Gem shop...

[Angul]

I think it would be great to have a gem shop in which we could sell gems and buy gems.

A gem shop adds a whole level of complexity to the game.

Right now, money is pretty much uncontrolled - you get as much as you could ever want, and since it doesn't transfer after a dragonkill, it doesn't matter much.

Gems are rare - and buy rare things - that transfer after dragonkills.
Gems also don't buy common things, like weapons and armor.

Keeping gems and gold separate maintains the little economy of the game.

Other servers do have gem shops - and first level players can be seen running around with max equipment.

Maybe there's a way to do it that prevents wholesale abuse of the gem/money transfer, but a "simple" gem to money shop is not something we want in the central server.

[Sneakabout]

The whole reasoning behind not including a gem shop is that *someone* would just stay at 15th level accumulating enough gold to buy as many gems as it took to unbalance the game...

[MightyE]

Right, there's two halves to the game economy, one is a temporary one (gold based), and one is a permanent one (gems based).

There are a few ways to spend gems that are only temporary, but you will never get anything permanent from gold.

As was pointed out, a player could stay at level 15 and accumulate a bunch of money to buy gems with, then slay the dragon to carry them over. Gems are something for which the acquisition rate is well controlled, and a gem shop would remove this ability. I have a good idea of how to let players spend extra gold for the future, I just haven't had time to implement it.

[Hardy]

Maybe the new forum posters should be given a sneak preview of this? Just maybe?

Hardy

[Angul]

That is a good a very good point. I'll forget i mentioned it.

[MightyE]

I'm glad you did mention it, this has been a common request, and since it's one I don't agree with, it's good for people to be able to debate :-)

[Akuma AKA Kurama]

Ta da, I am here to solve your problems, Eric.

Buygems.php

<?
require_once("common.php");
if ($session['user']['level']<15){
checkday();
page_header("Akuma’s Gem Shop");
addnav("Purchase");
addnav("6000gp - Buy a gem","buygems.php?op=buy&level=1");
addnav("10000gp - Buy two gems","buygems.php?op=buy&level=2");
addnav("16000gp - Buy three gems","buygems.php?op=buy&level=3");


addnav("Exit");
addnav("Return to the Village","village.php");
$gems=array(1=>1,2,3);
$costs=array(1=>6000,10000,16000);
if ($_GET[op]==""){
output("
Akuma has gems for sale.`n
");
}elseif($_GET[op]=="buy"){
if ($session[user][gold]>=$costs[$_GET[level]]){
output(
"Akuma grabs your ".($costs[$_GET[level]])." gold
coins
and hands you ".($gems[$_GET[level]])."
gem(s)".($gems[$_GET[level]]>=2?"s":"")." in return.`n`n");
$session[user][gold]-=$costs[$_GET[level]];
$session[user][gems]+=$gems[$_GET[level]];
}else{
output(
"Akuma tells you to count again as you do not have enough gold to pay for those gems.`n`n");
}
}elseif($_GET[op]=="sell"){
if ($session[user][gems]<1){
output(
"Akuma raises his fist at you knowing you do not have any gems.`n`n");
}else{
output(
"Akuma accepts your gem and hands you 0 gold coins in return`n`n");
$session[user][gold]+=0;
$session[user][gems]-=1;
}
}
}else{
checkday();
page_header("Akuma’s Gem Shop");
output("Don't you think it's time to kill the dragon?");
addnav("Return to the Village","village.php");
}
page_footer();
?>

As you can see, when the user reaches lvl 15, they aren't allowed to buy gems. If you don't like being able to sell gems, just take the sell part out. I hope I've been able to help.

[FanboyElric]

The only way a gem selling option might not off-balance the economy of the game was if the value of the gems when selling them was scaled based upon a users level when they sold him.

As for your idea for preventing game corruption by allowing the purchace of gems at only certain levels. I can see how one could make a lot of gems at level 14 by doing roughly the same thing as they would at level 15, but also sacrificing themselves to one of the "God" ranked players whenever they got close to being truant. It'd definately still be a breakable system...

[Kether Rowan]

I could, very easily, break the economy with a gem shop, even if it were restricted to 14th level. A day of fighting, a day where you do nothing but suicide, ressurect, suicide, to keep XP down.

Gold is earned, Gems are earned, Experience is earned. None of them are bought. Tied together, sure, but not interchangable, and it's balanced that way.

[Sneakabout]

If you had a completely different game economy, then you could have some method of buying and selling gems. However, the two main problems are that you can save up huge amounts of money and that you can sell gems at low levels.

Implementing countermeasures to these problems simply raises the question 'Why have a gem shop at all?'

[MightyE]

I've very little interest for sure in people being able to convert gems to gold, since that will result in level 1's with level 15 equipment. As to the commonness of gems, I think they're already up there pretty high (on the "too common" scale). There are some players who just have tons of gems. If anything, I'm looking for a new way to bleed gems out of the economy rather than provide a new means to acquire them. And converting them to gold is not the appropriate answer there either, for the carryover reasons.

[Sneakabout]

The problem which has created people having too many gems (Sneakabout has 96) is just that it's hard to spend them - Hit points become a hindrance after a while, after you get a Wyvern you tend not to change mounts and Cedrik's potions, whilst useful, don't really soak up enough gems.

One way to leech off gems would be to introduce some kind of joke shop (as has been mentioned before) or to introduce exotic weaponry which costs gems as well as gold... That way people would keep spending gems eack DK.

[Sir Freeman]

Here's the Vessa's Gem exchange...
taken from LoGD's SourceForge.net site and modified

CREATE FILE vessa.php
<?php
require_once("common.php");
if ($session['user']['level']<15){
checkday();
page_header("Lady in the dark");
addnav("Purchase");
addnav("2000gp - Buy a gem","vessa.php?op=buy&level=1");
addnav("3800gp - Buy two gems","vessa.php?op=buy&level=2");
addnav("5500gp - Buy three gems","vessa.php?op=buy&level=3");
addnav("Sell");
addnav("Sell a gem for 1000gp","vessa.php?op=sell");
addnav("Exit");
addnav("Return to the Village","village.php");
$gems=array(1=>1,2,3);
$costs=array(1=>2000,3800,5500);
output("`c`bLady in the dark`c`b`");
if ($_GET[op]==""){
output("7As you approach a lady in the dark, you realise that this is `2Vessa`7 - a famous outlow. You know that she is a very cunning lady so you don't try your luck catching her. She inquerys you: \"`&Does thou wish to purchase some `%gems`7... or perhapse sell them? I am sure thou will find my prices acceptable`7\".`nYou ask `2Vessa`7 how much `%gems `7she has and she answers quickly I have `5".getsetting("selledgems",0)."`7 gems");
}elseif($_GET[op]=="buy"){
if ($session[user][gold]>=$costs[$_GET[level]]){
if (getsetting("selledgems",0) >= $_GET[level]) {
output("`7Vessa quickly snatches your `^".($costs[$_GET[level]])."`7 gold coins and hands you `%".($gems[$_GET[level]])."`7 gem".($gems[$_GET[level]]>=2?"s":"")." in return.`n`nAs she is running away, you hear a sinister laughter and something about you being a stupid...");
$session[user][gold]-=$costs[$_GET[level]];
$session[user][gems]+=$gems[$_GET[level]];
if (getsetting("selledgems",0) - $_GET[level] < 1) {
savesetting("selledgems","0");
}else {
savesetting("selledgems",getsetting("selledgems",0)-$_GET[level]);
}
}else {
output("`2Vessa`7 looks you in the eye and confesses that she doesn't have any `%gems`7 to sell at this moment. \"`&For that you can only blame thy patrons - they havent sold me a single `%gem`7\"`n`n");
}
}else{
output("`7You go through your pockets but can't find a single valuable thing to pay `2Vessa.`7 With an insulted look, she punches you and mumbels some cursing words while heading to the deep, dark forest.`n`n");
// the following is optional, delete this if dont want users to loose hit points if they cant pay Vessa
output("As you rise slowly, you feel that you have to rest awhile... you lose some hitpoints!");
$session[user][hitpoints]-= round($session[user][maxhitpoints] * 0.1,0);
if ($session[user][hitpoints]<=0) $session[user][hitpoints]=1;
}
}elseif($_GET[op]=="sell"){
if ($session[user][gems]<1){
output("`2Vessa `7raises her fist and says to you: \"I know thou has no gems, why does thou bother me then?\".`n`n");
}else{
output("`2Vessa`7 accepts your `%gems`7 and hands you `^1000`7 gold coins in return.`n`n");
$session[user][gold]+=1000;
$session[user][gems]-=1;
savesetting("selledgems",getsetting("selledgems",0)+1);
}
}
}else{
checkday();
page_header("Lady in the dark");
output("Don't you think it's time to kill the dragon?");
addnav("Return to the Village","village.php");
}
page_footer();
?>

MODIFY FILE village.php
Find
addnav("Curious Looking Rock", "rock.php");

After add
addnav("Lady in the dark", "vessa.php");

[Akuma AKA Kurama]

Yeah Eric you are right, I thought gems were too easy to get after you could start getting them from slaying forest creatures. I didn't get a Stallion until I was a Squire and then saw farmboys running around at lvl 5 with Stallions and I was pretty pissed, lol.

[Xecutioner]

I know, I see pages with wyverns and phoenixes, I can't believe it, I got my Stallion when I was a Squire (2 DK's back then) and then a Wyvern when I became Sir but now I'm very, very happy :lol: :lol:

*Old Grandpa Voice* Well Son, back in the day a squire was only one DK.

[Akuma AKA Kurama]

^ was me BTW, not logging in sucks....

[LadyPhoenix]

And for some of us, horses are STILL the only option. :?

[JCP]

And for some of us, horses are STILL the only option. :?

What? No phoenix?

mindcontroll voice/
(come to the central server)
/mindcontrol voice

[Akuma AKA Kurama]

*hears the voice and comes to the central server* GAAA! If you weren't in New Jeresy I'd kill you! But I'll spare you because everyone knows being stuck there is the same as death itself. :wink:

[JCP]

I think I just convinced "Moonchilde" to raid our stables. :)

[Moonchilde]

I think I just convinced "Moonchilde" to raid our stables. :)

Hehe.. it's just been a case of me being more busy tracking down and working on other things and being busy at work.

Once I look through the sql dump I'll probably install some of the other creatures on dragoncat.net :)

[LadyPhoenix]

Thanks JT. http://www.imgmag.net/images/famtheresa/smooch.gif

[HHF]

Well, actually a page with wyvern is definitely possible in the central server. I did it, only level 2 page and wyvern 8) . just hope to get the wyvern last longer, 50 round is not enough

[Angul]

I think the wyvern is great. I find that it usually lasts through all of my fights

[JCP]

Thanks JT. http://www.imgmag.net/images/famtheresa/smooch.gif

Wha-?

I do all that work to get LadyPhoenix one of my lovingly raised, hand-fed phoenixii, and JT get the smooch?

:sad:

Alright, well, the "work" went something like:

JCP> you don't have a phoenix in the stable for ladyphoenix?
JT> Yeah, no time.
JCP> raid our stables
JT> MightyE, gimme the stable stuff
ME> okay here
JT> I'll look at them and add them in

:)

[anpera]

I'm thinking of a good gem shop very often. The solution I'm using now isn't really what I want. Prices of gems depend on how many gems are in stock and stock is limited, ok. But it's still producing too many level one chars with best equipment.
Next step is to limit the amount of gems a player can trade a day. I'll use banksettings for it i think. So if the player buys or sells a gem he loses a gold transferre or the gem cost from his transfere limit of the day.

Or maybe just one gem to buy/sell a day? I think 'll try out and see what happens :wink:

[neXus]

Actually, the gem shop idea was thought about long ago, in almost all possible ways. It was decided that lotgd.net was not gonna have a way of buying them. No matter what the price and the regulations. It is against the concept of the game - gems do permanent changes, and thus, are not buyable.

[Moonchilde]

Actually, the gem shop idea was thought about long ago, in almost all possible ways. It was decided that lotgd.net was not gonna have a way of buying them. No matter what the price and the regulations. It is against the concept of the game - gems do permanent changes, and thus, are not buyable.

Actually that's not quite true neXus. For instance, the forest smith offers a semi-permanent (permanent until you next buy a new weapon/armor) upgrade. So it is not true that all gem purchases are permanent. At least not any longer.

[neXus]

Actually I'm talking about something that was decided before you joined the main server. It was decided that gems would not be buyable by money. The forest smith on the other hand, is younger than a month, and not even completely finished in terms of the messages it uses (The "your weapon was downgraded" message for example) Besides that, gems still do permanent changes, it is completely irrelevant whether some of the things you can buy with them are only temporary (we already had foilwench for such), as long as you have something permanent that can be bought with them, there's no way of selling them.

[lonestrider]

I've very little interest for sure in people being able to convert gems to gold, since that will result in level 1's with level 15 equipment. As to the commonness of gems, I think they're already up there pretty high (on the "too common" scale). There are some players who just have tons of gems. If anything, I'm looking for a new way to bleed gems out of the economy rather than provide a new means to acquire them. And converting them to gold is not the appropriate answer there either, for the carryover reasons.


::offers an evil grin::

I'm glad to know I'm bleeding the gems out of the economy, one player at a time. . . AND if any of you players are complaining that the LONESTRIDER thievery is now one of the more common mods found in 2 languages on the LOTGD servers. . . Don't blame me. . . it's just more proof that your admin most possibly hates you.

::just laughs::

Seriously though, there needs to be a more complex economy to be certain. I've struggled with a limited gem market that seems to go pretty well with all sorts of governing devices and arrays to flux the prices and such. BUT, it does still radically affect the entire economy.

[Hermanathor]

I think I came up with a way of spending gems. :P

Do look at the feature request I set in the forum.

Thanks.