Cyclops43
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Posted - 2007.02.28 01:06:00 -
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First of all, ISK-sellers should have something very bad happen to them!
That out of the way, how about looking for the reason that ISK-buying is so popular... If this is known, then it might be possible to remedy the reason, removing the problem that way.
If you think a couple of years back, before T2, how much did a fitted fleet battleship cost?
After insurance, and with good equipment, it prob'ly cost you around 50-60 million ISK when it got blown up.
What does it cost today for a fleet battleship, with T2 equipment and rigs? Oh, I'd say you'd easily be out 300-400 million ISK when it goes kaboom.
(I'll here just remind the Dev's at CCP what they said when they put insurance in the game. It was something like "It shouldn't be too costly to get blown up!". Ehh, can I have that again????)
So in just a couple of years, the cost to compete in EVE has risen by more than 5 times!
What are the reasons for this? I have a couple of them that I'd say are mostly to blame:
1. The disaster that is the T2 market! It's been a joke for far too long, and it doesn't look like anything is being done about it in the short-to-medium future. The system is totally broken, but it seems CCP is still clinging to the hope that it'll fix itself.
2. Addition of rigs (but to be fair CCP probably hasn't finished adjusting these).
3. General and regular nerfings of income, like the upcoming nerf of level 4 mission running to appease gankers (sorry, but I say things as I see them...).
In addition, a lot of people are VERY rich (I blame ISK-printing machines T2 BPO's), driving up prices of faction/officer items, and a lot of new premium-ISK stuff has been added to the game (capital ships).
So in general, the price level to compete in the game has been driven (way!) up, the 'Grind' has over and over been made less profitable (repeated nerfs), and CCP wonder why people are buying ISK????
PS: For the record, I've NEVER bought ISK in any way (including GTC).
PPS: As an interim solution to the T2 market. Put all T2 items ON the NPC market at say 3-5 times the base price. This'll put an upper limit on them, and still leave a fairly large amount of profit for producers (without the extortionate prices of today).
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