It's time for GGG to take back reigns of trade for the sake of the game

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Nulledout написал:

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Nubatron написал:

What's the point?

Money, plain and simple. Back in WoWs heyday I was making 30k+ a month. The problem with botting a game, is that you can never play it for fun anymore. The overall problem with botting is that you now see all games as money and not fun. It took a long time to get out of that mindset. I now make so much money that the money isn't worth the time investment. So I am back to using gaming as my out instead of my main source of income.

Botting is a great hobby, and it is what got me into software engineering. I don't write bots anymore, but I still have pet projects like an image recognition software I am currently working on. But for most people, botting is not sustainable in a well monitored environment unless you are part of a private project that is not easily found by developers.

Of course. My comment was with respect to me. I don't view games as a source of income, so of course botting is ridiculous to me.

My friend also makes too much money at their real job for botting to be financially driven. I'm almost positive the bot is a hobby, like they enjoy making the bots more and more efficient. The not getting caught part is probably part of the rush too. I'm just speculating though since I'm generally put off by it and frustrated that they do it so easily -- it being on games that I don't play anymore helps ease that frustration I suppose.

Why others do it is crystal clear though.

Player X got a family and very little time to play. 10-15 bucks to get a nice T16 build going every 4 months sounds very appealing at that point to me. And why would this person waste money on MTX when they can do this instead? So it's literally eating into GGGs own profits.

I dunno what they should do TBH, but I know GGG gotta do something because this can't be good for anyone.

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la_blue_girl написал:

Player X got a family and very little time to play. 10-15 bucks to get a nice T16 build going every 4 months sounds very appealing at that point to me. And why would this person waste money on MTX when they can do this instead? So it's literally eating into GGGs own profits.

I dunno what they should do TBH, but I know GGG gotta do something because this can't be good for anyone.

I think that there are quite a few people that post on reddit or here that vastly underestimate how many people do this or think this way. And I'm not sure why. The RMT sites and folks are making significant money. Where do they think all that's coming from?

$30 for a battle pass, or $30 for enough divines to allow you to play whatever you want and gear up. If you are a casual gamer, this is very appealing given the required time investment to get the equivalent resources. If you are a currency seller, this is very appealing financially. Its definitely filling a demand in the market, and you would think GGG should have an interest in addressing that just from a lost revenue standpoint.

It does make a person ask why that would be? Well there could be a reason, but that would reflect very poorly on GGG.

You can spend 100-300 hours of your life farming for a mageblood, or go to a website and spend 30.00, the answer as to why people do this is obvious to anyone with a brain and a job. I make so much currency off the RMTers in Mathil and Ziz streams it is hilarious. I see the new build Mathil or Ziz is going to make, find the key pieces of that build, buy out the market and with in 3 days I have 10x the currency I put into it or more. Their followers are too easy to predict. They will literally credit card their way into what ever build those 2 are playing.

One league I bought out all the DD wands, sold them all for 10exalt+ when I was paying 10c each. One guy spent 150exalt on the wand, couldn't get the build to work, sold it back to me for 10exalt and I resold it to another guy for 100exalt. I spent 150c on that wand day 1. They are such easy targets and ripe with RMT monies.

People who don't think RMT is absolutely rampant have their head in the sand. I have had the same currency seller on my friends list for 2 years now, nothing has happened to them. I have 4 bots on my accounts who literally put their currency in their status every league, still on my friends list and nothing has happened to them. If GGG put ANY effort into trying to combat it, they could eliminate so many of these people.

At this point GGG might as well just say "Yea, we aren't going to do anything, you might as well bot and RMT" because literally nothing is happening to virtually anybody. Which is sad, because once upon a time, they actively policed their game to the point where bot makers stopped making bots for it because GGG was too good at shutting it down and banning people.

Edit: Removed any insulting words in my response.

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DarthSki44 написал:

$30 for a battle pass, or $30 for enough divines to allow you to play whatever you want and gear up. If you are a casual gamer, this is very appealing given the required time investment to get the equivalent resources. If you are a currency seller, this is very appealing financially. Its definitely filling a demand in the market, and you would think GGG should have an interest in addressing that just from a lost revenue standpoint.

This is a very good point. That 30.00 could be spent in game but instead goes to RMT. Imagine all the money they could make off people if RMT didn't exist. More over, maybe an easy mode where all things are account bound could solve the problem. Then people have no incentive and are unable to RMT.

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DarthSki44 написал:

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la_blue_girl написал:

Player X got a family and very little time to play. 10-15 bucks to get a nice T16 build going every 4 months sounds very appealing at that point to me. And why would this person waste money on MTX when they can do this instead? So it's literally eating into GGGs own profits.

I dunno what they should do TBH, but I know GGG gotta do something because this can't be good for anyone.

I think that there are quite a few people that post on reddit or here that vastly underestimate how many people do this or think this way. And I'm not sure why. The RMT sites and folks are making significant money. Where do they think all that's coming from?

$30 for a battle pass, or $30 for enough divines to allow you to play whatever you want and gear up. If you are a casual gamer, this is very appealing given the required time investment to get the equivalent resources. If you are a currency seller, this is very appealing financially. Its definitely filling a demand in the market, and you would think GGG should have an interest in addressing that just from a lost revenue standpoint.

It does make a person ask why that would be? Well there could be a reason, but that would reflect very poorly on GGG.

RMT and MTX purchases are not mutually exclusive. Nor could any reasonable argument conclude that the purchase of RMT directly equates to an inverse loss for GGG.

If you downloaded a movie off the Internet, Is that a $20 loss in DVD sales? Or were you never going to buy that movie if there was no illegal way to obtain it in the first place?

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DarthSki44 написал:

$30 for a battle pass, or $30 for enough divines to allow you to play whatever you want and gear up. If you are a casual gamer, this is very appealing given the required time investment to get the equivalent resources.

I will never get this point, even though I'm a casual gamer in most games I play (which isn't many these days), even though I might be considered a little bit more than casual in PoE.

Claim: To 'most' ARPG players: The 'gearing up' part is the game. The journey is the game. The fun thing is getting there, not being there. Why would I ever activate a map, if I didn't need anything it drops or the XP/Gem XP? Why would I ever fight a boss, if I wasn't hoping for a good drop?

Don't get me wrong here, I know you guys are correct - we all now these people exist, even in this thread. I just don't get the appeal of an ARPG if you have everything.

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muzein написал:

If you downloaded a movie off the Internet, Is that a $20 loss in DVD sales? Or were you never going to buy that movie if there was no illegal way to obtain it in the first place?

There is a massive difference between someone who was/is not going to spend the money on a movie vs someone who is actively spending money in the movie theatre, just maybe not to see the movie.

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Phrazz написал:

I just don't get the appeal of an ARPG if you have everything.

PoE has a ton of builds to try out, people want to try them out. You get the best gear and then move on to the next alt with the best gear. You keep trying out builds, that is what is fun to some people. I, myself, am one of those people. I don't remake builds, or at least try not to. I play a new one every league if I can help it, please see my character roster to confirm.

I know it seems like I am crapping all over this game, but please understand that I am trying to save it from losing its casuals.

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Nulledout написал:

There is a massive difference between someone who was/is not going to spend the money on a movie vs someone who is actively spending money in the movie theatre, just maybe not to see the movie.

The point is you can't observe an illegal movie download and claim that was a guaranteed loss in revenue for the studio.

It's worth pointing out that people who RMT their way through PoE are still spending money on a free game. If they're motivated to spend for gear, why would they not be motivated to spend for cosmetics--especially if those cosmetics increase the 'fun' of the game (which we can assume was the motivation behind RMT)?

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muzein написал:

RMT and MTX purchases are not mutually exclusive. Nor could any reasonable argument conclude that the purchase of RMT directly equates to an inverse loss for GGG

Well that's an interesting argument considering you cannot purchase gear or currency from GGG to begin with. Its false equivalence because its not a direct option. No one is claiming that.

Just at a base start, if a casual player had "x" dollars to spend would they rather it have real in game impacts, qol, or massive time savers or alternatively, simple cosmetics? Hell Stash tabs are are huge moneymaker for GGG, why do you think that is? I dont think that's crazy to imagine a player engaging in a process making a decison like this. I'd argue it very reasonable from a logic standpoint (maybe not ethical or game integrity view)

Even if we broke this down to a fundamental standpoint, you could argue RMT impacts player experience and that alone could impact revenues, not to mention the obvious limitations people have in their budgets. Not everyone is a whale, but casuals with money do make choices like this.

I'm not trying to convince you, because I think the evidence is there, even historically, when it comes to RMT. However, to make a statement that its "not reasonable" to assume players make either or financial choices with their money, undermines the reality of the situation. It's already occurring regardless of how you want to quantify it.

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DarthSki44 написал:

Well that's an interesting argument considering you cannot purchase gear or currency from GGG to begin with. Its false equivalence because its not a direct option. No one is claiming that.

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DarthSki44 написал:

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la_blue_girl написал:

Player X got a family and very little time to play. 10-15 bucks to get a nice T16 build going every 4 months sounds very appealing at that point to me. And why would this person waste money on MTX when they can do this instead? So it's literally eating into GGGs own profits.

$30 for a battle pass, or $30 for enough divines to allow you to play whatever you want and gear up.

My response was in the context that you both proposed: A player is choosing to RMT over purchasing MTX.