A question of ethics in MMORPGs

[Kasreyn]

...have every item in a MMORPG have some kind of built-in factor where it degrades over time. For instance, every 10th time Halbu repairs that rare Exec for you, it loses 1 max durability, and 1 off its min and max damages (thus a 100-150 damage sword would become 99-149). Armor might lose DR over time in addition to durability; shields might slowly lose blocking % chance (if they only lose DR, no one will care anyway). This is realistic (though that's not necessarily a good in a fantasy setting), but most importantly, it helps create a steady demand for new items. Eventually, you'd have to go back into the market for a replacement, but if you were wise, you'd keep an eye out for replacements LONG before the situation with your old one becomes intolerable. Thus, you'd never just plain ignore the market.

As it is, people can get their "dream gear" and then they have nothing to ever spend money on again. My Barb (v1.03 Open) has about 600k in gold sitting around, which he can't even spend. Gamble? All his equipment are rare / magical exceptionals or else the uniques he wants; he's almost guaranteed to get garbage by comparison. SoJ hunt? Can't, he's wearing one. His repair costs aren't too high by comparison with the amount of money he can rake in doing Hell Plains of Despair.

But, if that nice sword he has slowly wears down and finally breaks (or the damage just gets too low to be worthwhile), I've got something to spend money on again! I might actually have a REASON to go to a trade channel (aside from laziness, i.e. "I'd rather not do the gambles necessary to get this unique").

I see a major problem with the D1/2 economy to be this: It is possible to get exactly what you want, and then hang onto it indefinitely. After that, what further use is gold?

Goods should be made perishible. Maybe a timer on potions; they degrade in potency over time until used (they heal less life/mana/stamina as they decay). Maybe a potion that heals 100 Life would degrade by 1 point every minute until it hits some minimum value, say, 40. Maybe increase the cost of keys in NM/Hell, and set it so that there's a % chance each key might work on any given locked chest (say, 40% in Normal, 20% in NM, and 10% in Hell); thus in Hell, carrying 10 keys at all times would give an average 100% chance that ONE of them would work). It's always seemed silly to me that Gheed just HAPPENS to have keys for all these chests out in the wilderness...

There are lots of things that can be done, there just needs to be an MMORPG creator with the guts to defy what the weenie players want and DO it, to make a quality game with an actual working in-game economy.

-Kasreyn