Grulls, how do you get them? Options

[Forefallen]

My shower thought of the day was that it appears that the removal of MPs -> Grulls (as expected) hammered the amount in the system

My thought is that I think it’s gone too far along the other side of the spectrum, not in that people should have ‘free’ grulls, but that they should be able to do more to earn them outside of 3k/day they play.

What if monsters got pay too? A character of their choice did a shift in a shop rather than killed bad guys for a day…

Dungeon pay could be higher etc

Just a shower thought
Jack

[RichardCraig]

The entire economy is geared to people who can physically be in a cave, the only way to get more $$$ is to engage with the make system which only works if you are down every week to have your dice rolling.

When I see stuff for sale for 40K+ I have no idea how anybody is legitimately having enough cash for it, let alone 150K mega items. When it's 3K a dungeon played.

Roughly that means a 1K chr has 30K, a 3K might have 90K, a 10K chr 300K - if they saved ALL of their money.

One suggestion I floated previously would be to allow remote makes thus evening the playing field. Or maybe the make systems should be cheaper.

Like a magic sword should be 6-9K as you could save up for 3 events and then buy one.

[063whii]

Just from a personal perspective, most of my characters wealth has come from other characters. I've never converted MPs to grulls, but I have sold Tombola items, worked on CC contracts for hire (as eligible characters) and just been given stuff by wealthy characters of similar concepts.

Businesses are also really strong economically. Players get, on average, 750 grulls a visit on each of their characters with a business (not delving into folks who can operate multiple, or use additional as modifiers, ect). If they have, say, 10 characters with businesses, that's 15k entering the system per month per person with that setup, if they do 2 dungeons a month. (I do need to get better at using my businesses, I always forget.)

Anthony

[Orlock]

There are a variety of ways to save and earn some cash in game aside from playing all the time.

Auction House

You can sell anything on here – including scrolls, when you visit, get your priests to make a batch of healing scrolls if it’s your only maker for the players on the extended lengths coming up at a profit.
If you have a small ISP item, place of power, small business you aren’t going to use – sell those too – somebody may need them.

Makers

You can easily knock off the amount of rolls required and even make the rolls themselves cheaper cutting costs – pass this onto the customer. If you have a make slot and no makes, just knock out a decent but basic suit of armour or something and either stockpile it or add it to the AH at an irresistible price but still making some money.

Offer discounts for stuff in return – bring me a farm and I may knock off 15% of the armour for you for example – farms don’t do much without work but you get my point, as a maker you can build up your possessions and use these later on to make money.

Revisits

You buy a sword and later go back to the maker after a couple of runs and say ‘can you add +1 MAC now’ or ‘Can you now add red mana please’ for example as the wages come in from dungeon – not making the sword again saves a lot of money and rolling for all concerned and lowers the risk to the maker and staggers the costs.

[JackFlashblade]

It does take effort to aquire grulls as your characters, but for people who are down reguarly it is pretty easy between makes characters, businesses, working on others contracts, and selling stuff you don't need.

The biggest money makers in my experience are those characters who plow points into being good at makes.

One advantage for the club with people being able to buy grulls with moster points is that it gave more value to monster points, encoraging people to want to earn them.

Maybe allowing people to do so at a lower rate would be worth considering.

Just my 2p.

Chris

[Onasuma]

Im a millionaire as Emrie from selling physical items at a 30% mark up over 4 years.

For everyone else, I buy and sell as much tombola as I can and split it to the characters i expect to play the next year. Theres lots of grulls out there, theyre just clumping around a few people.

Heather

[Sharperoc]

It was a good change, the after effects are painful but imo ultimately good for the system. Need to let it embed for a few more years at least.

[Ryan]

I think the economy has cooled off purely on the types of makes I’ve been asked to help with - my character is oddly a good barometer for what’s going on. I’ve done far more personal stuff (teaching scrolls of non standards) or small types of things (magic sword with a plate self in it) - the G150k items that seemed a weekly occurrence have cooled down immensely.

Talking to makers as well margins have been cut, a lot of them a year ago were making 100% mark up! I sense that’s coming down to keep the buyers.

I still think it was a decent change all things considered.

[Whybover]

So, one thing people are missing when they talk about "be a makes character to get money" is that makes characters don't create Grulls, they burn them. If the question is about the system as a whole then "play a makes character" isn't helpful, because all being a makes character does is mean you're the reason that other people want money.
Businesses, dungeons, (and set rewards) are taps which add money to the system. Makes characters are, economically speaking, sinks which reduce the amount of money around.

If someone is playing a uses character and spends 24kG making an item, in theory that item "should" be the only item they can keep up: they earn 24kG in 8 dungeons. The only way for characters as a whole to exceed that limit is by pay increase (turning up the taps) or finding less costly sinks.

A makes character with better rolls & reductions might reduce the sink (and can make themselves extra Grulls in the process, but the place the Grulls 'come from' in this example is by reducing the sink). A character with a business increases the tap, meaning that they create more Grulls.

The change to MP:Grulls will take even more time to bed in, as a giant tap was taken away (in theory a crew of 2 monsters could walk away with 32kG, the same as a combined played party) and the ways the system will respond will be to maximise other taps (as Anthony pointed out businesses, but also things like the DORAC benefit and pay increases for hires from certain factions, and finally using MPs to make items directly), to reduce sinks (more efficient makes, several smaller items rather than fewer expensive 'must have' items), and to empty some stores (I wouldn't be surprised to hear that older institutions are having requests on their supplies made more frequently now).

I don't think we'll see the extent of the effects for a while; my main concern isn't the change itself, which I think helped keep powerful items rare, it's the change encouraging expertise and moving the bar for entry up. Making a stockpile of 20,000 Grulls using businesses takes a while and is inherently inaccessible to new players, unlike monstering, but it's a tap that's far easier to oversee and control.

[TimTreadwell]

The cost reductions/make 4 of the same for little increase of cost etc are out there. People have invested a lot of time and effort in developing these. If there is less cash in the system they will need to sell for less.

I have a profitable business that two of us worked on for three years and three CC contracts. It was a lot of effort.

The old grulls for monster points incentives mean that after 12 monstering sessions you could cash in for 100,000G and a 21/7 item without dipping into the actual monster points earned. Monster twice a month and you have 200,000G in a year. Auction off the 21/7's for 25K and it's another 50K. If you spend all you monster points as well, assuming the lower rate of acquisition, and you have another 100,000. You could earn 350,000 a year without playing at all.

So what do I think?

Leave things as they are currently with regards to making money. Pay monsters 1K along with their monster point pay. Give an extra 10K with the monster incentive. Have a few more "Well equipped" abilities available as standard. 20 points per free spirits worth of scrolls you can make each week for example. 120 points gets you a scroll of Total Heal each time you are down to play or monster. 10 points per standard healing potion. 8 adventure temp lembas. Etc etc.

Tim.

[henghasty]

The economy will find its own equilibrium. Say what you like about Capitalism but the rules of Supply and Demand are the solidest examples of how it works there are. There is now a reduced Supply of Grulls that means their value goes up which will mean that the cost in Grulls of buying something will come down.

Getting rid of MPs to Grulls conversions was a big deal; it fundamentally changes the economy. The solution is not to find fixes round the fringes by handing out Grulls to monsters but to accept that there has been a change and be curious about where it will lead us.

The reality is, of course, that the fat cats with capital (Radiant, Emrie et al) can ride out the storm of change in their gazillionaire yachts whilst those of us in somewhat more modest dinghys are tossed around some more. Come the revolution they will be the first against the wall.

Commissar Owen

[henghasty]

The economy will find its own equilibrium. Say what you like about Capitalism but the rules of Supply and Demand are the solidest examples of how it works there are. There is now a reduced Supply of Grulls that means their value goes up which will mean that the cost in Grulls of buying something will come down.

Getting rid of MPs to Grulls conversions was a big deal; it fundamentally changes the economy. The solution is not to find fixes round the fringes by handing out Grulls to monsters but to accept that there has been a change and be curious about where it will lead us.

The reality is, of course, that the fat cats with capital (Radiant, Emrie et al) can ride out the storm of change in their gazillionaire yachts whilst those of us in somewhat more modest dinghys are tossed around some more. Come the revolution they will be the first against the wall.

Commissar Owen

Although back to Jack's original question stealing all the treasure from an EL last year helped.

[fatteacher]

What about newer players that don’t have legitimate grull pools and no way to generate them?

[Sharperoc]

Tbh I just found 20K in my car, so the systems fine.

[henghasty]

What about newer players that don’t have legitimate grull pools and no way to generate them?

It is perfect for them. They gain grulls at exactly the same rate as anyone else - via playing and earning pay. Their grulls are worth more now than they were before.

Also I am not sure there is such a thing as a "legitimate" grull pool.

[fatteacher]

It is perfect for them. They gain grulls at exactly the same rate as anyone else - via playing and earning pay. Their grulls are worth more now than they were before.

Also I am not sure there is such a thing as a "legitimate" grull pool.

They gain them at the same rate as someone with 100k saved from years of MP to Grulls etc

Legitimate = MP to Grulls, Tombola, snap trap bounty etc?

[063whii]

Is a legitimate grull pool is 'i pulled 5k in a tombola envelope and I haven't decided which character to put it on' ?

Anthony

[henghasty]

They gain them at the same rate as someone with 100k saved from years of MP to Grulls etc

Legitimate = MP to Grulls, Tombola, snap trap bounty etc?

Sure if someone has saved up their Grulls they will have more but this is confusing phys reps with characters. A brand new player and an old player starting at 8th level have the same access to cash as each other.

Grulls "earned" not by a character are, potentially, a legitimate grull pool I grant you but for my own taste that should be going into your individual character wallets sooner rather than later. Saving up all your snap trap bountys to buy a complete set of Radiant goodies for your straight 8th character feels wrong to me.

[henghasty]

Is a legitimate grull pool is 'i pulled 5k in a tombola envelope and I haven't decided which character to put it on' ?

Anthony

Yes but one should decide sharpish who it goes to.

[Onasuma]

Yeah, like the tombolas been over for 2 months. You gotta put that somewhere imo, just sitting on stuff is against the spirit of it.

Heather