Economy: Items vs. Gold

[Carisma]

Spending hours upon hours finding the right buyer for something you've spent hours upon hours to finally get, is that your definition of fun?

Constantly refreshing games to look for items you want or spam in bot infested channels is fun?

kiddies selling/buying only in fg is fun?

d2 trading system is garbage and has simply too many flaws that made it too time consuming, the only thing that kept it sane was this very forum where only decent trades can be found.

the amount of d2 fanboys here is astounding, sad to say it's time to burst that boring old outdated d2 mindset.

The old trading system might of had flaws, but it provided a much more addictive habit than the action house does.
Not to mention the flaws with the AH, like the gems count toward stats. D3 is a watered down version of D2, getting people to forget the past game and to accept the new game will be impossible. The point of a sequel is to improve upon the old, and not to take steps back. Blizzard has improved up some things, but there are more negatives then positives. This is a diablo faniste, so yes there are d2 fanboys, and there is also people who liked blizzard more before they got in bed with activision.

[SnickerSnack]

Not to mention the flaws with the AH, like the gems count toward stats

Yes. The irritates me too and greatly reduces the utility of the GAH.



I like D3 quite a lot. I played D1 for a few years and D2 for many more years. Maybe I'm ~90% satisfied with D3 because I can't be bothered to worry about how great the game is. It's good enough for me. Not that anyone is supposed to get anything from that; I just don't see many people simply expressing basic satisfaction with the game.

[Hideo]

I'm playing Titan Quest at the moment. Fun game. As for D2, bartering was THE best thing for me since I started playing online games. It's so ****ing cool to meet with a guy who gives you decent shako free and has a lot of "crap" which he gives you for a single pul rune, which allows you to progress though Nightmare. I even got some items which were Hell worthy for free. Many thanks. Such situations are not possible in D3, since everybody is hoarding gold. Pathetic.

[AnimeCraze]

Gold, definitely. There's a reason why item to item trading is a niche in the real world. A currency is needed, and I rather have one that is straight forward such as gold than a weird one based upon gems and runes.

[Hideo]

Gold, definitely. There's a reason why item to item trading is a niche in the real world. A currency is needed, and I rather have one that is straight forward such as gold than a weird one based upon gems and runes.

There is a reason why I play D2 and trade in chat and on D2jsp, rather than becoming a ****ing real world trader. Money is boring, it has always been. It's just more convenient. In many Arab countries, when you trade on a bazaar, you are expected to negotiate the deal. If you don't, merchant is offended. He considers it an INSULT that you didn't negotiate the deal. Memories form Tunesia vacations.

[sacridoc]

Gold, definitely. There's a reason why item to item trading is a niche in the real world. A currency is needed, and I rather have one that is straight forward such as gold than a weird one based upon gems and runes.

When farming the medium of exchange becomes more lucrative than farming the items themselves, the game becomes boring. Finding items is interesting. Farming gold is not. People are drawn to the most efficient method of attaining the items they want, even if it's drudgery.

D3 has actually improved quite a bit recently as gold farming has become less efficient. The game is definitely better now than it was 2-3 weeks ago. As long as it's not more efficient to farm the medium of exchange than the items, the game is headed in the right direction. I think problems still exist with the RMAH, but I don't really see any problems with how gold is working at the moment.

The point is that it's not the existence of gold that people have issues with, it's when gold makes more sense to farm than items.

That problem could still exist with the RMAH down the line, but we haven't seen enough of the RMAH to know yet.

[Ixnatifual]

Definitely gold. One of the major issues with Diablo 2's economy was the uselessness of gold, forcing you to spend hours searching for trade games with people who had gear you were interested in. Except everyone were greedy as Hell and even if you found someone who had stuff you needed, the actual trade itself would be a pain as often they wouldn't agree to trade unless the deal favoured them.

Is gold too valuable? No, because if it was, items would cost less gold. Truth is, gold vs bartering is the same thing. Gold is just superior. That's why our economy advanced from simple bartering to currency.

Gotta say I love the "take superbly lousy features/exploits from D2 and somehow twist them into being the epitome of game design, so that Diablo 3 may be bashed for having rectified these issues" style threads.

[lanceuppercut]

at anything but inferno onwards then gold all the way. why? because gold is gold and GF makes you get more (admittedly at lower levels not that much more) however i feel once i get to inferno, MF will be the better choice due to the chance of decent stuff actually dropping.

[juju]

In D2 gold was useless

Hahaha no way! Have heard of gambling in d2? gambling circles/tiaras/amus/rings was really sweet and you could get really nice items by that!?

goldfind travi barbs was really nice and you could make ~700k gold/run if had right items

But yeah... now its all about gold