15 replies to this topic

[Tkwan]

Oh man. I can't help but laugh at this. Heim and co. Let me ask you a simple question.

Why do you think people do buy zeny?



Answer: Because you have not maintained control of the economy. I understand you and your team are busy, but this, if you are so adamant on people not cheating, should be one of your top priorities.

The fix is very, very simple.


Implement your raffle system. Permanently. Change the items around every month or so to make it fresh and attractive to continue doing.

Secondly. Implement buyable consumable crafting items. Most other games have their craftable items buyable, the reason is obvious. Money sink. Leave the hard ones obviously only on drops, but the commons like what oda listed and got suggestions for, make them buyable. Not questable. Buyable (or possibly both, quest to open up a buy npc). Allow them to be discounted too, so that the community can make money back off of those who wish to sell them.

Then your big red notice on the patcher won't be necessary. Your economy will be fixed. And you will once again be receiving the income you SHOULD be getting.

Yes this is an angry post. Mismanagement is aggravating.

Just to clarify for all those people with plastic halo's around their heads; this post was motivated by a guildie having his vend alt being banned for "appearing to have transferred bad zeny across multiple accounts". And all he did was sell speed potions and transfer that 200m to his main account, which they now want to take off of his main account in order to unban his vendor. That's a hell of a shot in the dark gravity. Fix your game and stop screwing with your PAYING customers.

[Anchors]

I haven't had to deal with the situation outlined in your small print (if true, talk about unfair...), but I don't know if outlining it in bold letters and a bright red background is going to do anything but make people wonder why spambotting is so prevalent to the point of looking like it's being passively allowed. I really think the old "more flies with honey" adage would have worked better... or fitting it into random NPC dialogue/random spots on the patcher in non-obtrusive print to do the whole post-hypnotic suggestion thing /swt

[cRoc]

People Buy Zeny because they are think their time is more valuable than the $$ they use to buy said Z.

Gravity doesnt need to do anything to get rid of zeny buying, other than enforcing their Terms of Service.

You are outright asking gravity to give you not exp and lvls on a silver plater but the items to play also??? why the F U K do you play this game????? if dont want to either lvl or farm items??


As the zeny sellers being fault of Gravity for not controlling economy, for that i only got LoL

Edited by cRoc, 27 August 2011 - 09:02 PM.

[Shane]

People Buy Zeny because they are think their time is more valuable than the $$ they use to buy said Z.

This is exactly right. If I work for 8 hours and bring home $100, that could buy me 1 billion zeny. To make 1 billion zeny in ragnarok I would have to play significantly longer than 8 hours. Some people simply don't mind spending real money to become more powerful in a game. Many people do this, some do it in acceptable ways (selling WPE for zeny, or purchasing lucky boxes in en masse), and others simply ignore the Terms of Service buy zeny straight up. There is a severely lack of enforcement, possibly because it is hard to monitor these transactions reliably, and so the business continues.

Apparently as of recent some people have been confused as to whether or not buying zeny is against the Terms of Service. By the number of novice bots strewn about Prontera on valk it is no surprise why this is the case. I think the patch notice is a good way to let those specific players know that buying zeny is against the Terms of Service. The ones who would buy it regardless will still continue to do so, but this may stop a few from spending their money on it.

[Tkwan]

People Buy Zeny because they are think their time is more valuable than the $$ they use to buy said Z.

Gravity doesnt need to do anything to get rid of zeny buying, other than enforcing their Terms of Service.

You are outright asking gravity to give you not exp and lvls on a silver plater but the items to play also??? why the F U K do you play this game????? if dont want to either lvl or farm items??


As the zeny sellers being fault of Gravity for not controlling economy, for that i only got LoL

I play a priest, my items are already buyable from the npcs. I'm suggesting this as a market improvement. By the way, Oda did a survey on facebook to see what kind of craftable items they want in a quest. I'm suggesting they just make them vendable instead of questable so it drops money out of the market on items that people will need on a daily basis. Also, I said the RARE ones should still remain dropped by monsters (like food crafts).
You're dragging a dropped thread and now moot point into this thread. Knock it off and quit provoking.

[Inubashiri]

I agree, don't buy zeny for money or the big bad Heimy monster will eat you

[ItsMoonie]

I'm way too paranoid to ever even visit one of those sites.
Even though I hear a lot of people do actually get what they pay for,I always presume the odds of it being a scam are rather high.

[Dukeares]

DONT BUY ZENY OR UR ACCOUNT WILL BE BANNED!!!

[Mayhem]

Well its always been bannable, but what about all these people just buying things to vend for zeny. Same thing

Or all these people that are buying points from people with zeny. Basically cash for zeny.


Simple solution is thus, Either Make it all illegal (selling things bought in shop ie boxed items, and buying kafra points for zeny) or make it ALL LEGAL. Whip your hands of it. Let people buy at thier own risk.

[Inubashiri]

Buying points for Zeny isn't illegal, but its not supported either because there is no profit lost by the company. Its not supported by gravity because there is no means by which they can guarantee you don't get scammed, so its still "at your own risk". It is also not allowed to post WPE trades on this forums either in case those reading this didn't know. Buying zeny from other people for real money is the same as buying music from bootleggers. Its intellectual property being sold without permission in order for someone else to gain a real life profit (selling essentially nothing to gain something), aside from all the other ingame stigma and unfairness issues that arise from it. Selling box items from the Kafra shop is also not illegal and more or less tolerated, in fact that is why they are in boxes in the first place to make them tradable or vendable if you have no means of making some quick zeny. Its also for those who can't use real money to pay with their in game currency to gain items or WPE if they need it. I think if you over use it they do give you a little talking to about it (or at least they used to, maybe not so much anymore).

Edited by Inubashiri, 28 August 2011 - 12:19 AM.

[Noumi]

Why people buy zeny directly? Demand & Supply I guess. Lets compare the effectiveness of the few known methods of obtaining zeny from cash. First off to start, 5K WPE costs 50 USD right? And 5K WPE can be converted into 6K Kafra points. So lets see what you can do with them:

With 50 USD, you can buy 400M zeny. Thats the rate that the zeny sellers are offering in Valk now.

With 5K Kafra points, you can get around 300-350M by selling WPE directly to players, about the average rate in Valk.

With 6K Kafra points, you can perhaps buy 60 HD Ori/Elu boxes and vend each of them for 4.5M Ragial average, getting 270M in total.

As you can see, the zeny sellers offer the best rates in town. No surprise why people are turning to them. Most sellers have official websites and see the big picture. they won't risk their site reputation over scamming just tens of USD.

IMO, the best way to sink zeny can be done in 2 simple steps:

1: Allow the kafra to directly convert Kafra Points to zeny, at a rate better than what the average zeny seller is offering now. That will force the zeny sellers to offer even more competitive rates. Also offer powerful and account binding eq to be bought for alot zeny from some NPC, so that the zeny will be sinked back, and not fly off to the zeny sellers.

2: Make it much harder for the zeny sellers to earn zeny. In case WP didn't realise their massive blunder, I shall point it out to them:

I: Zeny Sellers earn zeny by means of multiple bots running simultaneously, like a whole party of Rogues ganking everywhere. Rogues are easy to set up, can Mug directly for zeny, and don't require much eq to farm. Thats the first mistake Gravity made to screw the Bot infested RO market up: The introduction of the 2-2 Class: Rogue.

II: If that wasn't enough, WP introduced equipment that made the already earning so much Rogues earn even more, by means of equipment that gives a certain percentage to drop valuable items when killing ANY monster: OBB, Ale, Blanks, what else am I missing? A +7 St pat does not benefit an honest manual leveling player much. So he rather sell the St Pat for 130M. (Valk's Rate imo) The zeny seller buys many of them, farms ales with his rogue party, and sells the ales, earning even more zeny.

Solution to I: Rework the Rogues. Honest leveling rogues who intend to go shadow chaser have no use for Gank or Mug anyway. The rework won't affect the shadow chasers.

Solution to II: Make St Pats and Spares Account binding from the beginning... Though its too late for that. They can probably rework the St pat and Spares to not drop anything outside an event, and organize a repeatable event specially that allows one to go on Ale / Spare hunting, some what similiar to the monkey event. And make the Ales ONLY droppable from some monster they are supposed to hunt in the event if the +7 St pat is equipped. Maybe bundle it together with the turn-ins.

Back to making it harder for zeny sellers to earn zeny, control the market; Find out what is being vended by the zeny sellers that make them earn so much, and set up NPCs that sell such items at lower prices, DC-able. this doubles off as a zeny sink too.

The last source of income for the zeny sellers is thru direct OCing high NPC value loot. Touching this will probably cause the new comers to suffer even more. So I'd have to be cautious on how to approach this. Maybe make the new comers less dependant on OCing loot to earn zeny, by giving zeny rewards on turn in events; those that require both killing monsters and picking their loot, and trading those loot for comparatively higher zeny rates.

Or.... be like the freaking Government. Impose taxes on all items vended above everything they can tax. Like how income tax works. The more you earn, the more you are taxed. For example, it you earn less than 100K, don't tax. For:

Every zeny earned beyond 100K: 3% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 500K: 5% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 1M: 10% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 10M: 20% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 100M: 30% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 500M: 40% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 1B: 50% tax

Obviously as an RO player and a citizen of any country, I hate to get taxed... I pray WP doesn't implement what i just suggested

Edited by Noumi, 28 August 2011 - 01:12 AM.

[Psychogenik]

Or.... be like the freaking Government. Impose tax on all items vended above certain amounts and value. Like how income tax works. The more you earn, the more you are taxed. For example, it you earn less than 100K, don't tax. For:

Every zeny earned beyond 100K: 3% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 500K: 5% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 1M: 10% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 10M: 20% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 100M: 30% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 500M: 40% tax
Every zeny earned beyond 1B: 50% tax

Obviously as an RO player and a citizen of any country, I hate to get taxed... I pray WP doesn't implement what i just suggested

Lol no tax Valk not Ymir.

[Crabtipus]

I have no idea why St. Patrick's hats even drop green ales during non event times. Did no one see infinite ygg seeds being a problem?

[EvilLoynis]

I: Zeny Sellers earn zeny by means of multiple bots running simultaneously, like a whole party of Rogues ganking everywhere. Rogues are easy to set up, can Mug directly for zeny, and don't require much eq to farm. Thats the first mistake Gravity made to screw the Bot infested RO market up: The introduction of the 2-2 Class: Rogue.


Solution to I: Rework the Rogues. Honest leveling rogues who intend to go shadow chaser have no use for Gank or Mug anyway. The rework won't affect the shadow chasers.


The last source of income for the zeny sellers is thru direct OCing high NPC value loot. Touching this will probably cause the new comers to suffer even more. So I'd have to be cautious on how to approach this. Maybe make the new comers less dependant on OCing loot to earn zeny, by giving zeny rewards on turn in events; those that require both killing monsters and picking their loot, and trading those loot for comparatively higher zeny rates.

Ok the main problem to reworking Rogues the way you say with Gank is that many players legitly use this to farm items and it would hurt them massively to do this. How else do new players really get more items to vend or oc then this?

One way to perhaps offset this is to lower the sp cost of Steal to 1sp so that you could manually use it.


Also I think a better fix by FAR would be to make accounts harder to get/verify. This way when you DO manage to ban a botter/spammer they would not be able to pop right back up within 5min.

I really REALLY hate it when I see a friggin obvious line of bots buying pots from store or walking to exit in towns like Geffen and Morroc. I always so wish that I could get the attention of an online GM or something that could come see them right away and ban them. I mean reporting via the ticket route is just to damn annoying, time consuming and ineffective, especially with bot names being impossible to remember exactly.

I mean who here hasn't seen that thief/rogue bot train and wished they had the power to just instanly ban all 10-20 of them to help out everyone. Yeah we all hate the high level bots as well but sometimes getting rid of the low level ones is just as important.

[Charon]

http://forums.warppo...g-items-quests/


Yeah, the notice is a joke. Its not like it'll do anything. It may scare off someone perhaps. I'm not sure why they put it there.

[EvilLoynis]

Also I think a better fix by FAR would be to make accounts harder to get/verify. This way when you DO manage to ban a botter/spammer they would not be able to pop right back up within 5min.

I wonder if you could all lmk what you think of this part. I am not actually sure how hard or easy it is to setup an account now, but I know it was stupidly easy before.

I really believe that the solution to the botting problem is in this.

However I DO NOT believe that making people pay for an acct, like it was in the old days on subscription servers, as a way to keep out bots. This unfortunately also keeps away many many legitimate players.

I myself refused to pay 2 play back when I started but am now a VIP user. However I never would have gotten this far if paying had been a must.

I believe that most people who join now have a friend already playing and this may be a way to help with bots in regards to new accounts by perhaps using an invite or something.