Dev blog: Security Update - Q3 2018

[Andrian_Dallocort]

@Teckos_Pech

@Andrian_Dallocort

There have been a few posts saying that CCP isn’t using RMT for their own corporate benefit because they are not directly selling ISK. But they do directly sell PLEX for RM and then allow it to be resold in game for ISK, and it is very liquid with an active efficient market to easily convert PLEX into ISK. So CCP does do RMT through these RM PLEX sales. That should be an undisputed fact.

So what?

The point is no ISK is being created de novo. Somebody has to earn that ISK somehow…which is done via trading time for ISK.

What breaks a game is when you can buy resources de novo, IMO. I used to play World of Tanks. For awhile you could play for free, but after awhile you must open your wallet. With EVE CCP has been pretty clever IMO. Yes you can open your wallet and buy PLEX and get both SP and ISK, but they are not created “out of thin air” but come from other players in game who trade their time for those things. Thus, the supply is not “perfectly elastic” (look it up on google and learn something).

Interesting point. Its true that the way CCP implements their RMT causes other players to provide the ISK obtained by other ways within the game economy. Which avoids causing inflation by dumping large amounts of RMT purchased ISK directly into the game.

Of course CCP creates ways to farm ISK which is then used to buy the PLEX that they sell via RMT.

Anyway, getting back to the original point, its pretty hollow when CCP talks about their fight against evil RMT as if its some scourge of the EVE galaxy, damaging gameplay and game economy, when they themselves are probably the largest perpetrator of RMT and are really just fighting to corner the market.

[Teckos_Pech]

@Andrian_Dallocort

Of course CCP creates ways to farm ISK which is then used to buy the PLEX that they sell via RMT.

Sure…but would you rather this not be the case? There is a pretty basic accounting identity out there called the equation of exchange (should probably the exchange identity, but oh well).

The equation is,

MxV = PxQ.

M is money,
V is velocity (how quickly the money changes hands),
P is the price level.
Q is quantity.

So, if players build more stuff over time then either M or V has to increase or P has to go down to maintain the equality. If the money supply is fixed–i.e. no more new ISK via ratting. Then that leaves V and P. Now it is possible that players could spend their ISK faster and faster, but that will likely cap out. So that leaves P. In other words deflation. But once deflation gets “big enough” we’ll likely see a drop in V too. Why? Because deflation means you are earning interest by not spending your ISK. If the rate of deflation is 10% per day, then by not spending today I have 10% more purchasing power tomorrow. Eventually this will lead to a slow down in Q too. That is, the economy will eventually collapse.

High inflation or high deflation are very bad for economies. Both virtual and real.

So CCP has put in place a mechanism to let the money supply grow. Now they have to be careful with various changes that the growth in the money supply does not exceed the growth in the real economy by too much, or that it drops too far below the growth in the real economy.

And the growth rate of the money supply is based on players trading time for ISK. Where bots are a problem is that they reduce the time cost side of that process. That is a player is going to rat until,

MC(player) = MB.

MC(player) is the marginal cost of ratting.
MB is the marginal benefit of ratting.

But a bot is such that the MC(bot) << MC(player). That is the player that bots will rat alot more and thus we’ll get a higher growth rate in the ISK supply unless botting is dealt with at least to some degree. Hunting and banning bots pushes that marginal cost back up and moves us back to a healthier growth rate in the ISK supply.

And a player that bots and RMTs is even worse in that the marginal benefit for the botting RMT player is higher than the player who bots for his own wallet and also the player(s) who does not bot at all. Thus, distorting the ISK growth even further.

Now, is PLEX RMT? Sure. But it is not like the above. If I buy a PLEX and trade it for ISK, that ISK still has to come from a player who faces the above trade offs in regards to his time and the benefits. There is no real added bonus to rat more in aggregate. Because without PLEX how would I make ISK? Well…ratting is one way. So if I am using PLEX so I don’t have to rat and another player is ratting to buy my PLEX it is far from clear that there is a net increase in ratting and thus ISK generation.

In other words, drawing an equivalency between CCP’s “RMT” and botting RMT is a false equivalency, IMO.

[Linus_Gorp]

Market bots at work… Can’t get more obvious than that, now can it?

[Andrian_Dallocort]

@Teckos_Pech

@Andrian_Dallocort

Of course CCP creates ways to farm ISK which is then used to buy the PLEX that they sell via RMT.

Sure…but would you rather this not be the case? There is a pretty basic accounting identity out there called the equation of exchange (should probably the exchange identity, but oh well).

The equation is,

MxV = PxQ.

M is money,
V is velocity (how quickly the money changes hands),
P is the price level.
Q is quantity.

So, if players build more stuff over time then either M or V has to increase or P has to go down to maintain the equality. If the money supply is fixed–i.e. no more new ISK via ratting. Then that leaves V and P. Now it is possible that players could spend their ISK faster and faster, but that will likely cap out. So that leaves P. In other words deflation. But once deflation gets “big enough” we’ll likely see a drop in V too. Why? Because deflation means you are earning interest by not spending your ISK. If the rate of deflation is 10% per day, then by not spending today I have 10% more purchasing power tomorrow. Eventually this will lead to a slow down in Q too. That is, the economy will eventually collapse.

High inflation or high deflation are very bad for economies. Both virtual and real.

So CCP has put in place a mechanism to let the money supply grow. Now they have to be careful with various changes that the growth in the money supply does not exceed the growth in the real economy by too much, or that it drops too far below the growth in the real economy.

And the growth rate of the money supply is based on players trading time for ISK. Where bots are a problem is that they reduce the time cost side of that process. That is a player is going to rat until,

MC(player) = MB.

MC(player) is the marginal cost of ratting.
MB is the marginal benefit of ratting.

But a bot is such that the MC(bot) << MC(player). That is the player that bots will rat alot more and thus we’ll get a higher growth rate in the ISK supply unless botting is dealt with at least to some degree. Hunting and banning bots pushes that marginal cost back up and moves us back to a healthier growth rate in the ISK supply.

And a player that bots and RMTs is even worse in that the marginal benefit for the botting RMT player is higher than the player who bots for his own wallet and also the player(s) who does not bot at all. Thus, distorting the ISK growth even further.

Now, is PLEX RMT? Sure. But it is not like the above. If I buy a PLEX and trade it for ISK, that ISK still has to come from a player who faces the above trade offs in regards to his time and the benefits. There is no real added bonus to rat more in aggregate. Because without PLEX how would I make ISK? Well…ratting is one way. So if I am using PLEX so I don’t have to rat and another player is ratting to buy my PLEX it is far from clear that there is a net increase in ratting and thus ISK generation.

In other words, drawing an equivalency between CCP’s “RMT” and botting RMT is a false equivalency, IMO.

Did someone just complete an econ 101 course?

I’m less concerned with whether CCP’s RMT activities will damage the EVE economy but this is an interesting and debatable topic. The main reason for my negative reaction is the various statements made by CCP about RMT such as calling it “nefarious activity” and the people who do it are “scumbags” who “harm the economy of New Eden”. These are direct quotes from CCP’s security update and from my perspective they are hypocritical considering CCP’s own RMT activity.

CCP should either stop their own RMT if they really think its wrong/bad for the game or they should stop with their moralistic statements against it and just admit they plan to enforce a monopoly on RMT as best they can in order to make a profit, hence nobody else is allowed to do it per the EULA and they will ban any competitor they catch in the act. Either of these approaches would be legit.

[Teckos_Pech]

@Andrian_Dallocort

Did someone just complete an econ 101 course?

No, I took Econ 101 over 25 years ago…before graduate school and going on to work as an economist.

@Andrian_Dallocort

I’m less concerned with whether CCP’s RMT activities will damage the EVE economy but this is an interesting and debatable topic. The main reason for my negative reaction is the various statements made by CCP about RMT such as calling it “nefarious activity” and the people who do it are “scumbags” who “harm the economy of New Eden”. These are direct quotes from CCP’s security update and from my perspective they are hypocritical considering CCP’s own RMT activity.

I think that noting that RMT is possibly the worst in terms of its effect on the game is both reasonable and fair. Again CCP has managed to introduce some RMT but not in a way that will automatically lead to a destabilized economy.

@Andrian_Dallocort

CCP should either stop their own RMT if they really think its wrong/bad for the game or they should stop with their moralistic statements against it and just admit they plan to enforce a monopoly on RMT as best they can in order to make a profit, hence nobody else is allowed to do it per the EULA and they will ban any competitor they catch in the act. Either of these approaches would be legit.

Why? I can even advance further arguments why CCP’s PLEX is actually a good thing. A player who does not have much free time can use PLEX to get ISK and play the game when he does have free time. And the player who does have free time can trade that free time for game time. This is clearly a mutually beneficial transaction where the high-opportunity-cost-of-time-player and the low-opportunity-cost-of-time-player help each other out. Further, it can help shift the ISK distribution as well from established/older/richer (in game) players to newer/younger/poorer (in game) players. People often complain that CCP should do more to help new players…well here you go! PLEX can help the new player acquire ISK to buy skill books and ships and modules to go out and play the game without the necessity of a boring grind. And yeah, CCP may take a dim view of third party RMT because it cuts into their revenues and profits…but nobody here should be happy about that either. After all without profits CCP would not be here.

I’m just not seeing much downside to the concept of PLEX even if it is RMT.

[HotSele]

Some people play with their hands, but they are blocked until they prove otherwise. Why not give a temporary lock and give the person time to prove that he does not use bots and macros?

Some difficult questions can be solved with the help of different points of view of a couple of GM masters. As an example, CCP tell. my pilots are not mine, and even citing the example of when and to whom I wrote, what was spent and what did not was the proof. This issue is not regulated by CCP

[Arthur_Aihaken]

What a ■■■■■■■ joke.