Making money by buying perpetual claims

[GenghisKhan44]

Kill two birds with one stone: increasing traffic to the world, and lining your pocket.

Make claims something which, in some manner or another, can be perpetuated with money. Probably with a lot of caps and restrictions.

One of the really tiring things about this game is that you need to keep finding and making curios to hold onto your plot of land. After about a month of coming back and playing, I've had my fill. But I can't quite stop because I have the bad feeling my claim will die out and I'll lose all my neat shit.

Now I'm a hermit, and I have a lot of crappy stuff nobody wants. I don't have much to protect or worth protecting. But if I had a plot of land the size, say, about the size of 2 great halls, where I could build whatever I want and guarantee its safety, so long as I pay $5 or $10 a month, I would do it. I would be more likely to come back because I wouldn't have to build from the ground up because of looters. If I wanted to move, and move my 30x30 plot, I should be able to provided I give up the land it currently occupies. It should be adjustable so it never takes up more than 900 squares of land total, but no narrower than a log cabin and its border tiles.

Another restriction is that the paid-for claim should not be allowed any closer than 60 tiles from another paid claim, and perhaps users should be limited to 2 for $10-20 - or 3 for $15-30 a month - so that griefers cannot make an impenetrable "great wall" to block out players from areas, and "whales" cannot buy half of the world (y'know, unless unbridled capitalism makes the game more fun). Since one could use this to preserve landmarks such as markets or Great Hall sites as well, it should be able to exist within a village - probably it should not be buildable in a village unless you are a hirdsman or lawspeaker. Lawspeakers should not be able to revoke this claim, since he has not paid for this lot to exist; therefore ordinary villagers should be forbidden from building bought claims in a village.

They should also not be permitted on resources; only on land, sea, or the underground away from fairy stones, clay pits, etc.

Just having land I can be sure I can come back to in a few months, or even half a year or a year from now, would make this game much less stressful, addictive, and difficult. It wouldn't become an addiction in the worst way, because eventually it all becomes about fear of losing your stuff. Offer to remove the worst of that fear for a small fee, and it's a win-win.

[Fierce_Deity]

Should it make walls invincible too and keep your animals in stasis too? How far you willing to take this idea? This thread is going to get thrashed, sorry bud.

[MagicManICT]

Come up with some solid methods to prevent abuse, people might read it. Otherwise, I don't see the idea going anywhere.

I do get what the desire is, and I think most of us have it, or have had it. We'd like to be able to show back up after taking a few months off doing something else and know our things are there. Other than spawning in a bunch of alts or logging in once a week just to maintain claims, I just don't think there's any reasonable way of getting that.

[GenghisKhan44]

Should it make walls invincible too and keep your animals in stasis too? How far you willing to take this idea? This thread is going to get thrashed, sorry bud.

I know it will. Thus the detail.

The point of such a claim would be a hermit preserving his work or a village preserving its landmarks from casual looting caused by a dead claim. Walls should not be permitted on the claim, but fences should; fences require vandalism; walls require a ram, a sledgehammer, or a lot of time.

Up to two of each domestic animal should be permitted on the claim - one male, one female - rabbits and chickens excepted because of how easy it is to find them. If they are not fed, they should not die, but they also should not produce milk or wool etc, or reproduce, until they are fed a few times again. They can only conceive or give birth outside a bought claim so as not to exploit a loophole potentially allowing infinite high-quality animals to be bred from within a "stockyard". The bought claim is acting as insurance against the loss of your property due to negligence, since this is a game and not life.

Now should vandals or murderers be permitted to gank you or blow up your house? I am ambivalent; my intent on this bought claim is for hermits like myself to have protection from casual criminality and looting; I could understand if my claim didn't protect me from someone who took the time to invest all that LP in destroying my stuff or killing me. Maybe others would think that's a ripoff, but all I want is protection from people who build a wrecking ball, or wait for my palisade to decay, and just waltz in and take my stuff because my claim is dead. Legitimate murderers and vandals worked hard and they should get to enjoy the fun after wasting all that time grinding LP just to bash my great hall in with a sledgehammer and murdering me in my sleep.

Should they be able to vandalize the claim, too, though? No; that's what I bought. you don't get to destroy my claim marker or my borders once established. But anything on the land I claimed ought to be subject to normal criminal laws. That's why I say a bought claim. It's not bought land; it's a bought legal claim to the land.

[GenghisKhan44]

Come up with some solid methods to prevent abuse, people might read it. Otherwise, I don't see the idea going anywhere.

I do get what the desire is, and I think most of us have it, or have had it. We'd like to be able to show back up after taking a few months off doing something else and know our things are there. Other than spawning in a bunch of alts or logging in once a week just to maintain claims, I just don't think there's any reasonable way of getting that.

I think I did already. Limit the number of such claims you can have on one account at once. Limit the distance each such claim can be from another - not just on one's account, but absolutely. No bought claims within 60 tiles of another at all.

If it's subject to the normal laws of the hearthland - i.e, it can be vandalised, murder can be done there, theft can occur - and protected only by a fence on the border and whatever locks you put on your things (and palisades/brickwalls are forbidden) I don't think you could exploit it to get strong rooms. But casuals could be safe from other casuals. Hardcore players generally leave us alone because we don't have anything valuable; even our skulls are pathetic, so I'm not really suggesting this as protection from determined raiders, destroyers, and murderers. It's just to prevent casual looting by people like myself who aren't hardened criminals.

What else am I missing here, sir?

[overtyped]

Raiding is already very difficult and it's very unlikely your hermitage would ever be raided.
BAD IDEA BAD YOU

[Granger]

While the intention might sound good the proposed mechanic itself (in the sense of all possibly ways to implement it) is broken beyond repair.

Instead of coming up with hibernating things the focus should be on structuring the game in a way that makes joining(or returning to) a world late not completely pointless (and no, offloading a crate of tokens at the one-and-only market to get a set of runaway-quality-of-the-day tools and seed packs -or obtain these for free from your buddies in case you're connected- isn't what is required to attract and keep new users outside a world reset event).

[Headchef]

Entire idea is flawed.
If you have the idea that due to no upkeep (which is low for small claims anyway) that your shit will be safe, will get struck by a wrecking ball whenever someone cares enough and lose it the same.

[MagicManICT]

I think I did already. Limit the number of such claims you can have on one account at once. Limit the distance each such claim can be from another - not just on one's account, but absolutely. No bought claims within 60 tiles of another at all.

You did. I didn't, and don't, think it is enough.

[GenghisKhan44]

While the intention might sound good the proposed mechanic itself (in the sense of all possibly ways to implement it) is broken beyond repair.

Instead of coming up with hibernating things the focus should be on structuring the game in a way that makes joining(or returning to) a world late not completely pointless (and no, offloading a crate of tokens at the one-and-only market to get a set of runaway-quality-of-the-day tools and seed packs -or obtain these for free from your buddies in case you're connected- isn't what is required to attract and keep new users outside a world reset event).

It's not really about progress for me. I don't want to play HnH more than a month or two at a time. Nothing will get me to do so; it's simply too stressful and exhausting. I will always be behind the elite/hardcore, and I think most players are like that. My primary worry is that I will come back to a completely empty, looted base. I know my primary guard against this is a personal claim. I just want a way to perpetuate my claim that I can set and forget.

I just don't think this is the kind of game that can retain players constantly because of how intense it is. But it could undulate more if there were more security, even if it came at a small price. Runescape players pay about $7 a month, which gives them access to their own unique house and plot they may build as they wish, among other things. This gives them a freedom of self-expression, a sense of ownership, and a security that, among other things, makes buying membership worth it and Runescape worth coming back to.

OTOH, take Wurm's skill cap for basic players. That skill cap essentially prevents free players from stealing. Theft is a premium action. Now in the Hearthlands, theft is a non-premium action, and I don't think any of us would have it any other way. Security comes at the premium of time spent making curios to keep one's claim fresh- essentially grinding. Fine; but why can't we translate this security into money, at least to a limited degree, basically doing the inverse of Wurm or a similar thing to Runescape by providing anyone willing to pay with a small plot with perpetual claim, where you need theft or vandalism to violate it?