[MUD-Dev] Economic Growth (Was: [STORY] Story and population size)

[Travis Nixon]

From: "Koster, Raph" <rkoster at soe.sony.com>

> Wow, I thoroughly disagree. The next evolution in economies will
> involve getting the NPCs out of the loop, as they just distort it.

At the risk of sounding unimaginitive:

  Wow, I thoroughly disagree.  :)

Until every role in a world is filled by a real player, the economy
MUST be distorted without npcs.  I'd agree as far as saying that the
current level of NPCs distort the picture, but that's not because
they're NPCs, but because they're at the current level.

Unless you imagine some point in the future where players will want
to play an active role in an assembly line, endlessly repeating the
same task...er...hang on a sec...isn't that what we have now?

Ok, you win.  Maybe you're right.

:)

Seriously though, if you want a working economy, at least one thats
based on real-world principles, all those menial jobs that players
aren't likely to want to do have to get done.  That's not to say
that you have to have billions of NPCs, but the effects have to be
taken into account somewhere, even if its just simulated.  Of
course, if you don't care about having a working economy, and are ok
with fudging things, like making armorcrafting dependant on
tailoring so that people will tailor, then distortion is irrelevant.

I would think the idea would be to make NPCs better, not to get rid
of them altogether.  Take them away and then you truly have a
distorted view of the world.  Feudal systems with no peasants, only
lords and ladies.  Republics with no citizens, only presidents and
senators.

Seems rather silly to me.


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