have* to take the easy route of using real money to get in-game money, just buy some stuff off the CM and put it on the GTN to make cash.

I know that the Masters Holocron is reliably selling for around 400 million credits (plus around 8 mil for the gear you get in the bundle), and that's 2000 CC right now... so that's around half a million credits for 18 bucks or so...

And at least it's going to a known entity, ie. BioWare. Not some random terrorist or criminal organization.

But honestly, if you want to make money in-game, just start crafting the correct things or start playing a lot of end-game content to get your tech fragments and other end-game stuff that sells for a lot.

I was typing a message as my low-level Jedi, simply replying to a user who's mock angry so I decided to join in on the fun and I must've got silently squelched.

I understand I must've done something wrong, but getting quietly squelched and explaining what I have done wrong is pretty shady to me.

Here's hoping.

Hi there

First of all, I very much appreciate the work being done behind the scenes to attempt to keep the in-game economy running. As someone who has played the game since 2012 it has been such a shame to see the inflation of credits slowly but progressively become snowballed by gold sellers over the years, something which I believe has particularly hit long-standing players who have watched the value of their legitimately earned credits evaporate. Anything that is being done to address this is more than welcome.

With that said, I also must state that the problem does not only appear to be persisting, but it is getting worse month by month. I haven't posted until now because there are no easily implemented solutions to the problem; it is essentially a cat and mouse game that no doubt requires constantly keeping pace with the sellers. However, there are some things that can be done that aren't, from what I can tell, even if only as temporary fixes.

Of course, I am completely unaware of how much of what I'm about to suggest is already being done, or similar approaches, but here are my thoughts. I believe that rather than attempting to silence/ban the sellers, the focus should be on attempting to limit the means of generating the credits they are selling (assuming they are being generated though legitimate, albeit exploited means). In other words, treat the cause, not the symptom.

This means analysing where the credits are coming from. I would assume this would be any low-complexity, easily automated task, which could be performed in large, repeatable quantities by bots. A couple of examples of possible situations where this is could easily be mitigated:

- Farming grey trash items from NPC mobs. At higher levels, these grey materials can be sold directly to vendors for anywhere between a few hundred and a thousand credits each. A stack of 99 of these therefore is approximately 100k credits. A bot could be left farming stacks of these 24/7, and turning them over to a vendor for credits, which very quickly generates a high volume of credits from nothing. A fix for this could simply be to significantly reduce the vendor sale value of these grey items. Another fix could be to replace these grey items entirely, for something less useful to farming bots and more useful to actual players. For example, jawa junk that can be traded for materials. This example I have personally witnessed bots farming first-hand, so I know at least some of the credits comes from this.

- Credit lockboxes from crew skills is another potential source of credits generated from nothing which could be easily automated to be completed en masse by bots. This is more difficult to remedy, because players may view changes to these crew skills as unfair. Again, however, it might be possible to actually implement changes that are advantageous to players, while also preventing the possibility of exploitation. Credit lockboxes again could be swapped for jawa junk pieces, or another similarly useful item that does not simply flood the economy with more credits.

Another approach worth considering (and again, I know I have no idea what could be in the works in this regard), is transitioning to a completely new currency. When hyperinflation befell the Weimar Republic in Germany in the 1920s, the old Papiermark was replaced by a completely new currency, the Rentenmark, which held its value because it had its value backed by actual goods. Of course, real world practices like this are not directly applicable to game economies, but a similar fix could be implemented. For example, Galactic Trade Network sales could be altered to accept either a credit value or cartel coin value. This would effectively introduce the backing of real-world currency into maintaining the value of goods in-game. Alternatively, GTN listed items could require hypothetical 'GTN sale tokens' to buy instead of credits. This would enable credits to retain their current value and importance in performing certain tasks (repairing gear, unlocking legacy perks, buying stronghold unlocks, etc) but would damage the primary reason players are buying from gold sellers (to buy the currently hyperinflated CM items listed on the GTN for credits). These 'GTN sale tokens' could be implemented to only be easily earned by legitimate players though completing in-game activities that they would have already done in the course of playing the game, in a similar manner to how gear currencies are currently earned. Removing the link between credits and the GTN this way would arguably remove the very reason there is a gold seller problem.

A third and final means of tackling this problem may be to have an exponentially scaling GTN tax percentage. Currently the GTN tax is a linear 8%, so is the same regardless of whether the item is sold for 100,000 or 900 million credits. This could be changed to scale exponentially the closer the sale listing gets to 1 billion (the current GTN sale price limit). As a very rough and by no means deeply considered example, an item sold for 100 million could have a 10% GTN tax (so the player gets 90 million for the sale). An item sold for 200 million could have a 20% GTN tax (so the player gets 160 million). An item sold for 300 million could have a 30% GTN tax (so the player gets 210 million), etc. This would not only immediately begin to cleanse a significant portion of the currently circulating credits from the economy, but it would also incentivise lower price listings. I have purposefully listed this as the third of my suggestions because I believe this should be a last resort, and would also be the least effective of the three suggestions I have put forth.

By this same line of thought, I would also advise removing the 'tax evasion' guild perks, which do nothing to curb the current hyperinflation problem, and in fact actively contribute to its perpetuation.

As you can probably tell, I am not an economist, merely someone who cares quite deeply about the health of the in-game economy and would like to help restore it if possible. There are undoubtedly flaws with the above suggestions that I have not considered, so anyone patient enough to take the time to read though them, please feel free to criticise them if you have recognised any problems.

Thanks again, this is just my humble two cent, but hopefully some of what I've typed is at least food for thought.