I noticed they are putting minerals in the new raw moon stuff. They must have been worried about there being only so many miners, and everyone would switch to moons?
So what’s everyone thinking? How will the markets equalize when you have to mine the moon goo? Will CCP make it so everyone can just mine moons and supply the current demand for both minerals and goo? I doubt this is their goal, but it is probably a tough thing to balance in the beginning.
Yes, probably.
Maybe adding minerals in there gives them a price value that’s at least tied up to the mineral value? This way, you’re less likely to see raw-material that was intended to be high end go for one unit of ISK. If it’s tied up to x1,000 megacyte, then it’s price should be proportional to that. It could also give a guide as to how it was expected to be priced. Everyone now and then you see not so unusual things like pyrite being priced lower than tritanium. In today’s economy, this was become normal.
Moon mining will not affect every market, but the supply side of the Tech 2 market is the obvious target. People who are willing to band together and willing to pay out fair prices (isk/hr wages) to players participating in their mining operating will be the ones who benefit the most from this. I don’t know what fair is, but “fair” will be forced to adjust to both the cost of setting up mining operations and the demand side of the T2 market. However, nothing on the demand side of the market will change immediately.
That’s because anyone who is already doing T2 industry will have a stock pile of raw and intermediate material already in holding. The players on that side of the market will ultimately decide what happens on the demand side, and if the incoming supply doesn’t yield positive profit margins, guess what? That’s right, the T2 indy guys don’t have to build. The only things that are going to change that balance is if the supply guys decrease their price or if the end consumer (the people shopping around for a brand new T2 item) are willing to pay more.
Right now, the only people who are expected to change their business model are the moon miners. Everyone else already knows what they’re going to do. They’re just waiting for that price signal to either go up or down.