Forums » Suggestions

Limit high end weapon and ship purchases

Aug 06, 2013 Savet link
The proposal is simple:

Limit the following to x number of purchases per 24 hour period:

Weapons: Neut3, Raven, AAP, Rails of all levels, Gats of all flavors
Ships: All high-end ships: Tung-taurs, valks, IBGs, Rev-Cs, Corvults, etc.

Now, before you flame me....hear me out.

The 2 biggest complaints in VO is that death means nothing and that there is no real economy. By limiting purchases, players are encouraged to stockpile things, and players will have incentive to buy products from other players. Additionally, we can limit weapon trading to the extent that it's not an "I win" button in terms of profit when compared to commodity items. From there, we can balance actual trade without having to worry as much about weapon trade between stations.

Additionally, it will make fights more interesting, because people will use different ships rather than burn through their supply of valks or proms in sectors like Odia.
Aug 06, 2013 Helena Lycia link
I think balancing this would be an issue. If the limits were accidentally too strict then they would not impact on players with pre-existing stockpiles as much as for up and coming players. This would likely balance out in time however except that the players with pre-existing stockpiles are more likely to be experienced players and experienced fighters and so more likely to survive fights, thus their stockpiles would last longer. At the same time the limit could potential, for up and coming players, restrict access to resources needed to practice and improve.

I think there is already an effective limit on purchases on the high end ships. Sure you can buy as many as you want but they probably won't be where you want them. Valks and IBGs can only be purchased in Itani space, so an Itani wanting to operate on the grey space Serco border has to spend a considerable time moving ships. The converse is true for Serco wanting to use proms and servults near Iteni space. The Tung Taur is even worse, it's only available in 2 stations and one of those stations only has a limited selection of weapons.

Finally, is death being cheap a huge problem? If death was more costly then there would likely be less fighting, which could weaken the appeal of the game who play the game just to engage in PvP.
Aug 06, 2013 Pizzasgood link
-1.

Implement supply and demand instead of weirdness.
Aug 06, 2013 Savet link
But real world purchase limitations already exist on high-demand items.

I give you the pipe tobacco example:

http://www.smokingpipes.com/tobacco/by-maker/samuel-gawith/moreinfo.cfm?product_id=1991

"Due to limited availability, there's a limit of 10 per customer per day for this item."
Aug 06, 2013 TheRedSpy link
What the hell. Supply side variability </issue>
Aug 06, 2013 draugath link
Before you start trying to put purchase limits on Valks and Proms, perhaps this or something similar should be implemented first.
Aug 07, 2013 Savet link
No, because that has a lot of unanticipated impact, such as all those people who worked up serco standing but joined the itani military, being unable to buy proms, and vice versa. It's a bad idea until the ability to sell a ship to a player exists. This suggestion can exist along-side the one you linked, and is a good prelude to additional supply limitations.
Aug 07, 2013 coteyr link
+1 I like this idea, it allows for "some" stockpiling and more trading between players.

Players that like AAPs might trade ravens for AAPs with a player that prefers ravens.

As to problems of "limiting being unfair to new player" it will fix it's self. Once the stock piles have dwindled a btt the issue will be equally sucky for people loosing more ships then they can buy.

@"Implement supply and demand instead of weirdness."

Yeah that is basically what this is. Demand exceeding supply. It's very common IRL, specially when things are on sale. Did you know your limited to the amount of gold you can possess in the US. Or that certain quantities of household cleaner are illegal without a licence. Ever try to buy 2 boxes of allergy pills? It's a very common thing to have, and doesn't seem unrealistic at all. It would "encourage" people a bit, but also to sell their stock piles when others run low. Seems like a decent first step in getting a player based economy working better.
Aug 07, 2013 Helena Lycia link
We'd need to be able to trade ships too
Aug 07, 2013 abortretryfail link
-1 All this does is make it more annoying to FIGHT, which is this game's strongest point and best gameplay.

Like Pizzasgood said, Implement supply/demand for station items sold where prices are adjusted based on inventory available instead. That would improve some of the game's OTHER gameplay, like trading and "fix" this problem in a way that makes sense.
Aug 07, 2013 idd link
-1 to the OP. As ARF said, it'll make fighting a lot harder and there are other things that need implementing, like a player run economy and demand (basically what Rin said).

Just because there's something in the real world doesn't mean it should be implemented. IRL, we pee and poop, should we implement that in the game?

The idea of this is ridiculous until the player economy arrives.
Aug 07, 2013 Pizzasgood link
"Ever try to buy 2 boxes of allergy pills?"

No. I'm not so pathetic that I have to medicate myself to deal with the world around me.

"Yeah that is basically what this is."

No, it isn't. When I say supply and demand, I mean supply and demand, not some static per-customer restriction that has absolutely no basis on the activities going on within the game.

What I'm talking about is stations having a limited number of items available. Total, not per-customer. As supply decreases, price increases. Stations would manufacture new items over time, with the rate and number produced depending on the materials brought to the station by players and NPC convoys. Items sold to the station that it doesn't consume to produce other goods would be put up for sale. The station would pay more for goods that it intends to use in production, depending of course on how many it already has. Consumer goods would also be consumed over time, possibly to increase some kind of "station morale" meter that would improve overall efficiency.

The end result is that prices and item availability would dynamically change to reflect the events happening in the game. Blockades would have actual economic impacts. Players who consume a lot of weapons during a furball will induce higher prices, resulting in new trade routes and more convoy traffic. Etc. This could eventually be tied into things like the number of ships the military has available to send to Deneb or to deal with the hive.

Per-user limits are a completely separate thing, and not really appropriate for VO anyway. This isn't Hello Kitty Online. Economic warfare is supposed to be just as valid as military warfare, and the game doesn't impose some arbitrary limit on the number of ships you are allowed to kill.
Aug 07, 2013 Snake7561 link
+1 pizzasgood
Aug 07, 2013 vskye link
+1 Rin.
Aug 07, 2013 Savet link
The problem with total ship inventory per station is that it rewards the people who are online to snatch them up with no method for the late-comers to purchase any.

When I say limit daily purchases, I am thinking like 10 per day. So when you factor in 4 valk variants and the IBG, we're talking 50 ships a day. You have to be pretty bad at pvp to reach that limit. It would encourage diversity in furballs, to the effect of "ok, that's 4 valks lost, let's try an IBG, or let's use this corvult I have stashed. Additionally, nothing stops a person from buying their 10 each day, and leaving them in station. They would then have higher inventory, resulting in station rent, which would help create something to spend the endless credits on.
Aug 07, 2013 Faille Corvelle link
+1

If unlimited ships per player leads to infrequent players missing out, but a daily limit proves too restrictive, why not expand the player limit to a weekly limit rather than daily?

Faille.
Aug 07, 2013 TheRedSpy link
Supply side variability is coming. We don't need this rubbish in the meantime.
Aug 08, 2013 bladerus link
<a bit OFF>
As I see everything points towards the dynamic player controlled economy. All the ideas in the suggestions forum could be collected to create this feature in the game. This way traders would get a real role in the VO universe, and pvp-ers would face some limitations too. But introducing the appropriate supply sources and distribution network this could work.

The whole thing could be made up by determining what is needed for the production of each item/commodity at the stations. Now all players and NPC-s could contribute to production by supplying/selling raw materials to stations. This way the top level ship/wep production would be limited by the amount of raw resources. If someone needs things badly s/he can contact/hire traders to supply raw materials so that specific station.

Definitely this makes a huge amount of trading/hauling necessary. These could be resolved by player traders/NPC voys. This way NPC voys would get a goal to deliver supplies to stations.

I guess at the first time huge imbalances could form, but these can be equalized by fine tuning of the system.
</a bit OFF>

I think +1 to the limit idea.