Vending Machines and Turnstiles

[Marian]

I still feel strongly that this would be completely OOC, and to see a bunch of towns across multiple continents one day just suddenly decide they want to take these coins that they've never once had an interest in or use for and base a huge part of their economy off of them would disgust me.

Yes, vending machines would be convenient, but again, why coins? Why would someone want to take metal, spends days pressing it into disks, just so somebody else can spend days turning it back to normal? Why not just use the metal itself? Or any other resource? Why can't a tailor set their machine to accept cotton?

Because the programmers want Cantr society to develop a certain way, so they make changes to force coins into popularity by making them the only convenient and automated way to trade? (I'm not saying that this is the case...right now it's only some of the players that seem to want that, but if it were actually implemented I don't see what else I could think.)

[Songthrush]

I'm not one to complain too much about realism, but Marian, I can't imagine how a coin-op mechanism could possibly be created that would work when you stuff cotton or other goods into it.

Could you explain more what seems to be "OOC" to you in the idea of coin-op machines in themselves (not speaking of currency in general)? Currently we have coins and no interest in them. But now, a new machine is created which gives the coins a realistic use. What is the OOC aspect? Stuffing cotton and other goods into machines (magic automated barter machines) - now THAT would definitely be a huge mistake!

I agree with you that there should not be any overeager attempts made by programmers to force currency into Cantr. Many people are against this strongly as well. You should see what has been suggested by Sociologist in his thread, I think it would horrify you!

Towns can decide to build coin-op dispensers, but whether their economy will revolve around these or not is not set in stone at all. All barter trading will certainly go on just as before, it won't be affected by currency (which really is a convenience).

You mention that it's inconvenient to re-work the coins back into iron. I also thought about that and then realized that as long as they were in widespread open use NOBODY would want to re-claim their coins back into iron directly (i.e. by working at a stone table). It's sufficient to know that they COULD. Instead, traders would exchange them for iron, and at a premium rate. The coins quite naturally become more valuable than the iron itself, if they are used in convenient machines.

We can imagine a common occurence: 200g of iron being offered through a dispenser for, say, only 15 iron coins. In this scenario, the owner of the dispenser has plenty of iron, doesn't have time or the equipment to make it into coins and needs more coins (for example to travel to another town where he knows dispensers exist).

[Marian]

I agree with you that there should not be any overeager attempts made by programmers to force currency into Cantr. Many people are against this strongly as well. You should see what has been suggested by Sociologist in his thread, I think it would horrify you!

Actually I did read his thread, and I agreed with every bit of it. If coins, or just gold or diamonds or some other item we in the real world consider 'precious' gradually and naturally come into common use as curency in Cantr because chars figure out that they last longer than carrots and tomatoes, then great, I see nothing wrong with that. I welcomeit in fact.

But if a huge revolutionary change to the game like instananeous trade become possible, only coins are the only way to do it, how is that not an 'overeager attempt' to force currency? A fundamental part of the game, getting things done through cooperation and interaction at a slow pace, would have been completely removed for the sole purpose of giving towns and traders a huge incentive to switch to coins.

That would be like, somebody gets upset that bronze weapons aren't being made, so they program all bronze weapons to allow people to attack as many times as they want with them, with no tiredness and no one hit per day limits. So, combat is now very easy and convenient, and you don't have to communicate with other people or work to convince anyone to help you first, but hey, people are now going across the sea for zinc and phosphorous and everyone's finally making bronze weapons!

Stuffing cotton and other goods into machines (magic automated barter machines) - now THAT would definitely be a huge mistake!

how would one that uses coins any different? It'd still be 'magic automatic barter machine', it's just a restricted one that only allows people to barter with coins. Now you either want automated trade or you don't...I'm on the fence about this, but the one thing I do know is that if it's implemented, it should apply to all trade, not just the one item you're trying ot push.

[Songthrush]

Nowhere did we advocate instantaneous trade - we were talking about coin operated machines. They are not the same as automated trade.

Because you dislike that the idea of coins (their usefulness) is being unfairly promoted in Cantr, let us rename them into token operated mechanical dispensers, which work with iron tokens. These iron tokens could be Cantr's answer to real world currency, without carrying all the (for you negative) connotations of coins. It is the same thing, and no breach of character or the game philosophy is involved at all, because it is simply a mechanical device that works with manufacturable iron tokens/coins.

Universal trading machines are really the wrong way to go. Having no reasonable limits, they would be exactly what you fear, interaction-destroying automation.

By the way, Marian - barter is the exchange of good for good, or service for service; sale is the exchange of goods for currency. Therefore coin operated machines just can't be barter machines by definition, they are purely sales, and are severely restricted to work only one way. You can't put goods into them and get coins out in exchange. You can't put cotton into them and get something in exchange, etc.

Why do you think that all items should have the convenience associated with iron coins/tokens as in this idea we've proposed? It seems very unnatural. Coins work in machines, while cotton is not a currency and can't be put into a machine's slot (unless you want to clog up and break the machine). Nothing stops us from trading cotton as before, without machines and coins. What is the mean problem that I am missing?

[The Sociologist]

You bring up an interesting point...Why turn it into coins when all metals can be broken down to the gram? Want to make them worthwhile? Assign them 0 weight value... Or start constructing a system where the maximum grams that can be carried is based on strength and storage method. (i.e. pockets, backpacks, luggage, etc.)

Good points. Stressing the "convenience" factor involved in the acceptance of coinage in the first place.

Sorry, but I must agree with Marian on this one. There is no room for social experimentation here in Cantr if you force pre-made economic ideas down peoples' throats via things like "coin operated" machines and the like. Takes me back to conversation in an average Ultima Online town on some poorer shards: "bank open bank BANK baNk open bank bank bank". Ugh.

And if sleepiness is the main reason, you could take up my idea of a "barter mat" or some such. (See Essay I, recent addition). But, as I said there, I thought it would be too much to program and bad for roleplay.

[Songthrush]

I continue to defend the dispensers. A mechanical dispenser is not a pre-made economic idea. It is a machine which must first be built, and those who don't want it, don't have to build it.

A dispenser does not set prices.

It is not at all similar to Ultima Online vendors, because in that game gold coins are the pre-set means of exchange with artificially set value. In Cantr, the coins are player-manufactured and so are the proposed dispensers. In Cantr the coins have no fixed artificially set value.

The field for experimentation, social and otherwise, would grow enormously by the addition of this convenient and natural application for coins.

[Sho]

I don't think Marian or Sociologist want vending machines to accept cotton as payment. My argument, which I think parallels theirs:

It's unnatural and contrived to have vending machines accept coins and nothing else. Making coins a requirement to use vending machines would raise coins to the level of "default medium of exchange." And that's what we don't like about Ultima Online.
It would disrupt game balance and be contrary to the spirit of Cantr to have "auto-trade machines" that accept anything in return for anything else.
Therefore vending machines are a bad idea.

[Songthrush]

I would attack premise one as insupportable:

That coin operated machines are unnatural simply because they operate only with coins.

I mean, what else do you expect them to operate on?

It seems to me your premise is the rather contrived one - that coin-op dispensers should accept something else, but you're not exactly sure what, but they should.

My question is: why? Why can't player-manufactured coin operated machines operate by taking player-manufactured coins? Why can't a cantrian build a mechanism of this kind, if already every kind of mining machine, vehicle, and even electronic radios exist?

I know what you guys are inwardly resisting - the idea that coins are being given some definite use through programming. That is exactly the proposal; but you should re-evaluate its details to see how limited and careful what we propose is gameplay-wise. It is not a universal trading machine at all, and it does not and will not resemble Ultima Online.

To appease you we have even suggested separate machines which work with gold, silver, iron coins. Wooden coins (or tokens), turquoise coins, if you like. It is all the same though, because immediately upon being placed in the game world, we believe only iron or steel coins will really be used.

[Sho]

I would be fine with coin-operated machines (aside from the automation angle, which I'm not sure about) if coins were already a common medium of exchange. But I am not fine with coin-operated machines for the purpose of promoting the use of coins. Coins should drive coin technology, not the other way around.

As it stands now Cantr characters would find more use for a vending machine that ran on carrot slices than they would for a vending machine that ran on coins. I'm not calling coin vending machines unnatural. I'm questioning their reason for existence.

[Songthrush]

Their reason for existence was stated clearly from the beginning by yours truly, and need not be questioned as something mysterious. Here is that reason:

"This idea is a suggested solution for the problem of convertibility (currency=>goods and items) in the non-realtime context of Cantr. "

(quick recap: the problem of convertibility is simply that we can't instantly convert our currency, the coins, into goods or resources like we naturally can in the real world, because of Cantr's non-realtime nature. This naturally makes any form of currency untrustworthy and useless to people.)

I once again bring your attention to the fact that iron and steel are already a common medium of exchange. If the machines accepted raw iron or raw steel, it would make you fine with the idea, I understand. But it is only natural and makes sense that raw iron needs to be fashioned into coins or tokens of some sort to be used in a coin-op machine.

Let's discuss this more, and get to the bottom of the bad feeling you guys have. It must have some substance behind it which perhaps really needs to be addressed.

[Sho]

But coins-to-stuff isn't the single dominant method of trade. As a matter of fact, it's not even iron-to-stuff or steel-to-stuff, though those are the most common. A suggestion that solves the time-delay problem in the context of the current methods of trade (and leaves the door open to coin-based trade) would be neat. But this would change trade through what most players would perceive to be an "outside force." And such perceptions get RD hate mail.

As another point, the step from iron/steel-based trade to coin-based trade is a large one in and of itself, and definitely large enough to get people upset. Coins take time and machinery to make and to reclaim. Furthermore, they're completely horrible to carry, and even worse to pass, because they don't stack. A Cantr blacksmith probably wouldn't accept iron coins as equivalent value to the same weight of iron. And never mind any character who doesn't have any immediate use for iron.

As a third point, I'm going to sleep and am dropping the ball on both this thread and the other one.

[Songthrush]

Agreed, Programming must solve the stacking issue before the idea can become workable.

It is good that coins are labour-intensive to make. See my pontifications in this thread on the neatness of having iron or steel coins naturally acquire more value in the eyes of traders than the iron they're made of; and that they would rarely if ever be actually reclaimed. This reflects the real world in an uncanny, not immediately obvious way.

I do not understand the objection that coins are not currently the means of trade. They are not, because coins are useless. There is no reason to spend time making them. If there was a great machine like we're suggesting into which it "went" then gradually coins will gain prominence and become a common means of exchange.

So here we're allowing coins to become a real means of exchange gameplay-wise, where as right now, with coins that people can do absolutely nothing with, we're making sure they are ignored. Do you mean to say you're still waiting for the second coming when the people of Cantr will suddenly discover the joy of currency all by themselves and just decide one day to start using coins instead of trading with iron or steel (or indeed cotton and everything else)? It is safe to say, this will never happen. All theoretical wet dreams aside.

[BZR]

Coins as a currency is a nice idea, IMO, but only for names of coin presses:).

This discussion awaked two big and nasty problems:

1. Instant trade.

2. Currency - iron - naturally forced by game
coins - for now, only an exotic invention


I'm not playing Cantr for long enough to say somethin about first problem...

The trade iron for stuff is quite normal, remebrer Gothic?

Few players tries to force coins by an annatural processes like vendig machines. In the medieval there weren't such machines, but coins were. Money were made by kings and princes to control people in their domain.
Coins should be getting in as an effect of island capital cities policy. I mean that lords and organizations would start making they own money and accepting only currency, not iron. It's a matter of prestige. Everything what I read here is about artifficaly creating curency is a big OOC .

Sorry for my english

[Songthrush]

Hello BZR,

Your English is perfectly fine, but your logic is not. I want to show you why.

First, you compare Cantr to medieval society and if it does not match, you want to discount any ideas as OOC. How do you explain Cantr's buses, radios, limousines, jeeps, and I think there are even Helicopters in the game now? I think you do not know the game too well yet. In Cantr, gameplay determines the addition or non-addition of features, not the adherence to some predefined imaginary historical theme or period.

Coin op machines were technically possible and some artists did make them in the middle ages as entertainments for the Court. There were even coin-activated Androids which could mechanically perform different tasks like "talking", moving their heads and limbs, etc. I mention this because it highlights something: while in real life such machines are nothing but peculiar mechanical oddities, in Cantr they solve the very real and serious problem of convertibility of currency. In the real world, you can instantly convert your money to goods and services you need; in Cantr this is impossible because the game is not real-time. As long as it remains impossible, any form of money in Cantr will be useless.

Do you follow?

Second, you made the good point that in the real world no machines were necessary to enable money to develop. True! But in Cantr we need such a machine. Without it, money will never have a chaince in hell to develop, because its main function, instant convertibility into goods, is impossible in Cantr.

The value of money, after all, is that you can get something with it. We need a mechanism in Cantr which would allow this to happen in places where civilization is strong. But not instant trade! No way!

Only mechanical one-way convertation of iron coins into "lots", containing goods that other players have set out in their dispenser machines. No fixed prices, no artificially introduced coins. The machines, the coins, and the prices would all be made by the players and by the players alone.

Will somebody explain again where they see anything "OOC" in our proposal?

[Songthrush]

Let's hear a response from the Programming Team. How does the proposition look to you?