How can we revitalize trade?

[Cajoes]

Yeah, but a bar of metal is so valuable, you'd need cartloads of bread just to aquire one.

If only metal bars could be dispensed in smaller portions, like into nuggets, or even smaller metal discs. So that you could aquire them over time by selling smaller portions of bread and linen, without having to amass entire warehouses of goods.

[Brickbreaker]

How about Jorb or Loftar gives everyone a startup cash sum of a coin that can't be produced, and overtime they introduce an ingame system where the supply of the coin is controlled by lets say random spawning of a special rock to mine the coin from. Im not sure whether this would be regarded as a form of NPC or neither am I sure if its in the nature of Loftar to give everyone something for free (but wasn't there an occasion when Jorb handed out pumpkins?).

[Pansy]

Niche market: Ambulance service: Centrally place player/players will rush bandages/leeches to characters who send in a cry for help

Fair: Large village with okay reputation designates a certain day and time for their fair, hires muscle to protect from raiders and advertises on forum. Probably not viable until locations are better known. Alternative idea: Potlach

Niche market: Moneylender: (Even kings often resorted to them) Got a coin press and copper? Go into business distributing coins. Downside: vulnerability to robbery. Solution: only accepts things that can be stored in alt vaults.

Moderate forum: People who say stfu and stf and nobody-wants-your-shit to noobies get squelched so people who want to swap low q wheat seeds for low q water aren't afraid to post.

Advertising: Mini fair (no security) can be held at the junction of many rivers. If people start using/looking for river crossroads to meet and trade small sized local trade might be developed.

Monopolies: Right now monopolies are held by only the obsessive players: Not to break the monopoly by making silk/metal/high q goods available to all, but increase the monopolies so that you have to choose industry for metal (but need nature to get trees to fuel the smelters) or nurture if you want any kind of animal products (silk-wool-milk-eggs) or finesse if you want to craft anything of high q. You have to pick one of the four. Or of the six. Brute strength(for fighting) and Perception (for ranged and foraging) could be two more. That means to get access to everything you need six active characters, not just two.

Signposts: Travel and trade would be easier if you could permanently name and label landmarks. Runestones don't work because people don't read them and can move them, but if you could put up clear labels it would be easier to locate people who want to be located. Do you know Moray Firth? No? Novaya Zemla? Yes! Okay, let's meet on the Pike River at Blasted Heath.

Contracts: Stake your reputation. Deals are put up in the forum. If you break a deal that fact will also be reported in forum. Kinda like the e-Bay system.

More stuff to trade: Introduce new products in limited areas: E.g. In one minimap area the www seeds produce oats. In another they produce potatoes. In one specific spot L & J place a turquoise vein. Send the players on a scavenger hunt. If no one ever finds oats no one ever gets them. Likely uber players will snaffle the turquoise mine from whoever finds it if they don't find it themselves, but until then they may have to trade to get them. Trade will also be the most practical way to get the new crops. Keep introducing new products this way.

Give lp for trade: Don't know how the devs could set it up.

Market reports: Post details of completed trades and prices paid so that people have an idea what the market really will bear. It is always possible that Smoogsville is charging three chests of chantrelles for each bar of steel, but the picture changes if you find out that Durgleheim is charging one and a half and provides transportation too. Not knowing if you will be insulting, get cheated etc. may be discouraging people.

Middlemen: Towns interested in becoming trade hubs could try to set up ways for noobies to trade with each other. Someone who starts out trading for q10 leeches and a poppy seed has the potential to become the next maps uber trader in cattle, but not if he never gets those leeches. Hey, how much effort are you actually going to to encourage your neighbours?

Civic Projects: Two big towns get together and decide to run a road between them. They hire people to work for them and pay them to do it. Coins are distributed, people meet, reputations are made, travel is enhanced.

Cultural assets: You speak Polish? Congratulations! The devs have seen fit to gift your character with two beet seeds and the recipe for borsht. Use them wisely! You speak Russian? Congratulations! The devs have seen fit to give you two cucumber seeds, the plans for a samovar and the plans for an attractive fur hat with ear flaps. You come from Haro Port? congratulations! The devs have seen fit to gift you with a new species of fish -Cod- and the ability to produce salt. I think the Russians would like to buy some salt for their cucumber recipe. You are but a simple and humble cowherd? Congratulations! The devs have seen fit to show you an interesting new product where the milk thickens in the bucket without turning to cheese. We call it "sour cream". Do you know any Polish players? Downside: Serious potential for screams of favoritism here.



Okay, I know some of these ideas are totally stupid, but the thread isn't labeled "Good ideas on how to revitalize trade...

[ThirdEmperor]

Exactly, everyone should post their favorite ideas, whether or not you think othrs will agree, so here's my thoughts:

Credit based economy, if a stall is buying carrots and you sell a carrot, instead of getting coins you get store credit which can be expended to get items from said store. Perhaps if you don't expend all credit the store gives you a special item called a writ of credit, which you can cash in for the credit at another stall in the same village, transfering the writ to the stall owner. This gives the prime benefit of coins (adaptibility) while preventing inflation by macroers with gold mines. Best of all, villages would stamp on people paying ridiiculous amounts for stuff as the other shopkeepers would suffer.

[Brickbreaker]

Maybe a system where money is LP?
People are very much willing to trade for LP im sure, and anyone can get it.

[ThirdEmperor]

Maybe a system where money is LP?
People are very much willing to trade for LP im sure, and anyone can get it.

Great idea dude, three thumbs up as soon as I can find that severed hand.....

How about Jorb or Loftar gives everyone a startup cash sum of a coin that can't be produced, and overtime they introduce an ingame system where the supply of the coin is controlled by lets say random spawning of a special rock to mine the coin from. Im not sure whether this would be regarded as a form of NPC or neither am I sure if its in the nature of Loftar to give everyone something for free (but wasn't there an occasion when Jorb handed out pumpkins?).

Even better! Three thumbs and one pinky up! Simply make it so gold can only be used to make coins, then introduce special boulders that give gold instead of stone when chipped. Not sure bout the startup fund though, maybe they could give it to all characters active at a certain time? That way you couldn't mass spawn throw-away alts and gice the gold to your main.

[arriel]

What`s wrong with simply using tiny chips of ANY metal as money? Tin, Copper, Iron, Silver, Gold. Made in alloying crucible (so, accessible to anyone). Could be smelted back to nuggets.
The only problem I see here is a quality of the metal that goes into and out of the coins. I`d suggest a coin for say every 1q of a nugget, but I suppose that system can be abused when smelting back larger quantities of coins to make higher quality nuggets. Maybe cap the number of coins that can be smelted into nugget at once by Smithing skill or the quality of crucible (roughly appropriate to what q metal would have been recieved when processing common ore).

Granted, that will also require some stacking implementation on devs side, because no way you going to fit even 100 coins in a keyring-type purse.

[Ferinex]

nugget quality affecting number of coins produced and coins lacking quality actually makes sense and gives coins more use imo

quality vs quantity.

[Brickbreaker]

Maybe a system where money is LP?
People are very much willing to trade for LP im sure, and anyone can get it.

Great idea dude, three thumbs up as soon as I can find that severed hand.....

How about Jorb or Loftar gives everyone a startup cash sum of a coin that can't be produced, and overtime they introduce an ingame system where the supply of the coin is controlled by lets say random spawning of a special rock to mine the coin from. Im not sure whether this would be regarded as a form of NPC or neither am I sure if its in the nature of Loftar to give everyone something for free (but wasn't there an occasion when Jorb handed out pumpkins?).

Even better! Three thumbs and one pinky up! Simply make it so gold can only be used to make coins, then introduce special boulders that give gold instead of stone when chipped. Not sure bout the startup fund though, maybe they could give it to all characters active at a certain time? That way you couldn't mass spawn throw-away alts and gice the gold to your main.

Thank you

[Swordmage]

Maybe a system where money is LP?
People are very much willing to trade for LP im sure, and anyone can get it.

If you make LP a tradable commodity, can Real Life cash for LP be far behind?