Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

Hey guys. If you're like me, you'd prefer spending time RPing rather than grinding. This makes it hard to make any money for teleporting or the epic store.

My idea turns the rp xp drip into a gold drip at level 30. If any chests are looted the gold drip is deactivated for an hour so the grinders can't double dip.

This idea came about after hearing multiple stories of long time players having almost no money. Thoughts?

I'd rather increase the max buy price of merchants, increase gold awards from questing, or decrease the cost of consumables before gold is being awarded for chatting by the campfire. I can see the rp xp mechanic in terms of a pnp DM awarding players for rp as well as the fact that for those with conversation skills it's no different than gaining xp for picking locks. Gold falling in to pockets though is a stretch for me. I wouldn't be angry if something like this went in, I'd just prefer other methods.

chad878262 wrote:increase the max buy price of merchants, increase gold awards from questing, or decrease the cost of consumables

Flasmix wrote:My idea turns the rp xp drip into a gold drip at level 30. If any chests are looted the gold drip is deactivated for an hour so the grinders can't double dip.

Por que no los dos?


No but seriously, I'm all for more ways of making more pixels.

So, talking about this gold drip.

Mechanically, how much can it possibly pay out every 5 hours?

Depending on luck, a treasure run for me on a reset earns me between 2 - 10k gp. Yes, that does assume I vendor everything.

Yet, when I RP for xp, I earn between 20 - 35 xp per five minutes. Sometimes I get as many as 12 procs an hour, and sometimes I get as few as 3! So, I can't accurately estimate how much gold this will pay out because:
- I don't know how often the proc thing actually works
- I don't know what the hard cap is for earned xp in one reset

However, if sitting by the campfire earns between 2 - 10k gp per reset, then really what's the harm?

Why not make monsters drop gold to your inventory on kills? D&D is an adventure game. I do not believe talking nets gold. Killing a monster would though. I am still an advocate of upping XP and gold rewards from killing monsters and adventuring. There is already a problem with more people here sitting around talking and learning to use a sword through talk than going out and using that sword.

We could use that logic to say, talking doesn't allow one to kill monsters better but here it does.

This could be said to be a PCs "profession" money that he makes when logged off. I.e. a Ranger hunts to catch animals to sell food and pelts. Thus, we don't need to call it camp fire gold.

I think a hard cap should be implemented of 3k max per reset.

I've played on the server on and off for quite a few years and I have to say I am struggling to break even between consumeables or teleports with intermittant dungeon running. I think there is a slight economy problem in upkeep. Some way to bump gold would be good. I can definitely see the issue at 30 whereby grinding might feel like a bit of a waste if you're only getting gold (or just spoons) from it.

I like the idea of somehow getting a steady income but having coin appearing in your pocket feels a little immersion breaking.

Perhaps some alternative mechanic? I'm in favor of more high level Gold and Xp rewarding objectives or quests like the Northern Troll hides. It seems odd to me that a lvl 28 can get more xp and gold running around doing favors in the docks than looting an entire Duergar compound. Maybe the rarer/boss mops drop vauable things, like a dragon drops 3 scales that sell for 400 gold each?

Or you could add questgiver that involves going to an actual tough area, with a bag of gold as the reward? It would increase overall levelling speed as a side effect (if you were the type to do all the quests) but if you added higher level ones you could probably cap the lower ones sooner.

But as always these kinds of suggestions mean more work for the devs ;c. Maybe a simpler solution like Chad suggested?

Fair point! However if you cap it the potential to earn as the PBs do and afford gear is lowered exponentially. I understand trying to curb exploiting systems but it sucks when you reach your cap if you wanted to be on for an extended period of time. Why not do both? Lets give gold for RP and make monsters drop on every kill a sum of gold straight to your gold pouch!

Legofsalmon wrote:I've played on the server on and off for quite a few years and I have to say I am struggling to break even between consumeables or teleports with intermittant dungeon running. I think there is a slight economy problem in upkeep. Some way to bump gold would be good. I can definitely see the issue at 30 whereby grinding might feel like a bit of a waste if you're only getting gold (or just spoons) from it.

Can you list the costs you have for when using consumables and teleporting then what you gain on your dungeon runs? That will help us understand the problem.

Getting a bonus of gold equal to CR wouldn't be bad.

if you run out of gold, run to the place you want to go instead of teleporting.

Im with chad and rather see the max buy price of merchants increased rather than anything else.

And to think, just a bit ago people were asking for more gold sinks...now, its not enough gold.

The benefit of the original suggestion (or even a form in which a gold drip is available to everyone) is that it directly benefits players who dedicate the majority of their time to roleplay and partake in the communal storytelling of the server. I do not think it needs to be anywhere near the level of wealth collection one can achieve dungeon running but the fact that a player is spending their time engaging the playerbase and enriching it with storytelling instead of running around quick looting the server I believe deserves reward. At level 30 any reward for roleplay is exceptionally dried up and eventually the ticker even stops giving you numbers. I cannot emphasize enough that the suggestion revolves around benefiting roleplay.

Also remember, by raising merchant prices it's just helping the grinders mostly.

Increasing the max buyout for merchants would benefit the looters the most, I'm shotting myself in the foot but I don't think it's a particularly good idea. The new epic shop is only a temporary gold sink, like all shops. Once you're decked out you'll go back to earning gold and not having many means to spend it, since that epic shop seems there to stay let's not diminish its usefulness by making gold even easier to get through looting.

On the other hand I see no harm in Flasmix's suggestion, 3000 gold is peanuts to any chain looter, it won't change much for them while it can be useful for people who rarely go adventuring as they'll eventually be able to afford some items. The gold appearing from thin air is of course weird IC wise but it should be feasible for everyone to imagine a moderately lucrative activity done by your character in his off-time.

And if your RP says no to free gold for x or y reasons it's still very easy to burn that gold into nothingness through buying and selling the same item to a merchant.