Hello there!

In order to combat incredibly high item prices in SWTOR, reduce the impact/effectiveness of gold sellers, and prevent the 'forcible removal of money' from players as a possible solution, I suggest the following:

• Remove the ability to send credits through in-game mail and remove the whole COD function

• Retain the ability to send items through in-game mail

• Remove the ability to trade credits with another player in the game

Perceived benefits:

• I believe that this alone will greatly improve the prices of items in this game as people would be forced to use the GTN and therefore would be capped at the price of 1 billion credits that's already in place.

• Credit sellers would be greatly crippled by this limitation as well as that is how they likely receive and pay out their sales.

• All sales would be subject to GTN tax, therefore taking a bit of money out of the economy.

• You wouldn't lose players (subs) by removing their credits (I have personally been playing this game for 10 years non-stop and have thus built up credits that, if removed by Bioware, would make me quit the game immediately).

• GTN prices would eventually adjust to the GTN cap and quite possibly lower over time.

Legacy banks would be the preferred way to move money around between your characters. Guilds could reward their top performers by having them take items out of the guild banks, send items via mail, or even grant them a rank that allows them to remove a certain number of credits from the guild bank.

This solution would likely bring in-game GTN prices down, prevent sales from occurring outside of the GTN (and its taxes), prevent credit sellers from sending and receiving money in-game, and might even get Bioware more "real-life money" by getting people to buy items from the CM again instead of from credit sellers.

The only thing that would require more thought and a different solution would be the use/role of guild banks to transfer money around and bypass some of these other limitations.

Thoughts? What angles are we missing here or failing to consider?

Thanks!

Remove the ability to send credits through in-game mail and remove the whole COD function

I have 5 accounts, only one is a sub. The pref accounts cannot withdraw money from a guild bank, so I send toons belonging to those other accounts 950,000 credits, below the 1 million credit cap.

I'm against preventing the mailing of credits.

Remove the ability to trade credits with another player in the game

Maybe I want to toss a few thousand credits to a new player so that the person can buy the speeder off their choice off the speeder vendor on Coruscant, rather than asking them which they want and then me buying it for them.

I have 5 accounts, only one is a sub. The pref accounts cannot withdraw money from a guild bank, so I send toons belonging to those other accounts 950,000 credits, below the 1 million credit cap.

 

I'm against preventing the mailing of credits.

Why don't you use a legacy bank for that?

At some point we need to address the issue at hand with credit sellers and the increasing prices for items. I'd be willing to bet that most people don't mind not being able to mail credits to alts (again, why not use legacy banks?) if it means impacting credit selling and insane prices for items.

I also like giving new players things on starter planets... but I'll give them ITEMS, rather than money. Again, easy trade off if it means diminishing the impact of credit sellers/farmers and channeling all sales through the GTN.

I don't have a problem with this idea of eliminating p2p credit transfers. In theory it should shut down credit sellers, or at least slow them down a little working around the limitation. Giving new people credits is kinda a lazy way to help them, plus with inflation, unless you give them a lot, it doesn't really help them. Giving them items is better IMO because you know what is useful, while they do not.

Forcing people to use the GTN again is a wonderful idea. It wouldn't matter if you have obscene amounts of credits if prices for items is still limited, plus GTN taxes would slowly take credits out of the system. So, you say then we'd switch to barter. That's a possibility, but who wants to spend all that time trying to spam fleet trying to trade for items? Some people would, but most would not want to do that.

Another issue I see is the rising standardization of Hypercrates and Packs as a player currency. You can still get them cheaper from credit sellers, than getting them from the CM with CCs. The only way to stop this is to either lower the CC prices for crates (or everything in general), or make crates and packs non-tradable. The items contained within would still be BoE, so that is fine. What would happen is that more items end up in circulation. People start undercutting each other. And the market would bottom out somewhere again.

Why don't you use a legacy bank for that?

Is that a real question? One account cannot use another account's legacy bank.

Mail and direct trade is the only way for a sub account to hand a pref account credits, because as I earlier stated, pref accounts cannot withdraw from guild banks.

I have 5 accounts, only one is a sub. The pref accounts cannot withdraw money from a guild bank, so I send toons belonging to those other accounts 950,000 credits, below the 1 million credit cap.

Sorry, I misread what you wrote. I thought you mentioned that you had characters on multiple servers, not multiple accounts.

I'm willing to bet that 99% of this game's player base doesn't have multiple accounts so this wouldn't be an issue for them. I'm not even sure why someone would need that many accounts lol.

Sorry for misreading your response.

I'm not even sure why someone would need that many accounts lol.

It's called being an altaholic, and I'll hazard I'm not the only one.

Forcing people to use the GTN again is a wonderful idea. It wouldn't matter if you have obscene amounts of credits if prices for items is still limited, plus GTN taxes would slowly take credits out of the system. So, you say then we'd switch to barter. That's a possibility, but who wants to spend all that time trying to spam fleet trying to trade for items? Some people would, but most would not want to do that.

Yes, I concur. I think the more people use the GTN, the better.

What are your thoughts regarding preventing the withdrawal of money from guild banks? What about having guild banks be only used for repairs, invasions, summons etc? As it stands, guild banks can be used to transfer 4.x billion credits to an individual at a time. If we restricted the withdrawal of funds from guild banks and let them be used only for guild purposes like those things listed above, credit sellers/farmers couldn't use them to bypass the restriction on transferring credits via trade or in-game mail.

If that would be too restrictive, have there be a limit on a full guild bank withdrawal per legacy per week or something like that. Just throwing out ideas here on ways to impact credit sellers but not hurt guilds/players.

Thoughts?

It's called being an altaholic, and I'll hazard I'm not the only one.

More power to you! I have 70 characters on one account, spanning all of the servers, and I actually spend time playing them all quite a bit. Not sure how on Earth you manage that but with so many accounts!

Impressive, however I don't believe that your scenario really is similar to that many other individuals that play this game.

I still believe that the proposal in the original post would go a long way to address some of the largest issues in this game.

i like the idea of a price cap on everything. it's a great equalizer. nothing is to stop the rich from getting richer (albeit at a slower rate), but things become affordable for more people again, without having to buy from credit sellers. I also like more competition on the GTN. Even if whales buy things up, eventually, they will run out of room to store things.

As for having multiple accounts, it may be an inconvenience, but it wouldn't really affect that many people. I have 2 account myself, but since 7, I only use 1 of them. On a larger scale, it helps out most people. Maximum satisfaction requires that a few people would be negatively affected, but if it helps out in general, then it's fine.

It's called being an altaholic, and I'll hazard I'm not the only one.

You know you can have up to 100 characters per server if you use Server character slots. I don't know anyone that needs more then 500 characters between all of the servers.

You know you can have up to 100 characters per server if you use Server character slots. I don't know anyone that needs more then 500 characters between all of the servers.

I don't need to defend my playing habits to you or anyone else, but just so you understand...

1. I'm on a fixed income, and the 57 slots per server that I have on my sub account are the 57 I'm gonna have

2. I like building new legacies

3. A host of various reasons that I don't need to explain to you or anybody

All sales would be subject to GTN tax, therefore taking a bit of money out of the economy.

No, all sales would be via an equivalent of Guild Wars 1's Armbraces of Truth, an item that was subject to a dupe exploit (might have been just an "unintendedly easy fast acquisition exploit, which isn't any better).

The players who had been doing it were punished (bans, long suspensions, etc.), but the items themselves were too hard to track which were exploit-sourced and which were "genuine", so ArenaNet left them in the game. The players collectively decided on a value for them, and big-ticket items were routinely bartered as "100 AoTs for your Wossname" trades, for the equivalent of amounts that far, far exceeded the local equivalent of SWTOR's 4.29 billion credit cap.

If you think that wouldn't happen in SWTOR subject to this idea, I'll just go stand in a corner and shake my head in despair.

No, all sales would be via an equivalent of Guild Wars 1's Armbraces of Truth, an item that was subject to a dupe exploit (might have been just an "unintendedly easy fast acquisition exploit, which isn't any better).

 

The players who had been doing it were punished (bans, long suspensions, etc.), but the items themselves were too hard to track which were exploit-sourced and which were "genuine", so ArenaNet left them in the game. The players collectively decided on a value for them, and big-ticket items were routinely bartered as "100 AoTs for your Wossname" trades, for the equivalent of amounts that far, far exceeded the local equivalent of SWTOR's 4.29 billion credit cap.

 

If you think that wouldn't happen in SWTOR subject to this idea, I'll just go stand in a corner and shake my head in despair.

so remove them all, fix the exploit, and start over.

also we're already there with hypercrates and packs. a solution to stop that practice needs to be come up with. say like making them BoL. the items opened remain BoE however, as intended.

Yes, I concur. I think the more people use the GTN, the better.

 

What are your thoughts regarding preventing the withdrawal of money from guild banks? What about having guild banks be only used for repairs, invasions, summons etc? As it stands, guild banks can be used to transfer 4.x billion credits to an individual at a time. If we restricted the withdrawal of funds from guild banks and let them be used only for guild purposes like those things listed above, credit sellers/farmers couldn't use them to bypass the restriction on transferring credits via trade or in-game mail.

 

If that would be too restrictive, have there be a limit on a full guild bank withdrawal per legacy per week or something like that. Just throwing out ideas here on ways to impact credit sellers but not hurt guilds/players.

 

Thoughts?

Changing the functions of the guild bank could prove problematic. You want to limit the ability to use it as a transfer point though. I have a crazy idea, instead of credits being stored in the GB, you make a new currency that you have to buy from a vendor to put into your guild bank to use for repairs and summons. The intended function of the guild bank remains. Like the weekly currency caps we have now for gear upgrades, make a cap as to how many of the guild currency you can get per week as well.

Or you could redefine the limit of credits in the GB. Say 1B instead of 4.2whatever. That should be enough for most guilds to function week to week. The only guilds that wouldn't work for are large conquest guilds that do massive payouts, week-to-week, but oh well, they can figure out a different way to do their conquest rewards. On a side note, if you really have to pay people that much do to conquest, is it really worth it to be in those guilds?

No, all sales would be via an equivalent of Guild Wars 1's Armbraces of Truth, an item that was subject to a dupe exploit (might have been just an "unintendedly easy fast acquisition exploit, which isn't any better).

 

The players who had been doing it were punished (bans, long suspensions, etc.), but the items themselves were too hard to track which were exploit-sourced and which were "genuine", so ArenaNet left them in the game. The players collectively decided on a value for them, and big-ticket items were routinely bartered as "100 AoTs for your Wossname" trades, for the equivalent of amounts that far, far exceeded the local equivalent of SWTOR's 4.29 billion credit cap.

 

If you think that wouldn't happen in SWTOR subject to this idea, I'll just go stand in a corner and shake my head in despair.

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Where is your big idea then to end the huge inflation problem in the game huh. If you are going to shoot an idea down, at least propose a solution. People already base market price based on hypercrates. Under the proposed solution to make the hypercrates BOL and the individual items are BOE, then the only way to get money for it would be the GTN since you couldn't mail it or trade it for credits. If you are suggesting people will begin to barter...then honestly that is fine. People will still mostly use the GTN because it would be faster. Eventually, all of the excess credits would drained from the game (might take a long time but it would eventually happen). Again, inflation is a huge problem in game and this is a viable solution. Don't just shoot it down as stupid and not post a possible solution of your own.

I don't need to defend my playing habits to you or anyone else, but just so you understand...

 

1. I'm on a fixed income, and the 57 slots per server that I have on my sub account are the 57 I'm gonna have

2. I like building new legacies

3. A host of various reasons that I don't need to explain to you or anybody

First of all you can play how you like. I was just pointing out we all have the option how to get massive amounts of characters on one account. As for the fixed income, I can fully understand that.

Some ways to get those Character server slots available for FREE would be.

1) if you are a subscriber you get 500 free CC's a month, those can be used on Server slot unlocks when you get enough for each.

2) Galactic season is an awesome way to get FREE CC's to unlock more character slots. Each server you do Galactic seasons on gives you 4k CC's. So if you did it on 2 servers that 8k free CC's for unlocking additional character slot (a character slot will open an additional slot for every server, not just one.) If you did it on all 5 servers each galactic season you would get 20k CC's to use.

Of course you may decide to use your free CC's on other things instead, which is why you want the 5 accounts, and additional legacies for Role playing purposes, or any other reason. And all of that is just fine. As I said play however you like, it's your game time.

I wish there was a way to have multiple legacies tied to one account. Because it's the gold sellers who have multiple accounts to do the gold selling/transfers.

This way, if a legacy is involved in gold selling, BIOWARE would know which account it was and terminate all of the legacies by terminating the one account.

Giving new people credits is kinda a lazy way to help them, plus with inflation, unless you give them a lot, it doesn't really help them.

Giving them credits allows them to buy e.g.:

* A basic 8K speeder (10K for non-subs)

* Field Repair Droid character perk

* Rocket Boost legacy perk

* Field mailbox character perk

* Other buy-from-the-game things like that, none of whose prices have changed in years.

Where is your big idea then to end the huge inflation problem in the game huh.

I don't have one, because I don't think it *can* be fixed. The p2p economy is too badly broken for it to be fixable.

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Where is your big idea then to end the huge inflation problem in the game huh. If you are going to shoot an idea down, at least propose a solution. People already base market price based on hypercrates. Under the proposed solution to make the hypercrates BOL and the individual items are BOE, then the only way to get money for it would be the GTN since you couldn't mail it or trade it for credits. If you are suggesting people will begin to barter...then honestly that is fine. People will still mostly use the GTN because it would be faster. Eventually, all of the excess credits would drained from the game (might take a long time but it would eventually happen). Again, inflation is a huge problem in game and this is a viable solution. Don't just shoot it down as stupid and not post a possible solution of your own.

It may be a viable option in your opinion but that doesn’t mean it really is viable. Also, there is no requirement for someone to post a solution when they are arguing about why something is a bad idea.

So, my opinion is going to be one that you all disagree with. Inflation is only an issue if money is hard to come by. If the rich are rich and you can’t obtain that thru in game means. This is not the case. Over the last two weeks I ran my credits down to 70 million. Then ran them back up to 2.5 billion in less than a two week period playing fairly casually. Mainly on weekends. When you can early 500 million credits in roughly an hour. 🤷*♂️ Are credit farmers annoying ? Yes, if you don’t use them are they actually hurting you ? No,

Sales runs may be against what you believe in. They are not against the tos. It’s essentially a group helping another player with terms. Why are you against that help ? I just don’t see the problem. I’ve done multiple mail transactions with friends where I will tip them for crafting me something. This would eliminate that completely.

I don’t think the economy needs reset I don’t think prices have gone up like you think they have based on the time it takes to get said credits ow vs a year ago. It’s actually easier now than it used to be. My two cents.