MMOG Currency Seller Owns Media Network ? 268
Ogaming is a hub site much like Warcry, with a sub-site about most of the major Massively Multiplayer Games out there. Some enterprising /whois work by the original author of the WowCensus thread led him to realize that OGaming was registered with the same street address used for IGE's New York Office. OGaming's registration information was updated on the 10th, and now displays the name and address of a proxy registration service. Further damning is the thought that at one point a page on the Ogaming site claimed to own Thottbot.com, a universally respected and utilized tool for World of Warcraft in-game information.
The page that once claimed this (an advertising page) is now blank, with the words "under construction" displayed there. The Internet Archive's last update for ogaming.com is this time last year, so there is no way to check on the authenticity of that claim. If it is true it's disquieting to say the least. Thottbot is a massive database of in-game quest, item, character, and drop frequency information. Thottbot's information was gained through the goodwill and work of World of Warcraft players. The popular UI enhancement, Cosmos, included a plugin that sent information from the user's playing experience back to Thottbot. This included locations of enemies, the types of loot dropped, items the character had, and other specific details. While Thottbot claims to only keep information that is pertinent to other players, with the revelation that they may be owned by the disreputable IGE their trustworthiness is out the window.
This revelation didn't stay quiet for long, with MMOG sites CorpNews, Grimwell.com, and Allakhazam all creating discussions of their own about this weighty topic.
The authenticity of this story is hard to prove or disprove at this point, with the OGaming.com and Thottbot.com domains having a proxy listed under their contact information. But if it's hard to believe that IGE would go to the trouble of owning a media outlet and a popular plugin, think again. Garthilk writes "Cindy Bowens, community manager for Sigil Games online and Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, outlines their stance on secondary market items, and how they deal with IGE. Most interesting is the fact that IGE approached Sigil, and had offered to cut Sigil in on the revenue that IGE might make in the future."
Update: 02/15 20:07 GMT by Z : Drey pointed out in the comments that, at least for the time being, Google still has a cache of the page listing Thottbot as an Ogaming site.
Ogaming and Thottbot (Score:5, Interesting)
Frankly this looks very disturbing to me. I'm not saying IGE is going to break into accounts. I'm saying they are getting lots of information they can sort to find the best spots to farm various items and then use that to flood the market. I for one will not be using thottbot any longer.
Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:2, Informative)
As you profess to play MMOs, I'll assume you've read through the Terms of Service(ToS). Unlike a shrink wrap EULA, this is a perfectly binding, legal contract which you are required to follow in order to use the service. One of the common, yet usually unenforced clauses is that you will not resell ingame content as it is property of $MMO_Company, and doing so infringes on their rights.
Now, as for how IGE gets around that is this: They don't actually own any accounts, nor directly employ anyone who sells currency. As I mentioned, they are simply a sell point; a place for people who do farm items/currency to advertise their wares and sell them to turn a buck. The best way to think of them is as a really really big eBay store.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
It's an arrangement that works out well for the buyers, but is annoying for other players. I actually knew someone who ago (before they banned it) determined that he was making about 5$ an hour selling Everquest stuff on Ebay.
Re:Non-player (Score:5, Insightful)
people with lots of real-world money can achieve in games what normally takes hard-working players a long time to accomplish.
Sad to say, but it sounds just like the real life. Replace "game" by "university" and you get one such example.So basically, people blame IGE for being just one more company servicing the "rich people"? I don't see any difference with what I see everyday in the capitalist world.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Totally flawed analogy. What IGE does is akin to paying off teachers so they give you good grades, not having the money to go university. Having the money to pay for university is like having the money to pay your subscription fee, you expect a level playing field from that point on.
Re:Non-player (Score:3, Informative)
Sadly, there's no such thing as a level playing field in Universities either. If you're rich and stupid, you can get by in any University. I've seen in in the Ivy League, I've seen it in the Pac10. Does is suck? Of course it does, but the parent poster is right on in his assessment.
Re:Non-player (Score:3, Informative)
Totally flawed analogy. What IGE does is akin to paying off teachers so they give you good grades, not having the money to go university. Having the money to pay for university is like having the money to pay your subscription fee, you expect a level playing field from that point on
Obviously you never had to work full time to pay your studies. That is where the analogy is. Some are rich enough to provide few efforts to get the same thing that poorer people cannot afford without huge efforts.
It's also a fact that students who do not have to work while studying are much more successful than the others
I hope you get the picture,
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
I think thats a good analogy :)
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
I (and all of my friends in college) worked 20-30 hours a week, and took 15-18 hours per semester for four years. (Plus 6-9 hours per summer session, and fulltime employment at the same time).
I also maintained a 3.9 GPA and am *very* successful at what I do. As are my friends.
If you didn't get the grades you thought you'd get in college, look towards yourself. Stop blaming others, or talking about how it was too hard or impossible because you had to work. If you gave me that crap at a job interview, I'd kindly show you the door.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
And yes the students that didn't have to work did have better grades then me. But it didn't make them more successful then me post-graduation, because what I learned from my work experience and my ability to work 70 hours a week without sweating it made it possible to move ahead of the others in my university once I hit the job market.
Here's an adjusted analogy:
Can pay for University = Can pay subscription fee
Don't have to work during University = Players that have no jobs/life get ahead
Bribing professors = Buying plat/gil from IGE
Re:Non-player (Score:4, Insightful)
And that is exactly why so many are opposed to IGE and other such operations. When you start blurring the line between game and reality, you lose a lot of what makes a virtual world so exciting to begin with. I want to play a game, not log into "DnD sponsored by EBay". IGE, farmers, sweatshops, etc. just suck all the fun out of the experience for me. Particularly when you're talking about an RPG, as most MMOs claim to be, introducing such real-world influences just corrupts the feel of the world. I mean, roleplaying doesn't have to mean using "thee" and "thou" all the time, but it seems to me that at a bare minimum, you would "play the role" of a character within a fantasy world. When that character starts making financial transactions with beings from another dimension, and when the finances of the player have more effect than the actions of the character, it just doesn't appeal to me anymore.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Anyway, with thottbot's site claiming to run 40 servers, I'm suprised nobody tried to follow the money sooner.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:3, Informative)
Thottbot [thottbot.com] is a very useful web site containing data about in-game items, quests, monsters, classes, player profiles, skills, etc. in World of Warcraft.
How did they get this data? One of the more popular add-ons for World of Warcraft is called Cosmos [cosmosui.org]. One of the many features of Cosmos is a plugin to Thottbot so that information that your player sees gets uploaded to Thottbot to improve Thottbot's data - if you see monster X at coordinates Y,Z and no one else has, Thottbot now knows that monster X can potentially be there, and what items you can get from killing it.
IGE is a well known online currency and item broker, and many people within the World of Warcraft community are concerned that once IGE and the so-called "Asian Farmers" get a large presence that the in-game economy will be permanently ruined - better equipment for your character will be out of your price range unless you go to an in-game gold broker, paying real money for game money. World of Warcraft is the only MMORPG I've had experience with, but I've heard that activities like this have made some MMORPGs unplayable.
Most people assume that the Thottbot service was benign, but with the news that IGE owns it is somewhat alarming to people. This means that IGE now has information on what a large portion of the characters in game have and get their items and money, which could be used to more effectively farm high-demand items, collect in-game money at a higher rate, etc.
I don't neccessarily see this as the end of the world, but it is a bit of a concern. I'll probably stop using the Cosmos UI enhancements, or at the very least disable the Thottbot data aggregation.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:2, Insightful)
The game makers universally ban this sort of sale:
Some players argue buying in-game items is fine:What are they doing wrong? Not a lot. (Score:2, Insightful)
If they are violating the game's rules, then you could say that is wrong.
In the greater sense, I don't think they are doing anything wrong. They are providing a valuable service for those who want to enjoy the content but don't have the time to do so.
Some people suggest that buying in-game items or advantage is somehow unfair or inequitable. I would argue that these games take a long time to play, so the fact that I work full time and have little time to play whereas some players can spend a lot more time in-game is also unfair.
So some have more time, and some have more money. I don't see a problem with people trading one for another, especially when it has next to no impact on other players in-game.
Some may complain about how farming converts games into a "queue" system where you wait your turn. WOW have solved some of this with bind-on-pickup items and instances, as has been previously mentioned.
I'd say the blame for any problem beyond this must be placed on the game designers. I mean, it's pretty obvious by now that people will try to sell in-game currency and items, isn't it? It isn't exactly a new service that should take designers completely by surprise.
- Thomas.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:5, Informative)
Let's say that to earn a certain rank in Game X, you have to get a special item Blizzrt's Tail in order to prove your strength and valor, yadda yadda. Obviously, you get this by killing Blizzrt and taking its tail. The problem is that there is only one Blizzrt in the game world at any one time, so it becomes more a test of "waiting your turn" than of strength or valor.
Now, what IGN does is called "farming". They get 30 or 40 players to all stand around in the cave that Blizzrt lives in (where it appears every time its killed, this is its spawn point). Every time Blizzrt appears, they immediately start to kill it, and take the tail for themselves. Over and over, without respect for the other people who need to kill it in order to advance.
But thats ok, if you can't get a sword in edgewise to score a tail for yourself, the IGN crew will be more than happy to sell it to you on ebay for real money, since they seem to have just "stumbled across" a few hundred extra. Now getting that tail isn't about patience or valor, just about shelling out enough dough on an auction site somewhere.
Now whether this is bad or not depends on how much you care. If you say "its just a game" then consider it as frustrating as waiting in line at say... McDonalds. You have 11 kids in front of you, and they think its real cool to keep you from getting your food by ordering a glass of water, getting it, then getting their buddy in 11th place to let them cut in front for another glass. Unless of course you slip them a buck to get to the front of the line.
Re:Non-player (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not to say farming won't become a problem and such, but Blizzard also incorporated enough in-game money sinks (buying skills, mounts, etc.) that I think inflation from farmers will be slower to develop in WoW that in other games.
Finally, keep in mind that the ultimate way to stop farming and such is to play on a PvP server -- because if you don't like the farmer, you can round up a group of buddies to put an end to the farmers.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
It's easy to communicate between factions. Log off, create a char as the other faction,
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:3, Insightful)
Although there are a number of money-sinks out there, most of them are one-time deals which means that eventually you burn through them.
And your access to gold seems to increase expodentially as you level, which means that eventually there are going to be a number of bored level 60 players with an entire vault full of gold, 're-rolling' or just leveling up alts and dumping obscene amounts of money out for equipment.
You are right, Blizzard has put in place things that I hope will retard inflation in game, but I wonder if that will actually slow it or just build it up behind a dam that will eventually break.
They'll have to add new things (Score:2)
Seige equipment for their Battlegrounds would be a good idea. Allow players to dump money into getting devices that help win in PvP combat in teh speical battlegroudns. Given the continus nature of PvP combat (one side doesn't just win and then it's all voer forever) it would be a continous money sink.
So as long as they continue to expand the game, I can't see a problem with more things comming in to spend money on.
Re:Non-player (Score:3, Insightful)
If play like that is against the TOS, then the GMs should enforce the TOS. If it isn't against the TOS, then maybe it should be.
If the GMs aren't enforcing the TOS, then maybe people should just stop playing the game.
Sounds to me like this is a problem that the developer should be able to solve, not something that has anything to do with the market for in-game items.
Basically, it sounds like people are actually complaining against in-game griefing, not people selling items outside the game. Selling items outside the game should be OK. In-game griefing should be solved by the GMs in-game. If it isn't, then the players should simply quit playing the game, if the GMs aren't doing their job.
Re:Non-player (Score:5, Insightful)
It is a problem only in part with IGE. From what I can tell, IGE is sort of like an item/money/account broker. Where they make their Real Life money from the transfer of In Game items/money/accounts. While IGE has claimed in the past that they don't employ others to retrieve the in game items, they certainly do facilitate the sale of these items no matter how they were obtained. In truth, it's the griefers who are the most noticable effect of the service that IGE provides.
Selling items outside the game should be OK.
I disagree because the world in game is affected directly by the amount of cash a player has outside the game. I see these types of games as closed systems where advancement comes with skill, and time invested.
Re:Non-player (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Non-player (Score:3, Insightful)
I think most people would leave McDonalds and goto another establishment that didn't allow that sort of activity. Maybe you should follow my analogy and do the same.
Also you analogy is flawed. It be more like fishing and having people camp a fishing hole. No one is cutting in line(immoral) in the game, they were there before you. Point of the game is gather items and advance, there is no moral obligation for them to allow you a chance to advance.
Also if they didn't sell the items for real money but instead traded the items for other items in the game would you still be complaining? Trading items is perfectly legit in the eyes of the people who run the games.
Is it cheating when I put more money in the arcarde games so I can get extra lives and beat the high score? Is it cheating when I buy some guys oscar award off of them? Is it cheating when I pay extra $50 for the FastPass at amusement park so I don't have to wait in lines? Is it cheating when I pay extra for first class and get to board the plane before other people? Is it cheating when I buy a $500 super softball bat that allows me to hit the ball 30% farther than anyone else? Is it cheating when Ferrari Spends 500% more than other guys in F1 in order to come in first place? Is it cheating when you hire a tutor so you can pass a class? Is it cheating if I donate $25,000 Hollywood bowl allow me to purchase tickets before everyone else and giving me priority parking? Is it cheating when some millionaire buys his way into space while 100s of people try to become astronauts?
Re:Non-player (Score:5, Insightful)
It's more like buying all the food within a week's journey, and then selling it to people for outrageous prices. This is very immoral.
You're analogue is flawed, because
Actually, as a matter of fact, people do have the moral obligation of taking into account the consequences of their actions have on other people, and to try and minimize any negative effects. People who do not follow this obligation are called psychopaths (which, according to dictionary.com [slashdot.org], means "A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse").
So yes, there is a moral obligation for them to allow you a chance to advance.
Furthermore, don't forget that they aren't just refusing to help you (which would be within their rights to do) - they are actively keeping you from advancing (which you could do just fine without their harassment), unless you pay them a certain amount. This is Mafia tactics.
"Trading items" and "creating an artifical shortage in supply by keeping anyone else from getting to the item just so you can sell it" are a bit different, don't you think ?
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
The items involved are player-exchangeable objects. This means that a player can exchange them for any reason at all: because the player likes another player, because the player wants to help the other player level up so they can party together, in exchange for cyber-sex, so that they can finish a mission sooner and the player go to work...
If the game allows players to exchange goods and money for any reason at all, then the fact that one is being paid for the activity in the "real world" is just one reason out of many possible ones.
Farming and camping are part of the game whether you have an IGE or not. (IGE doesn't actually have farmers: they are a clearing house between players. The farmers are utilizing IGE as a brokerage. There are guilds that are large and organized enough to camp and farm with the best of them that are doing it "for fun." Like the case of your 11 guys who keep letting each other in to a line just because they're a clique. That issue is completely separate from the money issue.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who notes how weird it is, to play next to someone in an MMORPG who is doing the same thing he is, but while my friend was doing it for fun, the other is doing it as a job. The uncomfortable feeling that comes from that could be why IGE is hated so, more than anything else.
What is really going on is that people are playing different games within the MMO - some are playing the Advancement Game, and for them, people who buy stuff are cheating. But people who are playing the Exploring Game or the Socializing Game only see the advancement as a means to an end - in the case of the latter, it may be a way to keep up with friends.
Re:Non-player (Score:5, Interesting)
That's just about the smartest thing I've ever seen anybody say on the subject of farming.
Personally, I tend to play the "roleplaying game."
In EverQuest, I had a character named "Iwalk", who was an even cleric with a very simple ethos:
1. Never run. It's undignified.
2. Never fight. Hurting people is beneath me.
3. Heal people if they want me to.
I played the character up to about level 8 or so (and that took weeks) while strolling leisurely through the forest. Some were amused by my quirky character, and dozens tried to explain to me how I was playing "wrong" because it would take longer for me to "level up" doing what I was doing.
All of my exp came from delivering mail for the bard's guild (a newbie quest which merely involved going from one place to another with "mail"), and from rare people chosing to invite me into their group, in spite of the fact that I told them up front that I would neither fight nor run. (Some of them were stunned when they discovered that I meant it. They would try to "lead" me to some hunting ground or another, only to turn around at the end of their jog and realize that they left me about a half-mile behind.)
I got almost nothing "accomplished" in that vitrual world, but man was it ever fun. I felt a lot like Kwai Chang Caine, walking among the cowboys of the Old West, who can't understand why he doesn't carry a gun or eat meat like regular folks.
In fact, next time I log in to WoW, I think it's about time I bring the character concept back.
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Wouldn't the simplest way to stop this be to make the critical creatures unique ? When the game wants you to return with Blizzrt's Tail, simply have the game replace the word "Blizzrt" with some randomly generated string, wait until he's gone to the wilds, then generate the damn creature somewhere near the player - and if it dies, keep generating more, until the player kills it. Or, if you absolutely must have the thing inhabit some specific dungeon, make everyone (or every group) that enters it be transported to a separate dungeon - different instances of the same place, in other words.
Really, having a fixed spawn points for anything seems like a very stupid idea.
Then again, I've never played MMORPGs, so maybe I shouldn't comment on their design. But these particular problems seem so very simple to solve. Which almost certainly means that I'm missing something important...
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Re:Non-player (Score:2)
Thats exactly how they do it in WoW. All the harder dungeons where you actually have a good chance of getting worthwhile item drops are "instanced".
Re:Ogaming and Thottbot (Score:2)
Not use, or not contribute to?
There's no advertising on the site, so they aren't directly making money from it. In fact, every map burns bandwidth, so every person who uses it without contributing is a loss for them.
I remember bandwidth issues during Open Beta, and I figured that for them to handle access from a portion of 5,000 players to a portion of 500,000 (or whatever) the original guys just bought space on someone else, or had it donated to them. I could be wrong there, but I'm pretty sure it at least started as fan-based, even if it's not now.
Re:Ogaming and Thottbot (Score:3, Informative)
They are ironing out an advertising system. I caught a banner ad a week or so ago, and whatever poor server was serving them up quickly choked because the whole site was grinding to a halt.
30 minutes later the ads were gone and thottbot was responsive again.
Do a dns query on 'ads.thottbot.com'.
Re:Ogaming and Thottbot (Score:2, Interesting)
As far as thottbot goes, that site has data provided by the community. This data is uploaded by a program that you use from your computer. We don't know exactly what information it sends but the fact that IGE has went through great lengths to hide their ownership of thottbot makes me very suspicious of their motives.
Re:Ogaming and Thottbot (Score:2)
Bad day for IGE (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Bad day for IGE (Score:2)
Re:Bad day for IGE (Score:2, Insightful)
In addition to that, now that they own Ogaming, they can essentially live off the ad revenue from there, and even if they lose out on an MMO or two, of which WoW will likely be the one to really enforce ToS, they'll still roll along, skimming off the top from sales in games where nothing is done about the blatant ToS violations.
Re:Bad day for IGE (Score:2)
Remember, everything the gil-farmers got, they put into the economy. They, for lack of a better term, worked.
In other, more important, news... (Score:3, Funny)
harsh marketroid speak? (Score:5, Insightful)
"Page under construction" (Score:4, Informative)
http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:s7q2fzgQje
Re:"Page under construction" (Score:3, Informative)
This keeps slashdot from putting spaces in the url, messing them up [64.233.167.104].
Re:"Page under construction" (Score:2)
Wow, news... (Score:5, Funny)
People will try and exploit other people for profit.
People will release closed source software that does more than advertised.
People in MMORPGs are asshats, and cause the more honest MMORPG players harm.
Right. Thanks for the heads up, I -never- would've known...
Conspiracy (Score:4, Interesting)
My only guess is that some MMORPGS give selling rights and items to select individuals for a deal. I've done the math, the market this guy had was $100,000 a month, so it wasn't so trivial a company would ignore it.
So don't be suprised if these sellers are actually 'financed' in virtual goods by the MMORPG companies themselves. The key is that they don't want the public to find out or it could negatively impact the MMORPG's image.
Re:Conspiracy (Score:3, Interesting)
Some time ago, a GM, who went by the name Darwin, was creating millions of gold and selling them on eBay. Eventually, he was discovered because there was no way that any one person could have so much gold on so many different servers.
He was fired right after the news broke.
Reputations (Score:4, Insightful)
I still don't understand what makes IGE disreputable
They have found a niche market where they can make a lot of money. If it works, fine. Nobody's being harmed or spoiled - they are not breaking any law, so what's all the fuss about that?
They sell in-game content, which purchase the game provider prohibits? Well, fine again, don't buy it if you don't want your game account cancelled.
For all the rich idiots that buy 100 gold in World of Warcraft for 45 USD. Fine again! Have fun! Spend your money!
Re:Reputations (Score:2)
Re:Reputations (Score:4, Insightful)
As the interviewer in the previous article (which I believe this article summary links to) compared it to, if we're playing monopoly and I land on Boardwalk, I owe the owner (lets say it's you) $2000 with a hotel. Not chump change. But if I can turn to the banker and slip him five *real* dollars in exchange for $5,000 Monopoly dollars, I have violated the rules of the game (possibly, depending on your reading of 'no gifts') and undoubtedly violated the spirit of the game.
Likewise, MMORPGs are designed to have a specific amount of money in the economy and a specific number of items, distributed in a specific fashion. While the amount of gold in a game is effectively infinite (if you spend time 'farming' you can sell items and drops for as long as you want) it is assumed that the ammount of gold/items you have will at least somewhat relate to the amount of time you've spent playing. This does not take into account gifts or guilds helping new members out, but friends giving a couple gold is not going to effect the economy on the same scale as someone buying 100,000 gold off eBay.
So, in a sense, people *are* being harmed by such 'reselling' of in-game items, in the very broad sense that it throws off what was hopefully a carefully planned economy, put in play by the developers.
In a more down-to-earth sense, farmers disrupt my ability to play the game. Ignoring the fact that I think it's "unfair" (a very subjective term, I admit) for someone to buy the latest Sword of Pwning +10 from eBay, the item was obtained by killing monsters, and thus preventing 'real' players (another subjective term) from killing them and obtaining the items/gold.
World of Warcraft (the MMORPG I am currently playing and thus most familiar with) solves this partially by implimenting 'instanced' dungeons, where every party in the dungeon gets their own 'instance' of the dungeon, with seperate monsters and such. This allows each party to fight through without the posibility of running into other players. While this is a great sollution on a small basis, it does not prevent a gold/item reseller from farming in a high-traffic area, or an area with important quest-related NPCs.
On an entirely different issue, saying "hey are not breaking any law, so what's all the fuss about that?" is just stupid. Even if you don't think selling items/gold from MMORPGs on eBay immoral, saying that it's moral because it's *legal* is disgusting. I am in no way comparing selling a WoW item to any of these things, but slavery, preventing women from voting, segregation, preventing blacks from voting, husbands beating wives, and torture have all at some point been legal. Again, I am *not* comparing MMORPG item reselling to any of these things. Merely pointing out that legality does not indicate morality, nor the other way around.
Just my thoughts.
-Trillian
Re:Reputations (Score:2)
On an entirely different issue, saying "hey are not breaking any law, so what's all the fuss about that?" is just stupid.
What's stupid? It's legal - is all! I cannot change that! And I am not commenting on wherether it should be or not.Even if you don't think selling items/gold from MMORPGs on eBay immoral,
Being "moral" has nothing to do with laws, and that is in many case unfortunate. I am not arguing about the morality of it.
saying that it's moral because it's *legal* is disgusting.
Re-read my post, I have never said this, and never will!Merely pointing out that legality does not indicate morality, nor the other way around.
Same wavelength here. Again, I am not discussing the morality of it. Law is for everyone in a society, moral is for each separate individual. And one cannot impose to the other.Ethics and Morals (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Reputations (Score:2)
What I took from your originial post was that there shouldn't be any fuss because it was legal, and I was objecting to that concept. I still stand by what I said, but I do appologize if I went beyond that and misrepresented what you said and, from rereading your original post, do think I went a bit too far.
-Trillian
Incorrectness of this concept... (Score:2)
If this is really true, then inflation is simply inevitable. The amount of cash in the game always increases because the total amount of time players spend in game always increases. Unless the number of players increases accordingly, inflation is an inevitable side effect.
The *only* long term way to offset this is to limit the amount of cash in the game. Make it dependent on the number of active players. This is probably the only stable way to do it.
There's a lot of ways to remove cash from the game. Implement taxation to remove cash on a regular basis, this way players can continue to get cash from monsters and such. Create cash sinks for upgrades to their character. Create cash sinks for things like in-game mail (gotta buy stamps to send a letter!
And eliminate obvious ways to build up large amounts of cash by sitting in front of the thing 20+ hours a day.
Re:Reputations (Score:3, Interesting)
Sounds disquietingly like the morality of a spammer.
Schwab
Re:Reputations (Score:3, Interesting)
Sounds disquietingly like the morality of a spammer.
Or other corporations. Whatever they are: PROFIT!
And I agree, it's disgusting logic, but it is the way it works in our world, isn't it? You cannot deny that fact, like it or not.
Re:Reputations (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm tired of the game worlds being full of a bunch of 3rd world slaves farming stuff to sell.
This is the effect of living in the leasure society we're in. I'd rather the 3rd world sitting in front of a computer and play online for farming virtual money than have them be paid 10 cent a day to make my next (left) shoe at the expense of the health of a 10-year old.Farming for gold is the worse of two evils IMHO.
Re:Reputations (Score:2)
Ah, I see some of those Indian players have some downtime to troll the Slashdot boards and play damage control. Tell me, are all of your colleagues also this vacuous, or is it just you? I'm pushing the logic a bit far, but worse comes to worse, I'd rather have indians play WoW and farm gold, than farm my own job. All I'm saying that it's NOT illegal, and no amount of whining will change this, and some people WILL use it.
IGE: The MMMORPG. (Score:5, Interesting)
It undermines the spirit of the game "Monopoly". It does not undermine the spirit of the meta-game being played by (in this case) Parker Brothers against other board game manufacturers. If being able to buy Boardwalk for $5 makes Monopoly more fun to play, odds are greater that I'll buy Monopoly. (And if it makes Monopoly suck, I'll be less likely to buy the game.)
IGE (and SOE and Blizzard) are all playing the same MMMORPG, the object of which is to use the MMORPG market to make RL money. MMORPG Producers sell the ability to play WOW, SWG, EQ, EQ2, and so on. IGE sells the ability to more easily play the aforementioned properties.
If the MMMORPG were a game of Monopoly, I would start with representations of sheep (gamers), squares (producers such as SOE or Blizzard), houses/hotels (properties such as SWG or WoW), credits (dollars), bling (in-game loot, in-game credits), and bits (software).
The market has yet to the extent to which folks like IGE make MMORPGs "more" or "less" fun. Consequently, MMORPG producers are still experimenting with the question of whether to ban eBaying for credits, or to encourage it. (An interesting question: how many dollars would you have paid SOE for a Jedi out of the box, rather than craptastically grinding your way through a year and a half of, umm, craptastic grinding, only to find... well, more craptastic grind at the end of the tunnel?)
The MetaMMORPG - how to get the most bucks from the gamer, while not completely eliminating the fun and thereby killing the goose that laid the golden egg - has just begun. Game on.
Why is it a big deal who owns thottbot? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why does it matter who owns the thottbot site? It's my understanding that you can look at the plugin and see that it's not sending any extra information back to thottbot.org such as login or password.
Ultimately the worst case scenario I see is that the owner could start charging for access to the sites content that the players have built. Big deal, someone will start a new site.
I personally like the fact that blizzard has really cracked down on people selling gold and items. Selling accounts to me is not as big of a deal. I'm betting blizzard doesn't like this though. If I was completely done with the game, and would never play again, I would have no problems selling my level 60 shaman account.
Am I missing something?
Re:Why is it a big deal who owns thottbot? (Score:2)
> information back to thottbot.org such as login or password.
Nope, because the bit that actually submits the data is a binary executable. Not within the reach of average users to identify what that program is doing.
Re:Why is it a big deal who owns thottbot? (Score:2)
The thottbot add-on is obfuscated, meaning that while you can still figure out what is being sent, you'd have to spend alot of time working on it to be sure.
I don't believe in selling items or characters when the company running the game specificly prohibits it. But I do consider contributing to game sites that work similar to thottbot simply being a good citizen.
I contributed to both sites that had plugins to allow them to collect data. Now I only contribute to Alkazam. I don't like people who hide their affiliations like that, and I certainly don't want to help out someone who is working hard at something that I consider as making my game less enjoyable.
Your worse case scenario is far more rosey than the one I have. Mine is that IGE collects information which allows them to farm better, and decides to start either holding back info to have a 'competitive edge' or worse, starts faking information. Yeah, people can start their own sites, and I consider Alkazam a better site anyway, but only if they know they need to.
Hey, Children! (Score:3, Insightful)
You may consider it unfair that I can spend an hour on e-bay and get an item that took you months to earn.
I consider it unfair that I have to work 50+ hours a week.
So, I'll make you a deal: You spend 50+ hours a week doing something else besides Fishing and Skinning in WoW, and I'll stop spending real money for virtual items.
They say there's a PA for every moment in your life:
http://penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2004-12-
But look at this as reality. You and I started the day it went live. Now you have a nice mount and I just made 25.
Your unfair advantage is that you are willing to play constantly.
My unfair advantage is that I have a good job.
Until there is a law that says the world has to be fair, I guess we are both fucked.
Re:Hey, Children! (Score:3)
Hey cynical child! (Score:2, Insightful)
One day, you'll grow up and move out of mom's basement. On that day, you'll see that the real world is not fair. People who wine about it generally get crushed.
What you're saying is that it's unfair in the real world that other people have more time available than you to spend playing MMORPGs. Grow up sometime soon will you, you're the one whining about the real world. Your response to this unfairness in the real world is to cheat in the virtual world (where your ability to cheat is actually governed by the same inequalities in the real world) and so through your own selfishness extend these real world inequalities (that you whine on about) to the virtual.
FYI: I myself haven't lived with my parents for many many years (more than you I'd say judging by your immature post) and I'd be willing to wager I work more hours than you do - I don't have a subscription to a MMORPG anymore because I simply don't have the time - hasn't that occured to you?
The unfairness is indeed that you don't have the time to play so much as other people - but does that give you the right to cheat - no. You do however have the right to stop playing and find something else to do with your time.
With light of your selfish, socially backward behaviour I hope you get crushed sooner rather than later.
What people are upset about is that in a virtual world that they are paying to take part in people are breaking the rules, detracting from their enjoyment and effectivley ruining the game. That's the thing about playing games - it's an escape from the real world, why is it any different for a MMORPG?
That means that through your socially-unacceptable behaviour (in either the virtual or real world) you are depriving others of their fun and the hard earned cash that they've invested in a subscription. Now thinking about this means that you're actually depriving people in the real world of their resources (to you obviously a subscription to a game world is trivial, to some (many?) it's the vast proportion of their expendable cash).
There is a law in the virtual worlds that says that it has to be fair - it's a law layed down by god if you like (where god is the creater and contoller of the world eg, Blizzard). The reason they do this is because they want people to play in a fair system as that's where the enjoyment comes from.
Finally just because the world isn't fair that makes it neither moral or ethical for anyone to exploit that.
The same holds for anyone in a position of power (yup, money gives power so in this case you) be that person a CEO, president, judge, monk or infact a corporate identity either. You can read many slashdot stories to see how upset people get about abuses of power.
In your case this exploitation is made even worse by the fact you're simply doing it for your own pleasure.
Please go away and find some other form of entertainment that doesn't involve depriving others of theirs until you've grown up enough to realize that the whole idea of a MMORPG game is it's somewhere people go to escape the real world and play together on an equal footing.
You're evidently young and have plenty of expendable income, it's not like you have no choice - why not spend some of that time with real people in the real world - or they dislike you're air of selfish arrogance as much as me?
Re:Hey cynical child! (Score:2)
There is no such thing as equal footing in these games. Generally whoever plays more will be better off. Sure, you can say that one day you'll get sword of pwning, but by then sword of pwning +2 will be out. No one is on equal footing in the game world just like in life.
Re:Hey, Children! (Score:2, Insightful)
My unfair advantage is that I have a good job.
Until there is a law that says the world has to be fair, I guess we are both fucked.
If you don't have the time to play the game, you should not be playing the game. If you're buying items using RMT (Real Money Trade) you are making it more difficult for the player legitimately playing the game.
Please get off your high horse of having a good job. I have a pretty decent one as well, but I don't buy items using RMT. I spend the insane amounts of time to earn the items because I want to play the game. Your obtaining the items through RMT causes inflation of the going price of the items, unavailability of the items through legitimate means due to monopoly camping, and a ruined experience of the MMORPG for everybody in the game.
Re:Hey, Children! (Score:2)
For me, it's about not contributing to a company I despise. In my past experiences, IGE has done everything they can to monopolize the economy and ruin the game for anyone who doesn't buy currency from them. Why would I knowingly want to support (directly or indirectly) a company like that?
Hey, Bitter Adult! (Score:2)
However, that aside, here's what I really want to know: Why would you pay someone else to play a game for you? That's what you are doing, you realise. When you buy items, gold, etc you are paying another person to play the game for you. Well that seems beyond silly to me.
I mean games, other than the few educational titles, are for only one thing I can determine: entertainment. You don't achieve anything by playing them, you don't accomplish anything in life, you don't better the world, etc. The only thing you do is amuse yorself.
Now don't get em wrong, that is valuable. Humans need entertainment and generally we are happier when we get more of it. Video games are just another form of it like TV, fiction, theatre, board games and so on. There is no further justification needed for their existance or the money spent on them. They entertain, and that is all they are meant to do.
So the reason I'm willing to pay money for a game, and in the case of MMORPGs a recurring service fee, is because they entertain me. I enjoy playing World of Warcraft, the time that the monthly fee allows me to play is well spent, I come away happy with the amusement I've recieved.
What then would be the point in paying someone to play for me? What do I gain by having a larger number in some database associated with my account?
In games it's not the destination, it's the journey. I mean for single player games I could just order my system to play the ending sequence and be done with it. Well that's not the reason to have them, the reason is for the entertainment that leads up to that ending. It's just a minor payoff. I don't play a game because it has an awesome ending, with nothing inbetween, I play it because it's a fun ride, and if the ending sucks oh well.
The only reason I can figure for paying someone else to play a game for you is some inferority complex where you feel it necessary to evaulate your worth as a person by how much stuff or how high a level you have in the game. This is similar to people that need material shows of wealth to make themselves feel superior.
If that is the case, I would encourage you to seek counciling, as that's not healthy. It's nothign that's going to ruin your life, but you'll be a happier and more fulfilled person if you can take pride in who you are and what you've done and not rely on some arbitrary and meaningless comparison to other people.
So appreciate games for what they are: Entertainment. If the time you spend playing fails to entertain you, then stop playing that game, adn find one that does. Perhaps MMORPGs aren't your thing, perhaps single player games are more to your likeing. You could also try online games with non-perminant universes like FPSes. No one is ever any higher level, each round starts on a level playing field.
P.S. Before you shoot back, I'm not a kid, I work full time and support myself.
Mod parent up (Score:2)
In games it's not the destination, it's the journey. I mean for single player games I could just order my system to play the ending sequence and be done with it. Well that's not the reason to have them, the reason is for the entertainment that leads up to that ending. It's just a minor payoff. I don't play a game because it has an awesome ending, with nothing inbetween, I play it because it's a fun ride, and if the ending sucks oh well.
Exactly!
Re:Hey, Children! (Score:2)
As a world of warcraft player... (Score:3, Insightful)
So....do you? (Score:4, Interesting)
Among all the slashdotters having high opinions on that topic, WHO actually has the experience of using such a "service" to advance in a game?
As a hard-core player who just doesn't have time to play, I'm curious what exactly you really gain from it. Satisfaction? Time? What?
Re:So....do you? (Score:2, Insightful)
Every reason I've seen can be condensed down into one of the following:
Now, for #1:
The only potentially legitimate reason. I've got a 50 hour a week job, so I can sort of sympathize here, but I have the mentality of wanting to earn the rewards myself, and am willing to grind away at it until I do. If that means only doing high-level instances (in WoW, for example) on weekends, so be it.
#2: I have no sympathy here. I don't respect any character, high-level or not, cool "leet" items or not, if I can tell they don't know squat about cooperating in the group correctly, which is exactly what occurs time and time again with things they didn't earn "in-game". these people, along with those who can't generate a chat message that is even somewhat based on real English, go in my Ignore list. They are also dropped from the group about as fast as new pop singers come out...
#3: A friend of mine uses this, actually. He just doesn't want to take the time to do it. He has the time, just feels it better spent elsewhere. He also jumps from MMORPG to the next quicker than a used car salesman changes pitches. Can't say I can back this one, but hey, at least these people usually don't stick around long enough to cause in-game economy problems.
Of course, this is just what I've noticed, so I'm sure others have different views of things. After all, I'm only one of the many, many, many WoW and EQ players out there.
let me get this straight... (Score:4, Insightful)
Urg. My head hurts.
Re:let me get this straight... (Score:2)
Legal? Probably. After all, IGE didn't agree to the contract, they're acting as a middle man.
Ethical? Not in my beliefs. Helping someone break a contract they agreed to is not ethical, and is no more ethical than providing an alibi for someone who is cheating on a spouse. Assisting someone in breaking a lawful and binding agreement is not ethical.
Why is this on Slashdot? Well, they're using a game plugin to create a website that catalogs game objects (quests, NPC's and objects). They are likely using that same data to find good things to sell and good worlds to sell them on, and they'll know exactly what they need to do to get the items. Essentially, they're using me to collect data, spyware style. Of course, I use the collected data to find the same things on my own, but if there are other sites I can use the collected data from that are not involved in destroying the economy on my server (and there are) I'll swtich.
I'm uninstalling the plugin when I get home and switching to a cleaner one that doesn't have this...taint...associated with it.
Re:let me get this straight... (Score:2)
It's obvious that you have no experience with IGE and it's "farmers". They dominate an entire area 24/7 griefing legit players and monopolizing the market/economy. If you want to get anywhere in the game, you have no choice but to buy from them. They've ruined several MMORPGs and are intent on ruining more in the name of making a buck.
I'm glad that more people are becoming aware of these "hidden ties" so they can stop unintentionally helping them if they have any sort of conscience.
Legal? Not precisely (Score:2)
Well, one of the terms I've seen in EVERY MMORPG I've ever played is that you may not sell items in game for actual money. While that perhaps seems silly to you, it's their service and their right. To me it seems silly that at some restraunts a suit and tie are required, but none the less I must wear one if I wish to dine there. Their service, their terms.
So, while this isn't necessairly against the law in terms of you could get arrested, it's a breach of the ToS and they have every right to kick you off, and perhaps seek recourse in civil court (that's a little less clear). Also players are perfectly jsutified in being angry at those that break the rules. The rules are spelled out quite clearly, you need to obey them. If you don't liek them, find a game with rules more to your liking.
Just because tackling is allowed in football, doesn't mean it is or should be in basketball. Different games, different rules. Have to obey them too. If you tackle someone in the NBA you'll get susbended and fined at a minimum, maybe kicked out. In the NFL, they pay you a lot of money to do it all the time.
That's why gamers are pissed. Those of us that play by the rules, and believe the rules are there for a reason and are menat to be obeyed, are mad at those that ignore then and see nothing wrong with it.
I don't begrudge the selling (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem arises when people make this a full-time job. They create new accounts or acquire them, then strip them or build them up, then sell them. One person sits in his room with 12 computers all running a program called MacroQuest farming high level items.
When this happens, the game is flooded by materials churned out at a rate much higher than would naturally occur, and the in-game economy suffers.
Its not IGE that is necessarily bad... (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean, loot is pretty darn predictable in most online games, after playing a for a bit, you know what items drop from what creatures, and for the most part, the best items drop from a single mob that can be killed over and over again. If the predictability of loot drops were removed from these games, that would go a long way towards keeping set-ups like IGE from becoming too important.
Plus, you have games where the entire structure of the game is built upon "The longer you play, the better your character becomes." For people with full-time jobs, its hard to play at the same level as someone who doesn't need a full-time job or has free time for other reasons. If someone can afford to throw down $20 for an in-game item that might take him 3-4 hours to get otherwise, there really is not anything wrong with it, I mean, it is just a game after all.
In the end though, this is only a big deal if IGE is somehow manipulating the information in a way that player's wouldn't want. You can't just assume that because they have connections to Thottbot that they should automatically be proclaimed as "evil."
Here's what I don't understand... (Score:3, Interesting)
There are (believe it or not) other people in the world, who just like to kick a**. Never mind whether I earned it or not--I want to be able to play with the shiny cool toy. These are the people who love first person shooters, with the cheat codes on please.
I don't think one group is inherently better or worse than the other. They simply have different objectives in "what they want in the gaming experience." Given that objectives vary, this seems primed for self-selection. Set up "purist" servers and "wahoo" servers, "nice" servers and "wild wild west" servers. Different rules for behavior and language, different levels of enforcement. And let players choose where to play (or, at least, which kind of server to play on).
Someone selling gold on a "purist" server will not have much of a market, and so won't bother--they'll be selling on the "wahoo" servers, where there is a larger customer base more willing to pay.
Of course, the issue here is with lamerz, who will play on the purist server just to be a jerk to everyone, hoping for a bigger reaction. But my argument is that having different levels of behavior being tolerated on different servers makes it easier to enforce rules--"purist" servers have less open tolerance of such behavior, so it's easier to ban or otherwise sanction players who don't abide...
Re:Here's what I don't understand... (Score:2)
If the desire for the purchased equipment is simply to make the game easier, be a little more powerful just to kill that one monster that's been bugging you, then the self segregation would work out fine.
However, if the desire for the purchased equipment is rooted in the desire to appear better than the other players, then a problem arises. On the 'wahoo' servers, everyone is playing by the 'buy yourself better' philosophy, so everyone would have the max in their in game gold account, the best weapons and armor. How can you rub people's noses in their inferiority, if everyone winds up equal. If this is the reason players do the real money for in game wealth/power, then they're going to want to play with purists because they require someone to gloat to.
I'm not the most experienced with MMORPG's, but I have dabbled... and between my experience and an innate pessimism regarding human nature, I fear the latter form of 'lamerz' would be, if not the most common, at least common enough to ruin the separate servers tactic.
I'm new to all this and don't get it.... (Score:5, Insightful)
If paying real money for in-game items is cheating, then isn't using an out-of-game utlility to locate items in-game also cheating as well?
Both involve doing something out-of-game that affects what's in game... This seems to me like the pot calling the kettle black!
Obviously, since Thottbot is an add-on, not every player has it. So even though it's a free add-on, it still unfairly gives some players an advantage over other players, which is essentially what's being argued.
Re:I'm new to all this and don't get it.... (Score:2)
I would never buy game items out of game in real money. But I don't consider looking stuff up to be cheating (some people use GameFAQs, others strategy guidebooks, etc), especially since the internet is a resource available to anyone, and if you're playing WoW, you probably have an internet connection. It augments my gaming experience. I know I'm not going to get to lvl 60 as fast as someone who plays all day, buys accounts/game items, but the reason I play is because it is fun and relaxing. And the Thottbot site aids in that goal by preventing me from spending 4 hours of fruitless searching if a quest description says "go west from here" and actually meant east (or "It's just north of here" and actually means "It's just north of here... over the river, through the woods, and on the other side of that mountain range"). And I frequently will pass on that advice to fellow gamers in my area who are stumped by the same things I was.
Re:I'm new to all this and don't get it.... (Score:2)
This is essentially what money selling can do.
It's basically up to the company making the game (Score:2)
They Will Not Acknowledge They Change The Rules (Score:2)
Another anology that works better than the Monopoly one is that these MMOGs have constructed rules much like the line at McD's. Everyone gets in line and waits for their turn. The problem with IGE and their bunch is that they cater to the people who don't want to stand in line for any length of time. IGE sells a "service" where they will stand in line for you instead.
I don't think Bliz, SOE, etc. care if anyone makes money playing their games (beyond trying to make the profits their profit too) but it seems to really irritate designers and developers to have their carefully crafted situations governed by carefully crafted rules ignored.
Diablo2 (Score:2)
The point isn't that someone that paid his way through the game without having to farm any money or items at all is now level 60.
The point is the economy will go bad from it. What happens when a good third of the players that are under level 60 have a damn near infinite pool of money they can buy?
Everything they need is going to be bought from the AH at whatever price they can find it. People see they can get more for junk, and prices go up.
Pretty soon its 25 gold for a level 40 weapon, whereas now its 3-10 for an 'uncommon' one.
The same thing happened in Diablo 2. You could buy stacks of an often-duped ring (The Stone of Jordan, or SoJ) for cheap online. Same with the other items. You could buy whatever you wanted out of game and have it delivered to your in game character.
The economy took a nose dive. Suddenly, no one wanted ANYTHING for trade unless it was the absolute best. You couldn't get a goddamn Bonesnap for anything less than a Stormshield. And the path is going there with the other games, too.
I played FFXI before this. It was just starting to get bad there. The prices would consistantly go up, from say 1500z for a stack of crystals, to 2500z, to 3000z all within a month. It went from affordable, to downright lame for a price.
The people that want to have fun and don't want to have to go buy their money from eBay get screwed. Big time. When they can no longer buy ANYTHING of value.
The issue with IGE... (Score:2, Insightful)
The issue is that IGE and Thottbot may be connected at the hip. As the poster pointed out, having a 99% up-to-date database of EVERYTHING in the game (and I mean EVERYTHING - if you haven't visited thottbot.com, do so now, it is a truly amazing project) is a huge benefit to a virtual currency trader. Now, even that may very well be defended, as thottbot as well as the plugin for thottbot provides useful services that I wouldn't mind someone profiting from, BUT -
there has been no transparency in this process. Users who use the thottbot plugin believes they are gathering information for a community of users, while in fact they are gathering information for a private company with a profit motive. They may be gathering more information than they believe. They are, in effect, deceived and taken advantage of.
If the allegations are true, then the guy will lose all credibility - people will stop using IGE and stop gathering intel for thottbot. If he had come out immediately and said "Feel free to use our UI plugin to gather intel for thottbot. If you like it, why don't you show your support by buying some gold at IGE?" this would not have been a problem.
Wha!?!?! (Score:2)
I would say that the subject of this post is hard to understand at this point.
MMOG economies and inflation (Score:3, Insightful)
There's little difference between the game economics and economics in the real world. And that simply is that when you have too much frickin' currency or other "value" lying about, then prices go through the roof.
Most MMOG games have added trading of gold and items between players, as well as sometimes making it easy for players to set up their own shops and such, but without careful monitoring of the background economics of the world, inflation is inevitable. Especially when wealth is automatically generated.
First, think of the economy as a closed system. You have so many items in the game and you have so much wealth in the game. Prices remain relatively stable, based mainly on rarity of the items and rarity of the currency. Adding *anything* to this system causes a change to the system as a whole:
-Adding more players to this closed system increases demand thus increasing prices.
-Adding more currency to the system increases the prices, as gold is now more common, and prices increase to take that into account.
-Adding more items to the system causes prices to drop, as the rarity of each item is reduced.
In some of these games, no actual thought seems to have been given to the concept of balance.
If the amount of cash currently in the world gets too high, you have heavy inflation. To balance it off, you need to remove cash from the world.
Ideally you do this through cash sinks, such as one time upgrades, or by having methods whereby people have to repair their equipment occassionally (which is a temporary measure only, as the value from the cash is really converted into the extended life of the equipment they're using), or by some other method which encourages people to spend that cash. Or you reduce the amount of cash they get from battles. Or eliminate cash creation from battles entirely and have monsters get their cash by defeating players with cash and stealing theirs. This basically just moves cash around instead of creating it from nothingness.
Items are forms of value too. Have items get destroyed every so often. That shield won't last forever, you know. Armor wears down over time. Swords don't stay sharp forever. That sort of thing. Force players to discard items for better/newer ones, and make 'em pay for the priviledge. Wearing down items is removing value from the world as well, so make sure you have it there to balance out whatever value you're adding to the world.
Of course, in order to avoid inflation from increased demand, you need to add cash/items to the system when new players come into the game. So just randomly add some set amount of cash/items to monsters whenever there's added players.
Allowing infinite cash holdings is no good either, as a few strong players with nothing better to do can take control of your economy. Implement taxation on player owned businesses. Implement armies of tax collectors with muscle from the local king to go beat up and steal some cash from the richest players. Hell, run a revolution if you have to make it clear to the users that they need to band together to defeat the evil rich bastard up on the hill that's fucking up the game. Whatever it takes to redistribute that wealth away from the rich.
Done properly, this sort of thing will eliminate problems with off-game auctions, because wealth being redistributed in the game won't cause inflation problems.
Re:interesting (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Mod post down. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Isn't this more like spyware? (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't turn on collection because I worry about performance slowdown. I feel really guilty when I use thott though and know I'm not giving anything back to what it is giving me. I think thottbot is great because the community built it, and the community has access to it.
What you are getting mad at is like a company going to a library and making money off the information it finds there.
Also, spyware is called spyware because it gathers information from you without you knowing it is doing it, you know, like a spy. When you turn on the thottbot plugin (disabled by default btw), you know you are collecting data and sending it to the website, contributing to the wonderful community database that it is.
Not only that, but all the great drops come from instances and are bind on pick up. Guilds and public groups reguarly farm these instances over and over and over again. There are nonstop raids on these places. It's not stopping one single player from experienceing the content and these dungeons have to offer.
Because of this, the whole concept of a farmer being on 24 hours a day camping a single location and choking the item from being avaialbe to the public is non existant. There is nowhere in the game a farmer can do this, nowhere.
So what can they do, farm gold places? The most effecient way to do that is to control the auction house and run casinos (roll 1 to 100, get 580, double money, get 980+ tripple). People spam that all the time (which i hate). That is really the only effecient way to get cash.
So start getting mad at things like lootlink and auctioneer which will help someone control the AH. Start getting mad at player run casions (which blizzard has no problem with people running them. Even though the chars are named things like JoesCasino and MonneyBaggz, and spam chat, all the time, two things explicitly against blizz's tos and naming policies).
Thottbot's not giving any company some secret knowledge about the game and it's drops. If you want to know, go to thott and see what they can see.