The Decline and Fall of the Cantr Economy

[The Industriallist]

I believe that it is impossible to destroy any items of significant value in cantr (locks maybe, I'm not sure, but those are relatively cheap). Thus, I deduce that the cantr economy will colapse in the near future in more developed areas.
One character can only make use of a finite number of items at a time: a shield, a weapon, and a tool, machine, or vehicle. Since most characters don't try to amass things they can't actually use, the total amount of 'stuff' desired is some relatively small multiple of the number of characters. Since one character using maximum mechanization can produce all of this (except maybe a car) in a cantr year or two, it is not farfetched to imagine that there will soon be far more productive capacity than there is use for it. At this point, any companies that don't shut down will be running on pure momentum, with no real incentive to gather or grow...

If they never go away, sabres may come to outnumber living characters... the end would not be long in coming.

[Meh]

Just the opposite. If you've ever seen an old chracter die due to account inactivity you can see that they have amassed quite a bit of things that they never shared. And the goverments to a larger degree have storehouse full of stuff they don't need. You only needed those five planers to build the first five crossbows after that you store the planers away and forgot about them.

These living pharohs keep the ecoonmy alive but not sharing what was built before. The behavior of most chracters to gather more food than they will ever eat has already made food worthless in many areas when those chracters pass.

[Solfius]

still, it is a rather dody economy, no one needs anything much anymore, they just collect it for the sake of collecting it, and because there is nothing else really to do except collecting.

This is where deterioration comes into play, as things need replacing so there is a need to keep making things

[Meh]

Without tools and buildings wearning away as a favor to the economy I will take it as might duty to wipe out entire spawntowns and run off with all the goodies. Who needs new places when whole towns can be reset?

[Solfius]

What was that cap rule breaking group that wanted to kill everyone in the world and turn towns into Necropolis'?

[rklenseth]

I would disagree. Each area in Cantr has seen a lot of conflict and will continue to do so. Items will change hands some will be lost and forgotten in buildings (Krif Storage Facility!!!). Groups of people will move to different areas that will need tools, weapons, and protection etc... Populations in other places will grow and they will need more of that stuff.
I think adding in tools losing their effectiveness or breaking over time would add another good element to the game. One could even have their old tools, weapons ect... fixed or repaired adding in another business that could grow in the Cantr economy.

[Solfius]

Yes, I agree with that: regardless over whether the economy (Did we have one to begin with?) is declining or not adding in deterioration will only improve the game

[Pirog]

Yes, I also see deterioration as an important thing, especially since it would open up a lot of new business options.

[kroner]

you should mention item deterioration in the suggestions section. I think that it's a really important aspect missing from the game.

Another addition that could simultaneously deal with this econoic problem would be if metal deposits began yielding less as they were used. The resources in old districts would become more valuable. Thus, as tools became more abundant, they would also become harder to make and so retain their value. The only problem with this is that it favors older characters.

[rklenseth]

That's a good idea about resources being used up eventually and one I have suggested in the past on the Yahoo! Boards. But I think it shouldn't be done until the grid system is implemented. It could work where there is only so much iron or limestone etc... on a grid until it is used up and people have to look into another grid. I would also like to see people have to actually build mines and dig deeper into a grid for iron then there can be different levels of earth each with their own amount of resources. I also think for resources like iron, limestone etc... should have to be found in an area. For example you actually have to dig into the ground before you realized that there is iron in a given grid area. Making these resources harder to find and harder to get at will make their value go up.

[Solfius]

rklenseth scores again....

Another good idea, also I'd like to see different quality materials based on location

[Pirog]

rklenseth>

It is nice to see that we agree on some things at least