Can we unanimously lower credit sale prices?

@ Maple, I see that you're not willing to be open-minded. It's obvious that you consider what I am saying as an attack because you're one of the wealthier players. You completely ignored what I am saying and missed the entire point. I am not going to discuss this with you further as there's no point in this.


@ Forgottenland, exactly. As long as people can afford it, we will never be able to tackle credit inflation. Adding any kind of hard or soft cap to credit sales will only create more problems because players will use forums and the marketplace instead. If we ban credit sales on the forum and marketplace, we will just create an unregulated black market situation where there's more risk of players getting scammed or whatever because the players will have to use PM/transfer opinion to exchange. With transfer opinion, players can easily receive money and refuse sent credit in return. Vice versa.

TBH, I do not have a high hope that credit inflation will be solved. Sure, we will be slapping a bandaid solution temporarily but it will become useless in a short time just like all other bandaid solutions EV had done in the past.

I am just grateful that there are many kind players who are willing to sell credits for a reasonable price when they could've refused to. They are truly great people. To the poorer players, do not give up. It's not impossible for you to get credits at a more affordable price. It is possible as I've successfully bought 50+ credits at 60k - 80k in a year.

Last edited on 2023-03-26 at 18:06:20 by Lucia

@Lucia  -  You're getting a bit aggressive there, and projecting I think.  Nothing Maple said came across as defensive nor dismissive to me.  Someone not agreeing with you, or not seeing a problem the way you see it doesn't make them close-minded.  But the sort of directly accusing response you made there can easily undermine the credibility of your points in people's minds if you're not careful.  Just something to be aware of.  People often accept or reject a perspective based more on the attitude of the person saying it than on the actual points being made.

Now, as someone who has also been playing for years, is one of those "Rich" players talked about, and who has never sold art nor credits to get to that point, but earned it through strategic gameplay over years of work, I too have to ask what the problem is of players having a lot of EVD? 

As a longtime player, playing before the recode when EVD was harder to earn, I remember 50k per credit being super normal.  I have a personal maximum I'll pay for credits based on my experience and expectations. I do not like to post a lot, so I mostly prefer using the credit sales rather than searching the forums for a seller, and personally have not had that much luck using the forums when seeking to buy anyway.  I have not, that I recall, ever purchased a credit at $300k or more, nor do I ever have any intention to do so.  (Personally, I do not think $200k is unreasonable based on how quickly funds can be acquired and the price of a few items I've routinely tracked, as compared to similar pre-recode values.)  Just because "rich" players CAN buy it at high prices does not mean that they WILL, or that they are the ones specifically causing the problem.  Actually, I would assume the richer players would have better resource management practices from years of experience and so keep on top of their credit amounts to where they don't need to buy the overpriced ones.  But that might also be my own bias coming across, as I seek and plan for things like this fairly thoroughly.  I imagine anyone who needs a credit quickly, because they're running out of something they need to maintain their standard of playing, such as Deluxe, will pay whatever price they need to if they can, regardless of how much else they have.  As the saying goes, desperate times call for desperate measures.    Yes, spending $500k when you have $50 million is much less stressful than spending $500k when you only have $1 million, but if you really need that one last credit, you'd still spend it to keep playing how you want.

I'm also not sure what you're proposing about players with $50 million EVD or more.  Are you saying an account should be actively blocked from earning, obtaining, or holding more than $50 million EVD at any point?  That would drive a lot of people away because it puts a very large, very firm STOP in place for progress.  Once you can't earn anything anymore, why bother showing horses?  You can't sell if you can't get any more funds into your account.  It would quite literally make a "hit this point and leave the game" sort of thing.  And any cap would have that impact.  No matter how high a cap might be, it would have the same effect and someone would always reach it eventually.  If you're not saying that, then what are you trying to suggest?  Because you seem pretty fixated that no one in the game needs that amount.  But I'd also argue that no one in the game "needs" very much EVD at all.  It depends on how you play the game.  I can get by on under 15k a day, even paying showing fees for all my horses. If I put them in riding school rather than shows, I would need only enough to feed them, which isn't that much per horse.  On the other hand, I am a number focused person and am actively trying to get to a certain amount in my bank, even if it's more than I'd actually spend.  I imagine different players with different play styles have different fund requirements and goals.  Just because you don't see the point of having that much doesn't mean that someone else can't or shouldn't be permitted to.  And just having it doesn't dictate it's use either.  I'm going to amass an EVD fortune that will be essentially out of circulation because I don't want to lose my number once I get it.  Honestly, the issue might be more the people with just shy of $50 million, rather than those over it, because they're collecting a lot in interest and may want to spend it, even on extra high priced credits, just to keep from getting locked out of that income.  Deluxe player at $49 million in the bank gets nearly $250k in interest a day.  If they buy a credit, even at $500k, every other day, they get 15 credits a month while still being able to keep collecting interest to put towards anything else.  Those over the cap lose that interest, so actually have less reason to spend frivolously than those just under it.  Because, honestly, it's hard to find something to spend $250k on every single day.  :)

Currency sinks are also very difficult to get right.  If they're too high, new/poorer players can't participate.  If they're too low, they don't do much.  It has to be something that's available all the time, always wanted but not really ever needed, and priced high enough to make an impact, but low enough to be obtainable.  Or rare and expensive enough, but also available frequently enough to be a long-term goal.  Can you think of anything that would work for this game that would meet those sort of criteria?  

Honestly, the one idea I could see working even a little to sort of "Standardize" a conversion rate between EVD and EVC would be to restructure some of the credit shop items to offer them for both their EVC price, but to add an option to purchase for an EVD price instead, thus giving a pretty clear game defined "Conversion" rate.  But even that would still be hit-or-miss.  Account activity perks, like Deluxe, auto-show, auto-care, etc should NOT have an option to purchase with EVD, because that's the primary reason people purchase credits, which fund the game itself.  But some of the items, like marking randomizer or gene tweaks could work.  Players would not be beholden to that exchange rate, of course, but they might use it as a guide for pricing credits for EVD.  And even then, there would be people not happy with whatever priced was decided on, saying it's too high or too low, so it's no perfect solution either.  I'd hesitate to even declare it a good idea, but more of a mediocre idea if nothing else works.

And please don't take these points as me being okay with the high EVC prices.  I actually don't log on much anymore because of the high cost of credits, I don't want to run out my credit-based services when I'm not able to be on for very long any given day.  I won't pay the over inflated prices, I'd rather just not play for a bit than to pay that much.  If they went back to under $200k each, I'd go back to playing every day.  Sadly, even as a "Rich" player, this is all I can do about the price of EVC.  (Progressing today was actually an accident, I'm trying to make the most of it while I'm on.)  I agree that it's awesome there are still some people out there willing and able to sell credits for a much more achievable price rather than maximizing profit from it.  I also don't blame sellers who do try to maximize their profit because that's how they play the game.  I wish there was more incentive to sell low, but outside of more credits available by more players to make prices more competitive, that's really just not much that's going to change too easily.

so you mean to tell everybody who’s earned their money they don’t deserve it because you don’t have as much as them? and then you mean to tell me i should have my money stolen from me because i have too much money that i….earned? (granted i have much less now because i just spent 34 million on art)

Last edited on 2023-03-27 at 21:12:53 by wey

might be off topic but imo, some currency sinks are supposed to be directed at richer players anyway since they're meant to get currency moving naturally as opposed to currency staying stagnant or being deleted. they should just be something that players can choose whether or not to splurge on like rare backgrounds or plushies or exclusive colors for tack, the hall of fame is a pretty good example of a one-time EVD sink already in the game. just things that newer and poorer players would not feel is vital to their gameplay and can even be seen as an achievement to work towards if you'd like to.
i think EVC is in a weird spot because in some ways it's a currency sink but other ways it's not. you can play the game without EVC which could make it an EVC sink, if you think about it players throwing $500k at one EVC are technically getting their money back out there and moving around the game depending on what the seller does afterwards. but it's so incredibly in demand because to lots of players, deluxe and/or auto-tools are needed for a full game experience. so it goes back to being way too exclusive in comparison to its current demand.

Really off topic but @Forgottenland I love the idea of exclusive tack colors, what about rainbow and/or shiny saddle pads and customizable brow bands :D

not trying to make a suggestion on this post, just said that as an example. i think others have made suggestions about it before though.

yeah i know, but I still like it :3

@ timbergray, if you actually read it carefully, you will realize that I don't care who is rich or not. As I stated earlier, I managed to earn 5mill in a year and most likely will have 20+mil by next year. I am already on my way to being promoted to the upper class, anyways. Therefore, eventually, any fixes to the inflation issue will impact me too. Money sinks, so far, barely making a dent. I bought Hall of Fame pretty early on and regain my money quickly. I even created a club as soon as I got my deluxe and play with it for a bit until I got bored with it and deleted the club because I can afford it. Again, it barely makes a dent. I regained the money I lost within 2 months, probably. I am running out of money sinks to use. I already got an orchard and it's saving me a lot of money because I just buy seeds once and trees live forever. Now, I get free treats from orchards and riding schools. The major money sinks I probably spent on were tack recolors, but now, I don't really do that anymore. Why? I already have all tacks I needed from my first herd. My first herd aged up and died, and the tacks returned to me so I just simply reuse them on new horses. I have a wide range of tack combinations from the first herd, so I most likely already have the right tack set in the inventory for a specific horse. Decorations are not good money sinks as there are a lot of players who aren't interested in decorating their horses. We need more money sinks with lifetime limits that are not decoration-related. 

The only reason why I am firm on $80k per credit is to give poorer players a fair chance. If I raise my price to $100k+, poorer players will see that they have to raise higher to beat me so people will sell the credits to them instead of me. They will realize that they cannot afford it and lose hope. When I first joined, there are several players who remain firm at a low price and it gave me a chance at getting the credits I needed. I am grateful for them, along with players who sold me credits for cheap, as well so I want to pay it forward to the newer players by doing the same thing. If I ever start selling credits, I will only sell them for cheap to players who need them.

My entire point is that gaining money shouldn't be happening that easily from an economic standpoint. The game is not designed to handle EVD inflation. In real life, we have taxes, rising COL, etc to ensure that the currency still holds value. Here, the price of everything except for credits remains the same while we all get richer and richer. This leads to currency holding no value to richer players because we have plenty of money and easily regain what we lost. The large class disparity essentially screwed the lower classes. We have players who start off with only 50k in their banks while we have a bunch of players with millions in their banks. If we all decided to accept 400k as a new baseline for EVC, any newer players (or any players without budgeting skills) will never be able to afford EVC unless they shelled out their IRL money. The basic players have a herd size limit due to division restrictions which means they will have lower income from their horses. It will take them a long time before they can afford to pay 400k+ per credit. This is why we have low new player retention. Only the hardheaded ones will stick around until they finally have enough money. Most new players will join and simply leave after seeing how behind they are.

There's a whole issue in the horse market as well. Since the currency no longer holds value, the horses don't have any real value as well. Therefore, players get to make up prices. When I first started, I engaged in the market and was actively purchasing and selling horses. I quickly realized that there was no clear baseline. I've seen multiple low-quality horses on sale for high prices and high-quality ones for cheap. Vice versa. The horses just simply hold no true value because there's no value in the currency. The players clearly are willing to pay more for the foundation hauls. I've seen several posts asking for foundation haul because they used up their 50 slots. In those posts, those players offer to pay extra for our slots and time. The fact that they are willing to pay the additional fee instead of simply waiting until next week tells us that foundation horses are underpriced.

The economy is a fragile thing in IRL and in-game. We can keep doing bandaid solutions but we will never solve the core problem. We can slap hard or soft caps, but as Forgottenland and I mentioned earlier, it will not fix the problem. It will only cause players to move to forums, the marketplace, and PMs.

What's the solution? There are various ways we can do this. We can increase the starter money, and increase all in-game expenses (such as horse, items, etc) to match up the current situation and ensure that everything holds value again.  We can adjust everyone's currency. We can introduce EVD caps because there's no reason for everyone to have millions in the bank with the current money sink value other than bragging rights. But, I personally don't agree with any kind of cap on EVD. I rather adjust something to control inflation somehow. We can introduce taxes. We can cut down on the daily interest even further. We can increase showing entry fees to more than $100 for higher levels to create a new recurring money sink. Along with a higher entry fee, we also can reduce the showing income a bit. While I love to earn $400+ per show on multiple occasions, it's quite high based on how often we show our horses—etc etc. IDC what steps we choose to take for the economy, but something had to be done before we do something else like credit issue. If we don't, then honestly, the admins are wasting their time on credit issues when they can focus their energy somewhere else. We can't talk about horses/studs/broods being overpriced or underpriced as there's no baseline for pricing the horse. We also can't blame private breeders for going private as horses no longer hold any true value—etc etc. 

We need to adjust everything at the same time, tho. We can't simply just adjust the amount we have without touching the in-game expenses to factor in the inflation. So everyone regained what they lost eventually because the in-game expenses are still very low compared to in-game incomes.

The poorer players need to be able to feel like they have a chance to become rich to stick around. It will help with new player retention. We always will have classes where there are richer players and poorer players. However, we need to balance things out to ensure that everything still holds true value for everyone, including the richer players. 

Last edited on 2023-03-28 at 09:41:45 by Lucia

The economy is quite a fragile thing, which is why steps moving forward are slow and methodical to ensure that they are working as intended. Changing too much at once can upset the balance which is the last thing anyone wants to do. This topic is in relation to credit sales, and not the economy as a whole. If anyone would like to continue discussing the economy as a whole, please create a suggestion topic.

Since this seems to be a touchy area for some players. Please take some time if you need and re-read comments as if they are curious and respectful in trying to come to a resolute conclusion, and respond in a similar matter. Just because someone might not agree with a suggestion, does not mean that they are agitated. I actually see a lot of open minded communication in this thread aside from a couple comments.

Some of the issues with credit sales will be adjusted, the goal is to make the credit sale area more accessible to everyone, which will pull away the need for credit sales in the forums and over pm. Kali's thoughts are a great opener as to some ideas on what we can do as a player base in the meanwhile.

A couple thoughts from a newbie who has played a few games of this type before - I don't think the root of the problem is in an overabundance of EVC. Longer / more strategic players collecting excessive amounts of standard currency is fairly typical of games like this.

From my perspective the primary issue is in the special currency itself, EVC in this game. There may be a lot of transactions happening in forums or discord or other places that I'm not seeing, but at first glance the special currency looks fairly stagnant. There are 2 ways to get it - buy with IRL money, or buy with standard currency from someone who did buy with IRL money. (If I am wrong about this and there are other ways to get it, apologies) and really only 1 way to spend it - on items or upgrades that then take the currency back out of the game.

One thing I have seen other games do is allow certain actions, on a rare occasion, to grant a reward of special currency, or encourage actions that result in more special currency being used between players on a more regular basis, but ultimately I think the more realistic 'solution' to the complaint of special currency costing so much in standard currency is to address the lack of people buying and using special currency, and injecting it into the market.

I don't yet have access to the auction house, so I don't know if horses there can be bought or sold with special currency, but it looks like to me the primary ways to get a horse, especially if you are fairly new to the game, is adopt from the rescue, or buy a new horse direct from equine center (which does have a credit use option) The horse search by sale price is kind of hidden if you are new and don't already know where to look for it.

My thoughts for encouraging more special currency in the market would be to increase the uses of special currency between players (and possibly add a mechanism that injects small amounts of currency as special rewards to player actions, maybe a new game where 1/50 or 1/100 plays statistically will win you a credit or two). One of the ways I would do that would be by making a dedicated 'location' in the town to search for horses for sale (to encourage buying and selling directly between players), and to add special currency as an option for payment, also allowing credits as a purchase option for item sales - a fully upgraded saddle with a special color could cost several thousand standard currency, or maybe a credit or two.

It would not be a fast solution, but you don't want a fast solution because that will cause new problems. But if there is more regular gameplay use of special currency, more will wind up in the internal game economy, and more in the game means the overall cost in standard currency will decrease, while also increasing the intrinsic value as you can now do more things with it.

Right now it looks to me like the special currency is in a weird limbo of being both VERY valuable, if you are trying to buy it with standard currency, and honestly kind of low value - once you have it you can use it to buy special things that only special currency can buy, but not really anything else.

So there are two uses for it - buy the special currency only items, or sell it for fast cash, with no other encouragement in the game for actions that keep the special currency active in the game market. It's a pretty linear flow into and out of the game, with only small amounts diverting into the actual game economy, and I do honestly think that increasing the use of special currency within the primary game economy, will also result in more IRL purchasing of special currency.


And it might not be popular, but adding in special decorative items like holiday themed blankets or stall decor that can be bought with special currency, or money sink events where admission is only bought with large amounts of standard currency and rewards can include limited release themed decor items and possibly small amounts of special currency(to entourage participation of players that maybe don't care about the items, but need some credits and have plenty of standard currency laying around) would also encourage more movement of special currency


(for example, maybe someone like me is fairly new to the game so I don't have the large sum of standard currency I'm willing to spend on event access, but during that event another player wins a really cool looking blanket or decoration that I REALLY want and they are selling it for 2 special currency, as an adult with a career and money to spend on games there's a pretty good chance I would be willing to spend  IRL money to get the credits to buy that really cool item, and now instead of those credits disappearing, they are in the economy and that player could use them to re-up their premium options, or buy that super fancy baby that player C has had listed on the market for credits that they have really wanted, and so on)


Anyways, yea. Just some newbie thoughts from someone who did go buy the credits and sell a few for fast cash but once I get my premium account (when I know a bit better how the game works) I'm not totally sure what I am going to spend the leftovers on since I don't have a firm enough grasp of the breeding mechanics for buy special color additions and don't care a ton about backgrounds.

@ FoxDragon, everyone will get 2 EVC per month if they progressed their account daily. In my experience, the credit market is very active behind the scene. Most buyers do not use Credit sales because it tends to be so expensive so it looks stagnant. Most buyers usually post in the "Looking For..." thread and sellers normally messaged the buyers via DM. 

Here's an example of my post: ISO Credits.
At a quick glance, it looked like an inactive thread. There are only two comments from 2022. Realistically, it's very active behind the scenes. I recently bought 10 credits privately for 80k each. Before that, I bought 50+ credits throughout the year to upgrade my account with a year of premium after my 6-month premium ran out. Most of them are via the forum thread, DMs and Marketplace.

There are a lot of transactions going on behind the scenes. Don't let the Credit Sale and seemingly inactive forum threads fool you :) 
Players also get 2 free EVCs monthly from daily progression as well. I think we also even get credit from Leisure Riding and The Foundation (very rare tho).

As of now, we cannot buy/sell horses for EVC anywhere except on Marketplace. IMO, we should fix that someday. Same for item sales, I would like to be able to sell rare items for EVC on item listings as well.

There are several stuff to use EVC for other than premium and genetic modifiers. 
It will require paying EVC to convert horses' discipline for the second time. You also will need credit to change Club's name. You also can create a custom horse with credits (it's on the very bottom of Credit Shop, right before the transfer section). Players also like to buy/sell the artwork with credits too.

Personally, I am using credits for the premium account and auto-care tool. I also use it on the Auto-Show tool, Gender Swaps, BreedAgain Solution, and Coat Modifiers occasionally. I use them often enough for me to buy credits often. Recently, I spend some EVCs on coat modifiers.

Last edited on 2023-03-30 at 10:38:29 by Lucia

Thank you for the reply, it's good to hear that things are more fluid behind the scenes, and to learn a bit more about how things work around here :)