EVE General Discussion

I shall chock your navigators of their spice and will bend to my will.

Scrubs, you say ...

Only way I've been able to PLEX til december is by getting lucky on SOMER Blink. Otherwise the prices are ridicules.

It's kind of annoying, isn't it.

Though at least the people selling the plex are happy and hey, they're the ones paying CCP for it so ...

On the contrary high isk/Real Money Exchange range for PLEX would encourage the sales PLEX more than it encourages RMT.


More people are using PLEX to fund their accounts and less people are buying PLEX, its a two-fold effect that makes PLEXes rise high.

Except that as the ISK value rises it incentivises more players to pay real money for them as they can now trade them for more in game currency. Ask my buddy why he suddenly decided to buy 8 of them. This would at least partially offset the drop in subs. Also if people stop subbing with PLEX then demand will drop until the ISK price comes back to a level that people are willing to pay.

1 bill.

I think it's funny people just keep repeating the same line over and over again to support their argument.

(Some) Factors that are variable and influence PLEX prices:

• Customer willingness to buy PLEX with real money to exchange for pretend money.
We have seen a steady climb in PLEX price since it's inception based on game inflation primarily. This is possible because the type of person that plays EvE has been relatively constant, and thus the probability of them buying PLEX is also relatively constant. Playing the DUST beta, I think I can say w/o an NDA violation that using AUR isn't that big of a deal in the game... as you can't buy an advantage... but man it can save you some time. Because of this, I've noticed that whereas I tend to use a PLEX to extend my account in EvE because I'm dumb and forget how cheap the sub is, I'll be using a lot of AUR in DUST... and you know what? It's fine. It's cheap. I can get countless hours of entertainment for a mercenary pack equivalent of AUR every few months. Those DUST players coming into EvE will have fewer logical walls (such as those I think we EvE player have created around MT) in between themselves and a PLEX. Might throw a wrench into the works... to what end I can't say.


• Speculation.
I know PLEX prices are more expensive in the winter... and I'm not alone. Anyone anticipating the bump might be tempted to speculate. The more that do the higher the PLEX prices go. At some point a bigger trader... somebody w/ hundreds or thousands of PLEX, will decide to cash out. This will cause the market to dip a bit, followed by small holder panic, and real PLEX bargains in spring. It happens every year.


• Health of EvE the game and Community.
If people don't think there's going to be a 2014 for EvE, they won't buy a lot of PLEX. If they do, they might get a lot and sub out for a few years.


• Purchasing power of a PLEX.
The question a player thinking about forking over some green for some gold is 'what will this get me.' If the answer is 'three fully fit battleships' well that might sound pretty damn good, and so the PLEX enters the market. If the answer is 'one battleship kinda fit' than it might not be worth 20 bucks. So in very real terms, we attach the price incidentally to actual purchasing power of the PLEX at the time of the transaction between the customer and CCP. If there is a "true" value to a PLEX at any point in time, analysis of the PLEX market should begin here.


• Player RL money situation.
If you 'ain't got no job and you ain't got s*** to do,' PLEX becomes more valuable to your RL economy. If the price of a cup of coffee in one EvE playing country approaches the down payment on a car in another, I'll bet you good (potentially worthless) money that PLEX prices will go through the roof. Billion ISK PLEX? I can assure you it's only a matter of time.


• The stockpiles.
Some players use PLEX to hedge their fortunes against inflation. If you have half a trillion ISK you will loose tens of billions per year in purchasing power due to inflation if you keep it liquid. If those (and there are many) holding large amounts of PLEX have reason to dump them, they will. It will flood the market. It could create a crash that could take months or even longer for the market to absorb.

The fallacy of the "supply and demand" parrots is that YOU don't know what that means! "Demand" is complex. For demand, one wonders will eve be around for a few more years? Do I want to play that long? If it's assumed PLEX keeps pace w/ inflation how much ISK is out there in player hands that's going to get converted to PLEX? Is the likelihood of a DUST player buying a PLEX greater or less than that of an EvE player? The "supply" side is just as bad: what does a PLEX buy in game today? Exactly how many do you suppose are stockpiled in the richest players in EvE's hangers?

You can't just say "supply and demand" and call it good, because no one save the devs can even begin to approach the answers to the questions those two words imply. Supply: No one will tell you what the supply level is. No EvE players know (unless a dev broke the rules). Demand - this you actually can get a sense for if you look at volume over time (I would say a couple of years is good). That said, predicting the future, the most important aspect of "demand", is particularly tricky right now b/c of DUST.

tl;dr; PLEX is a very different kind of commodity. Predicting it's price is not simple. "Supply and demand" is a disingenuous answer. "Supply" is an unknowable number (for us players) and "Demand" requires some research, informed thought, and creative extrapolation. By design or accident, the PLEX market is dangerous, volatile, and very difficult neigh impossible to predict with a high degree of accuracy.

...just my 2 isk

You are doing it wrong.

New Eden needs PLEX buyers (sans job) just as much as it needs suppliers (Han's job).