Topic: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

If you have ever played long time running mmorpgs, you know why I think that. There is always some that leave and some that want to start playing. Unfortunatly a newbie often is discouraged because he has disadvantages since he is a newbie (less equip, gear, skill levels, what ever). After some time he will either decide to quit because of that or get along with it. The ones that quit could be kept if they are allowed to buy old accounts from quitters.

I see nothing bad about that.

If the dev team created some mechanics to trade chars on the website, there might even be some that buy another account laterwards to have a mining alt or sth like that. You would need to have the choice to change pilot name and start fresh in a starter corp in your biography.

Note: Having to start with a new char in a long running game like PO or EVE is a reason lots of people I know don't join playing later on.

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Has any game ever permitted this?

Although I don't think it's in their best interests to actively police this the same way they should RMT.

They could offer a character transfer option as a "legal" way to transfer vet characters.

"...playing a game is the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles."
Bernard Suits, 1978

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

after reading OP, the first thing that comes to mind that could be exploited is that a Vet character being transferred to new account that has not had it 20k EP spent.....

Think about it!!!!!
moving chatacters could level up* the characters too much..


*could not think of a appropriate term to explain this....

I Currently am the author of Perpetuum Fitting Tool - Continued..
EVE - bigsteve

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

The biggest reason companies don't support account selling is the exposure to fraud.

If your account gets hacked and 'sold' to someone else, there's no way for you to prove it wasn't a valid transfer. If there was, than the seller could make a valid sale, but than claim the account was hacked to get it back.

In any case, there is a LOT Of account management overhead that the company has to deal with, but it is not even in their best financial interest to support it, even if they get a % of the sale.

First, the game has to be successful and desirable for the selling of accounts to even make sense, so we have to make the assumption that new players are already coming in and the game is solid.

When an account is sold, the 'opportunity' costs are the continued payements of the existing account, which they would keep current for EP gain, plus the cost of the new account.

Game companies want to make it difficult for players to leave the game, they work hard at getting people to get invested in a game. Being able to buy an account cheapens the game experience, and removes the heavy investment that was made to generate an account worth buying.

Offically, they have to disallow it, for many reasons. This is also a reason why they don't allow you to change the email address, which would promote account selling, which is not in their best interest.

If they made it 'legal' I would probably sell mine though. But it wouldn't be worth it for me to break the EULA and get banned or risk getting scammed.

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

RMT account trading damages a game on many levels.

Trading accounts is a possible future feature, but it is not in focus at the moment.

6 (edited by Mara Kaid 2011-03-02 20:33:25)

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Generally people who buy the accounts have no idea what their char can do, and their points are quite a waste.

Making them use what they have from the beginning of the game to learn the ropes, and the meaning of their skills gives them a fundamental understanding of mechanics they wouldn't learn via buying.

This kind of undermines the idea of waiting to get your skills when you can simply grind nic, or grind cash to get it. If it were allowed. It also gives alliances on rich islands the ability to go even further then the mechanics allowed them.

Frankly I'm rather surprised alliances that control islands, have population, need something like this to get their members ahead another step. It's very shameful, and only hurts the game more.

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

I think the solution to limiting this - you can never eradicate it entirely - is for the devs maintain an EP power plateau that doesn't take a new player (or account) any longer than about two months to reach. And future skills added to the game should relate to new modules, new roles or new bot types rather than enhancing current fits.

"...playing a game is the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles."
Bernard Suits, 1978

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Campana wrote:

Has any game ever permitted this?

Although I don't think it's in their best interests to actively police this the same way they should RMT.

They could offer a character transfer option as a "legal" way to transfer vet characters.

Yes there have been games that have done this and still do this currently.

The Enclave - A mature, friendly, and cooperative corporation.

9 (edited by Liveware Problem 2011-03-03 14:25:34)

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Mara Kaid wrote:

Frankly I'm rather surprised alliances that control islands, have population, need something like this to get their members ahead another step. It's very shameful, and only hurts the game more.

Oh please. Leave your bleeding wound at the door in this thread that's not what he was asking for and you know it.  CIR does'nt need help clearing the island of scrub guilds, I would have thought you'd learnt that the hard way. 

The question he was asking was  basically how do new players compete against veterans.  Would a  transfer service make that more viable and encourage them to stay.

10 (edited by Mara Kaid 2011-03-03 16:25:45)

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Leave the politics at the door thanks.

My point is that being on beta will give people easier access to buy accounts via nic. That is a true statement. I know that disturbs you. I also doubt the game was intended to be that way. Why make a mechanic that makes people wait for skilling, when you can get on beta via a zerg recruitment ( ie join a beta island zerg guild ), and make huge amounts of money then buy a char?

11 (edited by Predator Nova 2011-03-04 13:23:44)

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Mara Kaid wrote:

Leave the politics at the door thanks.

That's rich coming from someone who insists on spouting their crouching tiger hidden failsauce ninja pirate *** on every occasion, it's like your record is broken. See your earlier post in this very same thread.

Anyway character selling should only be allowed for NIC not any real world currencies imo. Then it's completely fine.

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Let me explain my initial statement a bit:

I don't talk about buying with NIC, I talk about buying with real life currency. Only that makes sense for late starters.

Another way I could see and is probably more suited, would be buying EP packages from the publisher. Like pay 10€ get one months EP, pay 50€ get 5 months EP.

First off, since you can reset your account the first few weeks, you should be able to keep the extra EP as well and as such don't suffer from bad distribution.
Second if you join the game later on and have friends already playing (which more often is the case), you learn from them how to distribute EP best for your chosen role.
Third, the publisher can limit EP buying to an certain amount, let's say not more than the 80% of the longest playing active account or sth like that. Which gives long time veterans a very limited edge over newcomers but also keeps people from buying enough EP to instantly have everything at 10.

13 (edited by Zorac 2011-03-08 02:01:17)

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

I will quit this game the day you are allowed to buy EP with rl money.

Former CEO of X-23

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Zorac wrote:

I will quit this game the day you are allowed to buy EP with rl money.

If that is the only day you will quit, you are in for the long haul.

Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Zorac wrote:

I will quit this game the day you are allowed to buy EP with rl money.

Seconded. RL money already has an impact in terms of people who can afford to run many multiple accounts ( I may recall incorrectly but someone mentioned they had 12 accounts somewhere?) and this can skew things.

I liked the EVE model, I was one of those with lots of accounts early on (too much money not enough brain) and when it became a legal, safe exercise I got rid of some no longer played with chars. How it could be implemented here is for the devs to decide.

"like Kalsius, a shameless carebear and jitalover" - Syndic
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Re: I think account selling should be allowed and even supported

Account trading will probably happen “under the table”, until there is some or other “official” mechanism that permits one to reach similar ends.

I understand why this isn’t a priority currently for the Devs.

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