Gold Farmers

Well depending on the game some times you can make quite a bit of selling it at the right time to the right person
A real life friend of mine(StefanG) was the first in the world to get the legendary bow in The Burning Crusade. When he got it he got an offer of 10000 euroes, however since he was too excited he didn't sell the account, however 1 week later he changed his mind, but managed to get only 3000$. Still a decent amount of cash, but if he had acted at the right time he could have gotten a lot more.
Also yeah stamps do have a value, but what about going sky diving, or skiing. My point was that it shouldn't be strange to spend money on something that brings you pleasure.

 

I get your point and to each his own I think. And the offer your friend got for that bow is really insane. 10000 EUR for an account. Too bad he did not sell. Still, 3000 $ is a nice sum.

 

As in I've never heard of or even considered such a thing, so I'm assuming if the companies that publish these games catch you, its game over for you?

 

Think about it this way: Simply put, it is turning your hard earned, real life dollars and cents into monopoly money. You have to weigh on the scales your personal monetary obligations such as bills, car notes, etc. against the added enjoyment and time you can save not having to grind to get all of that gold.

If you can afford it and you want to pay to win a little bit, do it. Especially if it is going to add to your enjoyment of the game. Just don't let it get out of hand because you don't want to be eating top ramen for dinner every night.

 

Gold farmers and in-game currency purchase with real money really ruins the in-game economy. In lineage 2 for example, when I just started in open beta, some basic crafting material (drop from hunting) such as bones, iron ores, leather etc. only cost 60~70 to buy from other players (50 if you sell to NPC shops). A year later, you can set up shop in town to buy them for 1000 each and you still won't get enough of them since there are other players setting shops with higher purchasing prices. Talking about super inflation...

The players who pay real money for in-game currency not only gave themselves unfair advantages, but it also make life harder for other players who do not purchase gold with real money.

 

Haha, true! I know many people who have been playing for over ten years and are still going. I don't usually pay for things with real money, but I don't actually have anything against it. I just figure if I can get it without paying, then why would I pay?

 

I wouldn't have the patience to farm gold and sell it, sounds way too boring. But I understand why people do it, for the money and profit. It's toxic for the community but also unstoppable.

 

The "patience" has nothing to do with it. In lineage 2 for example, tons of gold farmers were using bot programs to farm. A single farmer could control dozens accounts to farm at the same time with little oversee needed. They not only ruined the economy for the game, but they also ruined many good hunting spots for regular players. Sometimes the gold farmers would take control of the characters and "train" a huge group of monsters toward real players in order to get real players in the same area killed... so the area is only available to the farmers. By doing so, they also forced more players to relay on buying gold/materials/drops from them because it is harder to obtain such stuff on their own with almost every good hunting spot is occupied.

 

Yea I have never really heard of gold farming any other way than by using bots. Someone I know (through a friend) was busted for this and if you have any questions about what happens to an in-game economy just look at World of Warcraft. Farmers bust into Stormwind all the time begging to give you a "good deal" no matter what you buy from them. Then of course, look at the auction house prices.

 

That's why the use of bots is considered cheating and is always against the rules of every game. And I fully support banning all those people.

 

I can see why people would pay money for in-game gold but I personally wouldn't do it. I've found a couple of gold farmers ingame before and they're quite obnoxious. They generally take spawn areas and they stay there the entire time. It's hard to outfarm them so you're forced to move.

 

In certain MMO's I think they actually help out a lot and without them the economy would be so bad. Take Runescape as an example without gold farmers there would be little to no raw materials in the game as a lot of people are just looking to level the fastest possible way and getting certain materials yourself slows you down a lot.

 

While there are rules, the enforcement is a completely different story. Yes NCsoft (the company runs Lineage 2) said botting is illegal, but there were always bots in the game. Report of bots often resulted in no action taken. Often time a single Chinese farmer would be leading a group of bots, if a moderator tries to talk to the farmer or any of the bots, they would either use broken English or pretend they don't speak English... the bots are programmed to respond when talked to... not to mention the farmer oversee them can intervene when a real player is needed.

 

Especially in World of warcraft I have noticed people only playing because of the mean to make money. There was actually an article in the news a couple of years of a chinese playing it 20 hours a day and making a living of it.