Go ahead, skip this as much of you will
The recent turn of events show that RMT affects short term prices. The gilbuyers will be out of bought gil soon, and if the prices stay high then the economy is ready to support the higher prices. If the prices drop, then it was an artificial boost in prices from a sudden surge of massive amounts of money to a few people. The whole point is that Gilbuying has a marginal, if any, affect on the long term welfare of in-game economies.
I'll use this example:
Say we have 10 people in a given economy, and 1000 gil in that same economy. Or, there is 100 gil per person. Now, one Osode drops per week. After a week, there is one Osode per 10 people.
Now say 10 more noobs come along and join during the next week, adding another 1000 gil to the economy. During the same second week the first 10 people sold items to NPCs, did quests for gil, or got drops from NMs. This adds another 1000 gil to the economy.
Now we have twice as many people (20), and three times as much gil (3000).
Or, 150 gil per person. The problem is, Osode is still only dropping once a week so now there’s 2 (still 1 Osode per 10 people). This creates inflation because now everyone has more money(150 gil) to spend on the same amount of items (1 Osode) and results in a price raise of the Osode. Instead of being worth 60 gil like before, it’s now worth 90 gil. This is what happens when the economy is not controlled. In FFXI there is too much money coming into the game (mob drops, quests, etc.) and not enough leaving (Chocobo, AH tax, etc.).
Now I know someone’s going to try and be smart and say that RMT increases the problem but it doesn’t. Sure gilsellers raise the prices sometimes on their items, but if the market is unable to sustain a higher price, the items won’t sell. This is apparent by the Christmas fiasco on AHs across all servers. For example, on Leviathan Evasion Torque was worth about a million gil before Christmas. During Christmas and up until that Friday it was at a solid three million or higher. Just a week later, it’s down to 2.5 million, and it keeps falling. This is because without the people with bought gil to spend it on it, people cannot afford it. The gilbuyers caused a massive, temporary increase prices. They have no idea what the money is “worth” because they didn’t spend any time getting it, so they spend it as they please. After they are out of money, the market returns to normal.
It’s all the fundamentals of supply and demand. Over Christmas you had a bunch of people with a bunch of money that they didn’t know what to do with. They found cool items to spend their money on (demand was high). Now you are left with people who have a measure of value of their Gil, and don’t want to spend that much on a given item (demand is low). This is evidence that the economy is not ready to sustain a permanent increase to 3 million gil for the Evasion Torque. If it stabilizes at say, 2 million gil, then the economy was ready to sustain a permanent price of that gil. It’s not the gilbuyers that sustain that price; it’s the rest of the economy that sustains it.
So I bring you to the definition of inflation:
in·fla·tion Reference
n.
1. The act of inflating or the state of being inflated.
2. A persistent
increase in the level of consumer prices or a persistent
decline in the purchasing power of money, caused by an
increase in available currency and credit
beyond the proportion of available goods and services.
In my example, each individual gil is worth less because there is more gil per person than before, but the same amount of Osodes per person. This fulfills both parts of the definition of inflation. Inflation is a long-term process; price jacking (what happened over Christmas) is a short term one. Again I bring you back to the dropping in prices. The prices are done being jacked (because of gil buyers) and will now return to a level sustainable by the in game economy.
Now I’m going to do something completely different than the people who only complain and point fingers and have nothing to offer.
1. Square can reduce the amount of money in the economy. In my example, returning the ratio to 100 gil per person instead of 150 gil per person. They are currently doing this, just not at a fast enough rate. They do this by Chocobo prices, AH taxes, Limbus, Dynamis, etc. They can increase the effectiveness of this method by adding more things to take money out of the economy. Buying more items from NPCs, higher taxes, make Jeuno and surrounding areas have bazaar taxes so there’s no bazaar field in Batallia downs. Now most of you are thinking “OMG no that’s going to make things expensive!” but it will actually help the economy. Why do you think the federal interest rate isn’t always low? They’re trying to control how much people spend so that there isn’t a huge amount of inflation.
2. Secondly, Square can increase drop rates. They can make stuff like, Thief’s Knife drop more often. While most of you are saying “OMG yea! I want one!” This is actually a very bad solution. The whole point of endgame is the challenge in acquiring these items, despite what you say. I bring you to Raise 3. A year ago, Raise 3 was a million gil. Those White Mages that had it were praised and adored because they were the “Elite” WHMs. Now, at 6k apiece, every White Mage has one. It is no longer a status symbol. Now imagine the same thing happened with Thief’s Knife. Instead of being an elite thief because you have it, you are now mediocre. There would be no “Dream gear” just gear. We all complain about how hard it is to get some things (damn jelly ring) but it’s the difficulty in obtaining these items that makes them so valuable. I bring Minstrel’s Coat, while not a whole bunch better than the AF armor (3 wind skill isn’t huge and it sure as hell isn’t worth the 6 hours of camping I did for it), it is much, much more difficult to obtain. I camped it not because 3 wind skill is worth 6 hours of my life, but because A. we went as a LS and had fun and B. because I am one of the few Bards that have one at 62. I am one of the “Elite” because I have it. If every bard could get it, I wouldn’t have that status and there would be nothing to reach for.
Personally, option one is much, much better. There are those of you that just want everything in the game the easy way, and I’m not sure why you want them. Because you can be “Elite” like everyone else? If everyone had them you wouldn’t be “Elite” you would simply be mediocre, just like everyone else. My guess is you are the same people that played Half-life and used invincibility to get through it and then shouted how amazing you were for beating it. There’s nothing to strive for if everyone and their mother had Osodes.
Most of you will see the 3 pages I’ve written and will pass over it I’m sure, but if I can show one person the truth, then I will be happy.
Edit: I also hope atleast someone will have an intelligent reply to this, I know it's hard but please.
Edit2: Some spacing issues.
XD
