Gold Farming II: Money sinks and inflation

Last time, I ended with a cliffhanger. Buying and selling WoW gold is a bannable offense, but why? Sure, there are purists who argue that it's a bit like steroids; spending gold that you didn't swing your own sword (or mace, or axe, or staff, if you happen to be a melee mage) to earn takes away from the game experience. There are legal beagles who point out that World of Warcraft®, a Medieval-Themed Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (hereinafter "WoW") is the intellectual property of Blizzard Entertainment, Inc., LLC, LP, Ltd. (hereinafter "Blizz") and thus all components of WoW are the property of Blizz. In simpler terms, the farmers don't "own" the gold they're selling any more than they "own" the coding that allowed them to farm it in the first place.

But the real reason why gold farming is bad is much simpler. It'll eventually ruin the game.

And not in the purists' sense of the word either. I mean it'll literally make the game unfun, unfeasible, even unplayable. Even more so than Warlocks.

Let's take a gander at the in-game economy model. The two most basic methods of creating wealth in WoW are grinding and questing. If you kill a mob and it drops 16 Silver, 38 Copper, that money is "created" on the spot and added to your inventory. If you hand in a quest and are rewarded 11 Gold, that money is likewise created out of Netherweave--er, whole cloth. Then, if that mob happened to drop [Platemail Bracers of the Whale], and the quest reward was [Two-Handed Sword of Spirit], and you realize both items are crap and you ditch them at the vendor, that gold also didn't exist before and appears in your backpack. (For many players, the Auction House provides much more income than grinding or questing, but since that gold is merely going from one player to another, it doesn't introduce new money to the economy.)

Now, take into account the sheer number of players who are grinding and questing at any one time, and try to contemplate just how much gold is created on any given server on any given day. What you should realize quickly (unless your Intellect is unbuffed), is that with all this gold being created daily, and with most players' equipment either being bought off the AH or looted from a dead instance boss, the economy soon bloats.

And it would, were it not for Blizz's use of money sinks. That term refers to any means by which money is removed from the game environment, and they're everywhere. Vendors are the most obvious money sink, and we buy from them a lot more often than we realize. 50 silver for a Rune Thread, 6 gold for a tailoring pattern, 2 gold for a handful of Imbued Vials, 3 gold for a stack of Purified Draenic Water--it all adds up, even if we aren't conscious of it. If you're as bad at the instances as I am, then any given run results in a 15-gold repair bill. And if you're tempted to splurge on a vanity pet or what have you, then kiss a few more gold pieces goodbye. Training new skills (and re-speccing) also can lighten your purse; at Level 70 expect to pay 10 gold per new ability. Even listing items on the Auction House is fraught with hidden tariffs--the deposit cost and the 5% Auction House cut.

But by a big margin, the most daunting money sink that every player eventually encounters is the mount. At level 40, the price tag is a (comparitively) modest 90 gold. By level 60, when 90 gold seems, if not a trivial amount, then at least a realistic goal, the epic mount will set you back 630 gold. Once you've reached the pinnacle of your WoW-ness at Level 70, your normal flying mount costs a cool grand, while the awe-inspiring epic flier commands an equally stunning price: 5,200 gold.

As ludicrous as the price structure may seem, most players do eventually attain at least one or two of the mounts, thereby removing a decent chunk of change from the gamescape.

But why is that so important? Why can't players just amass thousands upon thousands of gold pieces and swim in them, sleep on them, very painfully make love to them? Quite simply, because it would cause hyperinflation. (And possibly a urinary tract infection; God only knows what else Taurens do with their gold pieces.)

The current system of money sinks is adequate for a normal economy whereby players still making their way towards Level 70 earn a substantial amount of gold, while players at the level cap abandon grinding in favor of raiding (which trades income for drool-worthy epics). An endgame player wouldn't spend his time grinding in the Elemental Plateau; he wouldn't have any need to. He would rather be blasting his way through Karazhan and stomping upon Serpentshrine Cavern.

Ah, but then what's the problem? Why is this well-designed economy still potentially headed for disaster? I know, and maybe you already do as well, but if you don't, you'll have to wait till the next blog... /dance

Gold Farming pt. 1: Introduction

It was a pleasant Saturday afternoon in the Alliance capital of Stormwind, and the radiance of the sun flooded its paved streets with a brilliant chrome sheen. Adventurers of every stripe congregated outside of doorways, unhurriedly taking their finds to the Auction House or paying their respects to Highlord Bolvar Fordragon in the keep. Suddenly a Level 1 character bolts up to the mailbox and exhorts, "Visit [URL deleted] for the best WoW Gold Prices~ $5.99 per 100G delivered in 1-24 hrs. Powerlevel 1-70 for $359 7 days guaranteed, Honorfarming $14.99 per 10K honor AV"

We're all familiar with this bizarre phenomenon in some form or another. Perhaps you've never had the misfortune of hearing one of these gold farmers hawking their wares in Orgrimmar, but surely you've stumbled upon the "player" who grinds for countless hours without so much as going AFK for a bio, or the 5000-gold piece of Linen Cloth that someone put on the neutral Auction House to transfer funds to whichever faction bought them. Failing that, surely you've heard the derogative terms "Chinese farmer" or "Ebayer", used to denigrate players who play so atrociously that they couldn't have earned their level and equipment, but instead shelled out real-life money for them.

It all seems too ludicrous to be true, until you do a Google search for "World of Warcraft gold" or something similar, and find hundreds of sites willing to sell you not only gold, but powerleveling as well. Blizzard has unwittingly spawned an inchoate industry that pulls in millions of (non-virtual) dollars annually. Unfortunately for both the players and the gold farmers who rely on their work as a matter of survival, gold farming is a self-destructive industry.

Let's examine for a second the possible impetus for gold farming, or more accurately, the compulsion to convert real-life currency for its in-game equivalent. Not many can argue that World of Warcraft is a deeply engaging game, but as characters become more powerful, an exponentially larger investment of time (and gold) is required to continue progress. At level 5 it would not be unusual to level up within an hour, but at level 50 that elusive ding could take days. Unfortunately, free time in real life does not always accommodate this ever-steepening curve, and there is immense pressure (from guild mates as well as from endgame content that requires a high level) to continue advancing toward Level 70. Hence, some players find it necessary to tip the scales in their favor by purchasing gold.

They do so, ultimately, at their own peril. Blizzard has not been shy about hitting gold buyers with their epic 2-handed mace, [The Banhammer]. And not without reason; first of all, the sale or purchase of any in-game paraphernaila--items as well as gold--is explicitly prohibited in the End-User License Agreement and the Terms of Use. Thousands of accounts have been erased, millions of collective man-hours deleted, because of the compulsion to buy 100 gold for $5.99.

That's nothing compared to what the supply side has suffered. In a 2006 crackdown against the gold farming industry, Blizzard nuked over 30,000 accounts, sending an amount of gold estimated to be nearly a billion into the depths of the Molten Core. At current market prices, 1 billion gold could sell for nearly $60 million.

Blizzard sure seems like a big bully in this market, but there must be a reason why gold selling is against the EULA, right?

Right--but I've reached the end of this blog entry. I'll get to the reasons next time around, I promise. /bye

Who is this guy and what's he think he's doing?

Hello everyone, and welcome to my blog, The World of Warcraft Times. To make a long story short, it's always seemed to me that the world has too many computer-game blogs written in a "serious" light, where the writer insists he's the pwnage and anyone who disagrees (or, heaven forbid, plays the game because it's fun and not just to mock those who aren't uber leet) isn't worthy of holding a mouse. Well, I'm not what you'd call a serious player by any means, and my goal here isn't to belittle anyone just because they aren't in full Tier 6. God knows I'll never have that kind of gear anyway.

No, what I want to do here is have fun in the name of WoW. I uncover the latent humor that's inherent in this game we play, wherever it lurks--PvP Battlegrounds, instances, Outland, or some remote corner of Kalimdor--and make it accessible to every player. I get in depth with topics that are usually only /w, er, whispered about: gold farming, power leveling, item duplication, GM duping. (No, I won't advocate any of them, but I will poke fun at the people who do.)

Yeah, that's all well and good. You might even be interested in reading future posts now. But I can hear you mumbling, "Fine, but who is this Kefra guy, and how dare he presume to write about WoW when I bet he's some lowbie 11-year-old sharing his older brother's account!" Fair enough. This is who I am:

Kefra, Level 70 Human Paladin. Retribution spec. Not great gear, but pretty decent considering how often I get to run instances (roughly three times per ice age). It's always a surprise to my group when I top the damage meters: "omg a retardadin out dps'd me wtf"

Skeeve, Level 70 Human Mage. Hybrid, Arcane/Fire build. Even worse gear, but at least I managed to make the Spellfire set. Has more epics than my main, but also still has several greens, /sigh. If I burn my cooldowns, I can get a Pyroblast to crit around 4700. It ain't a 10k Shadowbolt, but it's not bad, either.

Minikefra, Level 70 Human Warrior (yes, I am aware I have a human fetish). Protection spec. Truly pathetic gear. It looks half-decent but most of it was bought off the auction house, so meh. And before you ask, I'm a horrible tank. I was press-ganged into tank spec by my guild and have yet to get the hang of it...

Tatsuo, Level 59 Night Elf (gasp!) Rogue. Combat spec. Tatsuo's my semi-twink (which is my way of saying I'm too cheap to hit 60 and shell out 640 gold for yet another epic mount). Besides, it's fun to stunlock stuff in Arathi Basin, and 59 is the only level bracket that hasn't been flooded with twinks...yet. Plus, it's ridiculously easy to twink 59, with Outland greens besting epics.

Aragom, Level 19 Human Warrior. Weird spec. He used to be my brother's, until he quit. I twinked him as best I could, but seeing as he's about 85% of the way to level 20, that rules out a lot of quest-reward twink gear. (No, he doesn't have a Sentry Cloak. Would you pay 150 gold for 2 agility?)

I like to think I have a fair amount of WoW experience and lore to share. Stay tuned, the actual content is coming soon.