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GTAW's Disdain for Wealth and the Deliberate Erosion of Money


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2 minutes ago, Dominykas. said:

I cannot speak for current staff team anymore, but I am sure it will never happen. Having to request for a permission to buy a sports car would create tons of work for staff team that is already busy, a lot of frustration for regular players and it simply sounds more like USSR than an auction.

The goal was to remove flashy cars from people who should not have flashy cars. I don't see how it could be that great a workload, especially if not many people were to be given flashy cars. The economic changes that some assumed would fluidly fix the issue without admin intervention created new, unforeseen changes in the economy that affect more than the vehicle market. The staff team wanted the right people to have these cars, but in this system it only ended up being the lucky people who got there first.

Edited by Spenser
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18 minutes ago, Rumbunctious said:

As you disregarded my main point, let me reiterate: If you want the script cash to match your RP, earn that script cash. People are willing to part with their money, but not for nothing. Do research, find a way to convince them to part with it. Do business that fits in with the server, look at servers like LSRP and look at which businesses have worked and which haven't.

 

Then let me explain it to you. 

Disregarding the time spent setting up the system, the staff team will have to receive your application, analyse your application, do enough research on the applicant's character to see if a sports car would actually suit them, then they have to discuss it internally which can take a long, long time if there differing opinions, make a decision, and finally, spend time actually giving the player the sports car.

Basically, a sports car application system would require an entire admin vehicle team... Which then takes away from other, much more important admin work.

This is only a good idea if you want to work the staff team like 1950s Ford workers.

I am not complaining that I can't make money, that isn't the problem. I can make money. You are right, some things do still make money, but they offer a niche experience. I can go buy a club and make profit on it. I don't want to make money buying a club. I already know the lucrative means to acquiring wealth and it is why I have wealth. I am not trying to make money, I am trying to have transactions and experiences that are face-to-face and COULD result in making money lol. But this exists only in the lower rung of the economy right now. I am at a point where I want to invest that wealth into personal role play endeavors, at the forefront being a law firm. I have taken loss on some of these endeavors for the sake of the experience, because the market is not developed for them.

 

I can tell you what businesses work. Illegal arms sales are very lucrative, guns are in extreme demand. Leasing is good, people rent all day. Clubs still make money, people like to be hedonists and jump around on the dance floor (sometimes, not always, and nowadays with help from government subsidies in special cases). Garages, though very expensive to own, are also very very lucrative to run. My point is that when the economy grows at such a rate that it did and then suddenly halts, it has repercussions that echo throughout the rest of the economy. This is what people in real life call a recession. In GTAW, it resulted in an exodus of money from the higher end of capital transactions AND in a general slowdown of the player-to-player services economy, because few people are willing to pay someone else to accomplish a task (especially if that task is not tangible, but merely an experience) when money is so tight.

 

Before this stage, people were more willing to spend their IC capital on things that were less ICly consequential, like that of having an interaction at all (we used to do therapy, cheaply, which was fun). There is less money in the hands of the many, more money in the hands of the few and the money that is being circulated is being done so primarily in lower-end assets (cars below 150k) and server-side expenses (taxes, business registration fees, other methods of true monetary removal from circulation). 

 

Before, there was too much money and too few players. The reactive measures were so effective that they have caused there to be too little money in the hands of the many, and a whole lot in the hands of those who knew how to sit and play it safe. Those who knew how to sit and play it safe return to find a market much smaller and less open to unique, alternative services-based role play.

 

And as for the cars thing, I still really don't see how it could be that big a workload and I think the amount of people who would request those cars is being vastly, vastly overestimated, but I will settle for calling that one an impasse and will let it go.

Edited by Spenser
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I was under the impression most of the changes you've mentioned here were heralded as the efforts to undermine the patterns of unrealistic spending. What I'm hinting at is it isn't a planned, rehearsed economy policy but a reactionary effort to the roleplay quality and OOC circumstances, from the lack of a better phrase.

 

Which isn't how economy should be done, of course.
 

Quote

 

"how can you sell a $600,000 property to flesh out the story of your character and engage in business RP that is not just empty talk if nobody on the server still has 600k in cash?"

 

 

How about, "If nobody has $600,000 in cash, why are there $600,000 properties on the market?". It's just another, small issue that compounds on a number of other, small, issues.

 

Quote

"These sports cars did not become more expensive with the taxes: in actuality, they became cheaper on the market. With the addition of vehicle taxes, maintenance was such a disincentive towards buying expensive cars of any sort that demand shrunk. I saw a Raiden being sold for $250,000 recently, but when bought new from a dealership it will run you close to $430,000 to register and fully modify. [...] 4 weeks later, the result is that they have a cheaper car than I do and $24,000 less in liquid money, whereas I have not lost anything. "

 

They are cheaper to buy precisely because the maintenance costs have grown. The $20,000 vs $6,000 vehicle tax argument is an argument of "choice". It's only by coincidence you haven't been punished, and, by extension, haven't suffered the consequences of the said choice. Two weeks later, the result is they have another $12,000 less, but your character is a criminal.


 

Quote

 

"For example, the market for homes has nearly entirely diminished. People cannot afford to buy homes outright any longer, and those who would have done so for profit are discouraged because the housing market has eroded. But people still need places to live: so instead, they are leasing, and all of that money is accumulated by the owner of the property rather than having wealth spread out healthily in the economy via multiple well-off homeowners."

 

 

 

 

Which is precisely why our government is introducing the affordable housing program - which is players living in the government-built houses, with their rent simultaneously going towards their future buyout price for the property. That aside, there are houses available /right now/ for anyone seeking lodging that are well within the $200,000 starter kit. We can't possibly blame people for taking advantage of the poor decisions of others.

 

Quote

I have money, why does this matter to me? Because in order to properly engage in business RP that is full and satisfying, there need to be people with sufficient capital to participate in the "upper echelon" of the economy. [...]

 

It is my belief that the server is simply not established enough for it to accommodate what you'd call the "upper echelon" roleplay. There are ways to work around it, but it all boils down to what I bring up in the summary.

 

 

Quote

Every one of those things has been dismantled by the rate the market has shrunk, and the result is a removal of an upper echelon of economic RP, infinitely approaching a server where there are 5-10 magnates and then 100 cops and robbers.

 

The market has shrunk because it was artificially pumped up in the first place.

 

 

___________________________________________________________

 

 

I've made my personal thoughts regarding the economy known in a number of threads. The economy is NOT in the right place. Some of the changes made by the server administrations were right, and some of there were not. While Spencer's post is tackling a very specific area (upper echelon RP), I'd rather cast a wider net.

 

We need a FULLY FLEDGED economic policy that will address precisely towards what system are we headed, and how do we reach that state. One that will actually be set in stone, followed and worked on.

 

That's what I consider the crux of the problem here. Bad change is worse than no change. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by AVRO DANKASTER
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I didn't want to weigh in here. The people who have the money on this server, ironically, aren't grinders (a few exceptions).

 

 

I don't agree with this, stuff added are not designed to hinder players ability to be rich. If poor people didn't try to jump into the fastest most expensive car on the market, they won't get hit by taxes. And rich people (to whom I have interacted) try to buy a lot of fancy stuff to buff out their characters, and will eventually grow poorer.

 

 

I hope to have the spread sheet finished, I just need to test the jobs out myself and gather a few more details from businesses.

Edited by Mecovy
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The economy definitely needs some fine tuning, but not in favor of players who want the biggest house and fastest car their first week in.  Prices for comfort items are absurdly inflated right now because people can afford to pay it.  You make a player second guess reckless spebding through taxes, bills and the like prices will eventually reach a more realistic level.

 

Grinding certain jobs took priority over roleplay and that's likely something the team doesn't want to see.  But it seems the team is slowly implementing features that will eventually balance everything out and I'm all for that.

 

I definitely appreciate the 40 hour pay boost, as anyone who played SWG knows how crappy it was starting out having to run all over the map and grind mobs just to earn enough credits to afford a shuttle to the next city over.  They gave us that bonus to reach a reasonable level early on so we can have a car and house to start with.  If people want to jump into GTAW as some oil tycoon then they're gonna have to work their way up and earn it, and maybe in the process they'll gain a little more appreciation for their character as they build their story.

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I should point out that vehicle taxes are not the easiest way to really add measures against it, speaking as a PD player, taxes on cars are often not paid at all, and only really paid when they are pulled over. Most of our cars and patrol forces don't check all the plates that we see so for the most part it depends on the subset of cops that do check and the Traffic unit that has ALPR that automatically checks for the driver if the car has tax or not.

 

As a consequence of this a lot of people only pay taxes about half the time and a lot of people don't pay at all, and simply evade in vehicles that are no easy task to stop and so it generally works out easier to not pay. Sure these are issues that may be alternate, but end of the day there were some people I kept track of in my head who basically never paid taxes on their vehicle every time I checked.

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This post essentially comes from a misconception of the problem. This becomes evident only two sentences in and continues throughout.

 

The problem is not wealth itself, nor is it players being rich in any form. Players being rich or roleplaying rich roles is not a problem we are attempting to tackle in any form. The problem is portrayal of wealth.

 

Portrayal is a key aspect of being a good roleplayer in a heavy roleplaying environment, and understanding how to portray a character well and performing research on how to portray certain backgrounds is one of the core parts of what makes an excellent roleplayer. During my time here I've noticed many people are aware of concepts like character development and well-written/presented emotes to improve their overall roleplay quality, however, there is a general lack of awareness around the concept of character portrayal.

 

Firstly, we must understand player wealth vs wealth portrayal. Roleplaying servers never have perfect, realistic economies, due to their nature of working off a game script that cannot fully replicate real economical systems. If I were to start a character who lives in the ghetto, I would still gain the $200K starter bonus, yet from a roleplay perspective, my character would be poor. Although this new character technically has the "same wealth" as my other characters, it is my responsibility to roleplay the character in realistic means - by making choices on what my character is to own. I can purchase a low-class vehicle and a home in South Los Santos, and chances are I'll still have a considerable amount of money left. So, to other players on the outside I have a basic car and a low-end apartment, so I appear poor, but on my side I have considerable wealth left over.

 

As such, money is to be understood as a resource that can be used for portraying your character. It will never be a perfect reflective value of the character's wealth - instead, a tool to be used to portray the status of your character. Let's get into the opposite of above's example: portraying riches. If I want to roleplay rich, I can purchase a more high-end house and an expensive vehicle. Once I have acquired these, I now have the means to portray my character, and what I own paints a picture of my character's "overall wealth" to the outside. My actual wealth may be near 0, around 100K, several 100K, or over a million, yet this does not change what vehicle/property choices have been initially made to portray the character from the outside. I could accrue more money over time, yet the overall picture of the character remains the same to the outside (I could of course purchase more properties/vehicles, but at this point the 'picture' of the character has been established). Even though I may become "richer" from a script perspective, the image I paint largely is the same.

 

A large majority of your post hinges on that certain systems are in place to act as "anti-wealth" measures. This is where the misunderstanding comes in: these measures are here to control portrayal, not control wealth.

 

I'll explain each aspect:

1 hour ago, Spenser said:

I remember in the summer there was somewhat a fever going around among the staff team about how non-RP it was for a character RPing in the hood to drive a sports car.

As I've been rambling on about in my post: this is a portrayal issue, not a wealth one. The issue those staff members had was that it is incredibly poor portrayal of lifestyle and wealth: if there was a group of eight players living in the ghetto with high-class sports cars that looked straight out of a racing game, it would be dreadful portrayal. Is it possible IRL to own sports cars and live in the ghetto - sure! How likely is it, though? Average wealth of residents there is way below means to afford it, and crime would put these vehicles at constant risk. The server does not replicate this 1-for-1, as you could easily roleplay a ghetto character but decide to grind mining for hours straight, and there is no real levels of crime similar to IRL with a low server pop/gang presence. 

 

It's bad portrayal - not a wealth issue.

1 hour ago, Spenser said:

doing auctions on very large properties based on the qualifications of someone's character rather than their wealth, in an effort to keep the IC environment cohesive and consistent, was one that I remember debating against for the imbalance it would put in the economy by enriching people easily. 

Here you refer to pitch auctions, the system I designed, which was specifically designed to address the character portrayal issues traditional auctions presented. With traditional auctions, simply anyone could grind for money and win them, and the winner would be whoever could bid the highest, regardless of if it matches my character background. I could roleplay a hobo character but spend 9 hours mining each day and win supercar auctions, simply because I have the script-wise money to win them, regardless if it fits my character background.

 

Pitch auctions directly address this background mismatch issue by ensuring characters have somewhat of a relevant background to own something. The price barrier for entry is much lower than what a traditional auction would become inflated to - sure. When we had this discussion a few months ago about economical balance, your concern was that players could buy properties for cheap on this system and sell them for a much higher value ("enriching people easily"). However, from as early on as the first auctions we discussed this very issue internally: pitch auctions are intended to distribute assets to characters that match it. As such, a player winning the pitch and redistributing it to someone else would defeat the very purpose of matching the asset to that player as it may place it in the hands of someone who doesn't match the asset. That's why every pitch auction that has taken place lately has had restrictions on resale/transferring:

On 10/21/2018 at 4:47 PM, Pascal said:

There will be some special rules for this request:

  • You may not sell or transfer this property in any form before contacting Property Management for approval.
  • If you wish to namechange the character with this property, you must contact Property Management for approval.
  • The minimum bid will be $200,000.

2 hours ago, Spenser said:

Since then, only more measures have come to stifle the accumulation of wealth. Vehicle taxes were added to expensive cars

These measures used on vehicles govern portrayal by discouraging players to own these vehicles. Before this system was in place, people were free to drive whatever they desired once they could afford it. This led to many people with a lack of portrayal skills purchasing "cool vehicles" not because it matched their character in any form, but because they could easily purchase them. Do I agree that vehicle taxes are the best solution? No - it's a bandaid solution, and I'd rather see several vehicles removed from the vehicle list. Does it achieve an impact, even if not full-scale? Yes - whilst some players still use the cars, the rate of these cars being seen around has declined significantly. Is this the permanent answer? Definitely not, and I have some ideas as an alternative that can coincide with the design vision of the upcoming script jobs. That's an issue for later.

2 hours ago, Spenser said:

how can you sell a $600,000 property to flesh out the story of your character and engage in business RP that is not just empty talk if nobody on the server still has 600k in cash?

I can run a UCP search on every character on the server right now for bank/wallet cash, and the reality is far from "nobody on the server still has 600k cash". 

2 hours ago, Spenser said:

For example, the market for homes has nearly entirely diminished. People cannot afford to buy homes outright any longer, and those who would have done so for profit are discouraged because the housing market has eroded.

Looking at the data, I fail to see how players cannot afford to buy homes. I personally saw to setting the house inactivity kick timer back to 1-month (used to be 3 months), which has led to a wide availability of properties on https://map.gta.world/. Each new character starts off with $200K, and there is a HUGE body of housing options available for less than 200K. Many mid-range houses in Alta/Hawick only price slightly over 100K, and most areas outside of that have houses way below 100K.

2 hours ago, Spenser said:

Far more money is being held by increasingly few people than before. 

Could you name those few people who increasingly hold the wealth? I'm looking at the UCP search right now and not seeing it. There are rich people there, yet it remains fairly the same as it has been for the past few months, with a few new people entering the higher levels of wealth every so often. As it stands this point comes of more of a 'perceived issue', an assumption that the economy is functioning this way, rather than the reality of the economy. It's essentially a claim with no evidence - what leads you to believe this? Do you know people who hold far more money? Are they suddenly reducing in number and it's suddenly becoming harder for them to earn money? We have not made major changes to the way money is earned, simply a small change to how money is used pertaining to vehicles to control the portrayal of them.

 

Let's approach the second issue, outside of portrayal. Playerbase, and number of people filling certain roles. This, I think, is where your main issue lies, and can be seen towards the end of your original post + how you mentioned in Discord there is "no other business to RP with".

2 hours ago, Spenser said:

Because in order to properly engage in business RP that is full and satisfying, there need to be people with sufficient capital to participate in the "upper echelon" of the economy.

You frequently referred to needing players to RP with on Discord + in this post. This is where the actual problem is: there's a lack of other players roleplaying what you intend to roleplay. You can't strike business deals without the business partners, and as the playerbase is much lower, there are less business partners to choose from. The market for house buyers is also considerably smaller with less players, and most players already have a basic home where they need due to availability vs playercount - making it hard to resell. You also mentioned on this thread and in Discord that admins have removed ways of earning money and that no one can afford anything, yet what exactly has been removed? Look through the changelogs. What income sources have been removed? These are simply claims, but being here actively for several months, I can't name something significant that has been removed. 

 

In summary: several changes have been brought in to control character portrayal. Acquisition of wealth has not changed significantly. When admins are complaining about grinders in Discord, they're often referring to poor portrayalists, who spend time grinding for cash and then execute awfully portrayed characters. All-in-all, nothing has been changed majorly for the actual acquisition of wealth, instead controls have been placed on spending, to attempt to enforce better overall portrayal. Several parts of this post + Discord messages show the misconception that we are trying to prevent players from becoming rich. Instead, we are trying to place measures on what players can portray with the wealth they have.

 

The admin team does not "hate rich players". Many of us dislike players who mindlessly acquire wealth and then use said wealth to misportray their character, so we have measures in place to control how gained wealth is spent. Acquisition has not changed, and is in fact about to be expanded greatly now we can introduce entirely new systems that add paid roleplaying jobs, and new things will be introduced for players to spend on (such as a new system that will allow us to implement multi-interior apartment/hotels similar to how GTA O's apartments work, with one entrance that has a menu that leads to multiple interiors).

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53 minutes ago, Pascal said:

This post essentially comes from a misconception of the problem. This becomes evident only two sentences in and continues throughout.

 

The problem is not wealth itself, nor is it players being rich in any form. Players being rich or roleplaying rich roles is not a problem we are attempting to tackle in any form. The problem is portrayal of wealth.

 

Portrayal is a key aspect of being a good roleplayer in a heavy roleplaying environment, and understanding how to portray a character well and performing research on how to portray certain backgrounds is one of the core parts of what makes an excellent roleplayer. During my time here I've noticed many people are aware of concepts like character development and well-written/presented emotes to improve their overall roleplay quality, however, there is a general lack of awareness around the concept of character portrayal.

 

Firstly, we must understand player wealth vs wealth portrayal. Roleplaying servers never have perfect, realistic economies, due to their nature of working off a game script that cannot fully replicate real economical systems. If I were to start a character who lives in the ghetto, I would still gain the $200K starter bonus, yet from a roleplay perspective, my character would be poor. Although this new character technically has the "same wealth" as my other characters, it is my responsibility to roleplay the character in realistic means - by making choices on what my character is to own. I can purchase a low-class vehicle and a home in South Los Santos, and chances are I'll still have a considerable amount of money left. So, to other players on the outside I have a basic car and a low-end apartment, so I appear poor, but on my side I have considerable wealth left over.

 

As such, money is to be understood as a resource that can be used for portraying your character. It will never be a perfect reflective value of the character's wealth - instead, a tool to be used to portray the status of your character. Let's get into the opposite of above's example: portraying riches. If I want to roleplay rich, I can purchase a more high-end house and an expensive vehicle. Once I have acquired these, I now have the means to portray my character, and what I own paints a picture of my character's "overall wealth" to the outside. My actual wealth may be near 0, around 100K, several 100K, or over a million, yet this does not change what vehicle/property choices have been initially made to portray the character from the outside. I could accrue more money over time, yet the overall picture of the character remains the same to the outside (I could of course purchase more properties/vehicles, but at this point the 'picture' of the character has been established). Even though I may become "richer" from a script perspective, the image I paint largely is the same.

 

A large majority of your post hinges on that certain systems are in place to act as "anti-wealth" measures. This is where the misunderstanding comes in: these measures are here to control portrayal, not control wealth.

 

I'll explain each aspect:

As I've been rambling on about in my post: this is a portrayal issue, not a wealth one. The issue those staff members had was that it is incredibly poor portrayal of lifestyle and wealth: if there was a group of eight players living in the ghetto with high-class sports cars that looked straight out of a racing game, it would be dreadful portrayal. Is it possible IRL to own sports cars and live in the ghetto - sure! How likely is it, though? Average wealth of residents there is way below means to afford it, and crime would put these vehicles at constant risk. The server does not replicate this 1-for-1, as you could easily roleplay a ghetto character but decide to grind mining for hours straight, and there is no real levels of crime similar to IRL with a low server pop/gang presence. 

 

It's bad portrayal - not a wealth issue.

Here you refer to pitch auctions, the system I designed, which was specifically designed to address the character portrayal issues traditional auctions presented. With traditional auctions, simply anyone could grind for money and win them, and the winner would be whoever could bid the highest, regardless of if it matches my character background. I could roleplay a hobo character but spend 9 hours mining each day and win supercar auctions, simply because I have the script-wise money to win them, regardless if it fits my character background.

 

Pitch auctions directly address this background mismatch issue by ensuring characters have somewhat of a relevant background to own something. The price barrier for entry is much lower than what a traditional auction would become inflated to - sure. When we had this discussion a few months ago about economical balance, your concern was that players could buy properties for cheap on this system and sell them for a much higher value ("enriching people easily"). However, from as early on as the first auctions we discussed this very issue internally: pitch auctions are intended to distribute assets to characters that match it. As such, a player winning the pitch and redistributing it to someone else would defeat the very purpose of matching the asset to that player as it may place it in the hands of someone who doesn't match the asset. That's why every pitch auction that has taken place lately has had restrictions on resale/transferring:


These measures used on vehicles govern portrayal by discouraging players to own these vehicles. Before this system was in place, people were free to drive whatever they desired once they could afford it. This led to many people with a lack of portrayal skills purchasing "cool vehicles" not because it matched their character in any form, but because they could easily purchase them. Do I agree that vehicle taxes are the best solution? No - it's a bandaid solution, and I'd rather see several vehicles removed from the vehicle list. Does it achieve an impact, even if not full-scale? Yes - whilst some players still use the cars, the rate of these cars being seen around has declined significantly. Is this the permanent answer? Definitely not, and I have some ideas as an alternative that can coincide with the design vision of the upcoming script jobs. That's an issue for later.

I can run a UCP search on every character on the server right now for bank/wallet cash, and the reality is far from "nobody on the server still has 600k cash". 

Looking at the data, I fail to see how players cannot afford to buy homes. I personally saw to setting the house inactivity kick timer back to 1-month (used to be 3 months), which has led to a wide availability of properties on https://map.gta.world/. Each new character starts off with $200K, and there is a HUGE body of housing options available for less than 200K. Many mid-range houses in Alta/Hawick only price slightly over 100K, and most areas outside of that have houses way below 100K.

Could you name those few people who increasingly hold the wealth? I'm looking at the UCP search right now and not seeing it. There are rich people there, yet it remains fairly the same as it has been for the past few months, with a few new people entering the higher levels of wealth every so often. As it stands this point comes of more of a 'perceived issue', an assumption that the economy is functioning this way, rather than the reality of the economy. It's essentially a claim with no evidence - what leads you to believe this? Do you know people who hold far more money? Are they suddenly reducing in number and it's suddenly becoming harder for them to earn money? We have not made major changes to the way money is earned, simply a small change to how money is used pertaining to vehicles to control the portrayal of them.

 

Let's approach the second issue, outside of portrayal. Playerbase, and number of people filling certain roles. This, I think, is where your main issue lies, and can be seen towards the end of your original post + how you mentioned in Discord there is "no other business to RP with".

You frequently referred to needing players to RP with on Discord + in this post. This is where the actual problem is: there's a lack of other players roleplaying what you intend to roleplay. You can't strike business deals without the business partners, and as the playerbase is much lower, there are less business partners to choose from. The market for house buyers is also considerably smaller with less players, and most players already have a basic home where they need due to availability vs playercount - making it hard to resell. You also mentioned on this thread and in Discord that admins have removed ways of earning money and that no one can afford anything, yet what exactly has been removed? Look through the changelogs. What income sources have been removed? These are simply claims, but being here actively for several months, I can't name something significant that has been removed. 

 

In summary: several changes have been brought in to control character portrayal. Acquisition of wealth has not changed significantly. When admins are complaining about grinders in Discord, they're often referring to poor portrayalists, who spend time grinding for cash and then execute awfully portrayed characters. All-in-all, nothing has been changed majorly for the actual acquisition of wealth, instead controls have been placed on spending, to attempt to enforce better overall portrayal. Several parts of this post + Discord messages show the misconception that we are trying to prevent players from becoming rich. Instead, we are trying to place measures on what players can portray with the wealth they have.

 

The admin team does not "hate rich players". Many of us dislike players who mindlessly acquire wealth and then use said wealth to misportray their character, so we have measures in place to control how gained wealth is spent. Acquisition has not changed, and is in fact about to be expanded greatly now we can introduce entirely new systems that add paid roleplaying jobs, and new things will be introduced for players to spend on (such as a new system that will allow us to implement multi-interior apartment/hotels similar to how GTA O's apartments work, with one entrance that has a menu that leads to multiple interiors).

I agree with the majority of your post and understand the distinction between the number in the top right corner and portrayal of wealth. I will nitpick a few things I disagree with.

 

1. I consider business to be part of my character's portrayal. I have a nice car and home and I ran a podcast on FaceBrowser. In that regard, some would consider this my endgame. I portray a high-end character and have acquired the means to portray that character realistically. There are a good number of people involved in business who have reached that point as well. But this is what I call the point of stagnation and empty role play: simply portraying a role rather than having the capability to action the things those roles portray. What is the point of a businessperson with an office if they do not actually provide a service or engage in the economy? I'm not interested in role playing a magnate who sits on the beach with a nice car and whose only remaining motivation is to retire and gloat. Intentional or not, a ceiling has emerged as regards upward mobility and levels of economy beyond the initial half million. This is why I advocated for an alternative system for the vehicles in my posts above: it fixes the portrayal issue without affecting the true distribution of currency in an economy at all.

 

2. I do not believe that rich people who are recklessly spending are getting poorer, primarily because excess capital is a means of producing capital in itself. I believe that people who were not actually rich, but invested the majority of their wealth in the portrayal of being rich, oftentimes unrealistically, have had a rude awakening and that they comprise the majority of players who were unhappy with new taxes. That is not what I am trying to address. I am trying to address newfound limitations to the upper services economy that is a result of general decrease in average player wealth, in part due to the fault of the player for holding onto an unrealistic portrayal that causes them to hemorrhage capital, but ultimately enabled by the script. It is a byproduct of the solution to the portrayal problem. And even to that end, as I mentioned regarding police enforcement of vehicle taxes (and the leniency that a member of the LSPD kindly expanded on first-hand), I believe it is the mid-range people in the economy who are hemorrhaging most. Nothing is either the fault entirely of players or of the script, but of both simultaneously. An economy moves on its own and human nature does not change. Again, regardless of if it is too cumbersome for implementation, I would refer to the car example I mentioned prior as an example of how portrayal of wealth can be reasonably subdued without subduing the economic forces that are at play independently in a virtual economy.

 

3. I would not doubt you have found a large number of wealthy people in the UCP and that some continue to gain. I gain as well and so do some of my associates, but not via direct player-to-player services like I used to and would prefer to. Additionally, I would question how many of those enriched players are still active and/or participants in the economy. There is an important distinction to be made between active wealth and inactive wealth. As far as I'm concerned, a player who has 1.5 million but has not logged in for three weeks is not relevant to a discussion about the change in economic dynamic.

 

4. I did not mean to imply that any direct streams of income have been deliberately removed other than those that have been announced, like the upcoming removal of mining. However, I make a distinction between the server-funded economy and the player-run economy, as I believe most do. I have noticed a shrink in the player-run economy and I feel as though fewer people are making significant money off services, and the primary "service centers" of the server like bars, nightclubs and etc. largely operate today with subsidies or on lease from property management. When I said no one can afford anything, I consider that a byproduct of portrayal changes. Does this mean that too many people are choosing to portray unrealistic characters at the expense of their actual, true-to-number wealth? Possibly, but I believe that chalking it up to being their fault as irresponsible RPers will not reverse a recession in upper markets. Formerly, people could afford to participate in services and own assets at the same time. OOC discontent with portrayal brought about a reactionary system wherein participants had to pick. I believe the staff team wanted people to reallocate and expand in services instead of trying to maintain their image at a loss. I believe that in reality, players picked the latter and it took a few months for the effects on wealth distribution to be evident.

 

If you are genuinely going to add paid role play jobs, wherein a person is guaranteed both to 1. receive sensible income and 2. have interaction with other active players, then that is a solution to the problem of stagnant services in itself, but I can't speak on anything like that until I actually see the remedy implemented.

 

To sum, I believe if the issue was portrayal, then it should be portrayal that is targeted exclusively. I know you say that is already the case, but it is not possible for that to be the case because changes will ripple throughout an economy. The remedy for the OOC issue in portrayal was one centered in reorganizing the economy to ICly INFLUENCE AND DISCOURAGE that unrealistic portrayal without directly restricting people's freedoms, but I believe it would have been better achieved in the long run just by directly attempting to OOC influence portrayal at the expense of that freedom. I believe OOC problems are sometimes best solved via OOC solutions. The intervention in the economy has had consequences that exceed its original intended purpose.

Edited by Spenser
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19 minutes ago, Spenser said:

I consider business to be part of my character's portrayal. [...] I portray a high-end character and have acquired the means to portray that character realistically. [...] But this is what I call the point of stagnation and empty role play: simply portraying a role rather than having the capability to action the things those roles portray. What is the point of a businessperson with an office if they do not actually provide a service or engage in the economy? I'm not interested in role playing a magnate who sits on the beach with a nice car and whose only remaining motivation is to retire and gloat.


I think of GTAW as a fictional story (tv/movie/novel). It's all about struggle/conflict/challenge. When a character gets to the top, either the story ends or they suffer a fall from grace. (It doesn't have to be a loss of wealth, it could be a divorce, a scandal, whatever.) When an empire gets too big it falls apart, suffers corruption and unrest. When Henry VIII gets the throne he starts killing all his wives because he's obsessed with having a male heir.

For your own enjoyment you might consider ways to "fuck up", maybe because of greed, pride, lust, envy (pick a sin). If high-level business is frustrating/restricting maybe this is a good opportunity for something dramatic.
 

Quote

excess capital is a means of producing capital in itself
[...]
hemorrhage capital

[...]

recession in upper markets


I feel like you are focusing on money as a computer game mechanic (as if this were a strategic/economic game), instead of focusing on the character/narrative. Business meetings aren't about money, fights aren't about violence, sex isn't about arousal. (This is the mentality I use to try to make my rp enjoyable.)

Consider one of your earlier quotes:
 

Quote

That is the primary IC motivator for most things, and those who deny that by saying interaction is purely for the "good of RP" will be disappointed to find that the majority of players on any game with an economy seek upward mobility.


The characters might want upward mobility, but the players shouldn't want that unless it fits the character's story. My current character wants to get an education and move out of Rancho. She will surely fail completely because of her strengths/weaknesses/personality/circumstances. Each time she does a job, it's not about money. And if I was playing a business person, the effort to make money would really be about their character flaws and stuff like that.

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