12 Nov, 2011, arholly wrote in the 1st comment:
Votes: 0
Hello:
This is not a problem (well it is), as much as a question. Has anyone developed a stock market system where the stock market does not constantly go upward without ever doing any self-correction? We have a stock market code, but without any other influence, it just continues to go up and up.

Just wondering.
12 Nov, 2011, Runter wrote in the 2nd comment:
Votes: 0
I had a long post typed up about stock markets and what self-correction is really, but I lost it so I'm just going to sum up my point quickly.

If you want a stock market to work you need to deal in real trades with real people. You can't artificially make prices go up and go down. The notion of self-correction is that people realize now what they missed before. Such that stock X is worth more (or less) than its current trading value, or that the future outlook is good. The corollary to this is that people currently holding the stock must disagree. They must believe that the stock is worth less or the outlook is bad. Otherwise they wouldn't have sold it at that price. To figure out the value of a stock you must figure out trends on real *public* trades. It's not as easy as it sounds, and manipulation is a big issue. You have to use algorithms that determine unique trades vs trust trades. Unique trades vs ping pongs. And weights have to be assigned to these factors. Ultimately your reported value for the stock shouldn't actually matter. I.e. if your system says my stock is worth 10 coins and I decide to sell I should need to find a buyer for 10 coins before I can collect. Otherwise your system has a fundamental flaw. That stock can be traded without buyers of the stock. That last point is important, because there's no way for your stock market to continually go up and up if people aren't willing to pay for the stock.
12 Nov, 2011, Scandum wrote in the 3rd comment:
Votes: 0
You can introduce a limited money supply, which in theory should balance out the stock market. If you have money sinks you need to balance the game for that as well, as well as fix the money supply when a player is created or deleted.

Next you can introduce a voting booth in a PK area where players can vote whether they want to redistribute the wealth or not. Rich players are likely to hire poor players to kill any Marxist that comes near the booth.
12 Nov, 2011, Runter wrote in the 4th comment:
Votes: 0
Also you shouldn't confuse inflation with a continual increase in the value of a stock. If a stock goes up annually at 1% but inflation is 3% you're still losing value on the stock continually. Yet the price on paper has went up. Virtual worlds are particularly susceptible to inflation. Because coins are created from nothing and farmed usually from some repetitive task nobody really benefits from. Like slaying frisky fidos over and over. "money sinks" are used as tools against inflation in virtual worlds. That can be repair costs, player own homes, vanity items, etc. But ultimately if coins are abundant, they becomes meaningless. Analogous to price controls is a potion in the shop may always cost 100 coins no matter what happens with inflation. But if everyone has basically an unlimited supply of coins, 100 coin cost approaches free. A solution to this problem is making prices for goods in the game based on demand rather than a static value. Make the price of things decay at a set rate hitting a floor. Like 1% per minute. Then use a formula to boost the price of the item every time it is purchased. Apply the changes after the item is restocked. Perhaps each hour. This has three purposes. First it keeps the value of items sold in shops meaningful, which is a goal. Otherwise you would have everything free in the first place. Second, it guards against cheap and low level items that are too powerful. Like a level 1 potion that even heros want to use at max level. And last of all, it acts as a natural money sink.

re scandum

Wouldn't it be more interesting if the voting was for players to redistribute the power from the staff members? That would be silly and wouldn't ever work, but I think the analogy is still apt for real-world-edgy-analogy attempt. Perhaps then you'd have staff members that just autoslay every player who approaches the voting booth? Or maybe they'd just destroy the voting booth completely, if they're competent enough to change the code. Then again, maybe if they aren't competent enough 'viva la revolucion' was in order after all.
0.0/4