EVE General Discussion

. double post

Hey Mal, can you tick your buy order prices up just a little?

I need some spare cash for the new BCs when they come out.

You fail at mathematics and you fail at economics.
The system as it currently stands = diminishing returns.
Even using your own flawed example, "SOMEBODY" grows less and less, pray tell, what then ?
At the moment you are playing but not paying.
You are generating mountains of ISK and using that to pay for your accounts, you open new accounts with ISK you are making ingame (and making even more ISK to buy more PLEX which as you see now, has become more expensive) - You do the maths on that one. The "SOMEBODY" who buy Plex are lessening, hence CCP making it more attractive to the paying "SOMEBODY" to buy more Plex with special offers. The "SOMEBODY" are only willing to pay cash for (x) amount of PLEX they can sell for ISK ingame. The increased price of PLEX ingame is no accident. Open your eyes and mind.

It's all diminishing returns. You do the maths properly, you and others in this thread who blithly say I fail at maths. Clearly you have no foresight as to what is happening in terms of CCP getting hard cash from players.

Your flawed argument is that someone else has already paid for that account. Your omission is the fact that your new, freely-subbed account you bought with ISK is now generating even more ISK. So the wheel turns. People with free and ready real life cash to pay for PLEX to sell ingame are growing less by the day.

Your new, freely-subbed account (because you make so much ISK) is money CCP is never going to see as real, hard cash. There is no "1 for 1" here. My buying a PLEX and selling it ingame does not equal "your account has already been paid for". If that is as far as you can work it, then you truly "fail at math". Very short-term thinking.

This is the biggest flaw in your whole argument, here let me simplify it for you ...


PLEX ARE MEANT TO BE SOLD FOR ISK SO OTHERS CAN USE THEM TO PAY FOR THE GAME THAT IS WHAT THEY ARE FOR, STOPPING PLEX FROM BEING TURNED INTO GAME TIME DEFEATS THEIR WHOLE PURPOSE.

That PLEX came from real, hard cash from another player. There is no way around that. The only way to get PLEX into the game is via players buying them for real, hard cash. The total number of game months paid via PLEX cannot be higher than the amount of PLEX sold by CCP. So I don't see your point.

I hope you all realize this is exactly what CCP wanted. A increase in Plex price means more people will be willing to buy Plexs for $$, this helps with curbing illegal RMT as well as increase profit for CCP since Plex > Sub cost . Its just a shame all those who play just to pay will get screwed, but all of us who are ballin really don't care.

I'll not chime in into trolling and failure accuses. However, I think you should respect one thing:

The PLEX price is determined by supply and demand, as is everything else in this game.

The very transaction of a PLEX does not add ISK to the game, nor drain them (other than the taxes involved in the transfer). Also, it does not grant free gametime. It's simply a trade between two players where one player gives the other player gametime (or an ingame object that is an abstract manifestation of that) that he paid for, getting ISK from another player.

What does that mean for economy?

At first glance, nothing, because no values are created, and no ISK are created or removed (in sizeable quantities). As a second-order term, liquidity in the game might be increased. The player who purchased the PLEX might or might not have had too much ISK to spend. The player who SOLD the plex is usually intending to spend the money rightaway or invest it, hence making it available for the market. So, a small increase in "liquid" ISK but hardly enough to have any gamebreaking effects, rather helping in keeping the markets going.

Does the PLEX price influence the number of GTC's bought?

If the plex price is any indication, then PLEXes are more desireable than before. Also, their price is rising, therefore the motivation to sell PLEX might even be increased. Hey, now you get more ISK for your money.
Only /IF/ the only motivation to buy GTC and sell it as PLEX is a fixed number of players wanting to get a fixed amount of ISK, then the number of PLEX created in game would decrease and prices would rise even further. But... as prices get even bigger, I am sure more players are lured into spending a quick 10 bucks into their game to get LOTS of ISK for that.

The sad thing about highly increasing PLEX prices is that you can easier P2W (pay to win) this game, because purchasing a titan with USD has never been cheaper. Also, new players might have a harder time financing their PLEX with in-game-work since it takes some time until you're able enough to fly incursions.

But that's about it.

I agree these prices are bull. Where the hell is the ccp economy guy when you need him.

He's off having a hard time figuring out how to explain to mission runners, explorers and incursionists that they're going to have to take a pay cut…

…or possibly, he's just laughing at the PR people since it's up to them to entice people to keep paying for PLEX.

A few observations:

Paying for an account with cash costs $12 to $13 a month. A PLEX costs $17.50. Every account CCP can get switched to being funded via the PLEX market is more money for CCP.

A higher PLEX price (in ISK) doe not increase supply as much as you might think. Consider if I want to buy a 1.2 billion isk ship, funded via PLEX. If the PLEX is at 300 million I get 4 of them. If the PLEX is at 400 million I only need get 3. So in this case increasing PLEX prices REDUCES supply. Not everyone acts this way, but many do, so the result is higher PLEX prices do not increase supply that much.

PLEX price rises: I think its going up simply because more and more people are learning how to make bucket-loads of ISK. As the price works its way up, they keep stepping up their game to match. I know my present operations could keep my 3 accounts funded up to a PLEX price of 700 million, and I could step it up.

Why use ISK rather than working far less real time in a RL job? First, I enjoy the activities that make ISK. Next, over my eve career I have saved myself $1000, not a small amount. Finally, Im salaried, which means I cannot get extra pay for overtime, Im paid per week, not per hour. To work extra hours to pay for eve would require getting a second job, and jobs that allow you to work 2 hours a month to pay for computer games are few and far between.

What can CCP do to reduce the PLEX price? So far it looks like the only thing is PLEX special offers. Game changes to reduce player income would lose subscribers. The ones that go are those just on the edge of being able to fund their subscription with PLEX. The ones like me who can deal with the high price would remain, so some upward pressure on the PLEX price would remain.

ISK sinks: The biggest sink in the game is the Loyalty Store. Many items require ISK along with the LP. A while ago a Dev posted this:

"A freebie, last 24hrs transaction stats for a selection of faucets and sinks -
as you can see, Concord is a very generous organization!

Trade Total

* Market Transaction 5,848,221,406,963

Faucets
* Bounty Prizes 876,039,478,466
* Agent Mission Reward 68,923,141,163
* Agent Mission Time Bonus 63,450,447,585
* Insurance Payouts 111,942,877,603

Sinks
* Sales Tax 6,227,911,218
* Brokers fee 6,733,818,276
* PI Construction Costs 7,575,185,000
* PI Import Tax 290,289,843
* PI Export Tax 3,355,153,925
* Insurance Cost 43,021,823,156
* Clone Activation 20,197,210,000
* Sovereignty Bill 59,332,000,000
* LP Store 135,343,150,000 "