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Game economy

Jack

Administrator
Staff member
To simplify (as my original post was 10,000 words).
Yes, shop items and rewards are broken. We know this. We stated before crowdfund that these would change before release.
Levelling is somewhat on the hard side, see https://community.projecttorque.racing/threads/levelling-changes.87/#post-642

Race rewards, shop and levelling all tie into the economy of the game.

The issue people are having atm is that shop items cost too much as race payout is too little.

The race payout has not changed since early PT builds but some of the prices have. And at the current state, the shop is broken.
Car upgrades should not cost 4x the cost of the car.


My proposal is so.

Take the Class 1 stock cars for example.
They are 8,000 RP each low tier car.
We increase them to 20,000 RP.
Upgrades (28 in total) total the same cost as the car.
This means, a fully upgraded Class 1 car will cost 40,000 RP total.
Your first car is free. So the total cost, to get it upgraded is 20,000 RP.

We are estimating that 1 hour of race time gets you around 6,000-7,000 RP (based off Arcade racing finishing 3rd).
So you are looking at 3 hours to fully upgrade your first car.

Upgrade to class 2.

Hexan GT, current price is 16,000 RP.
We double it, 32,000 RP.
To buy this car, that is 5 hours of race time. Total time spent in Class 1 is 8 hours.
To upgrade to max, that is another 32,000 RP which is around 5 hours while in Class 2.

Total race time in game is 13 hours, you have Class 1 and Class 2 car fully upgraded.
You should be around level 16 by now.
In total, you have spent 84,000 RP on cars and upgrades.

This ignores any cosmetics. Obviously you love the game and will use GP on cosmetics. WONT YOU....

Later cars do cost more. Some of the class 8 cars are in the 200,000-250,000 range.
But you should see an XP/RP increase when playing at higher levels. So this change is no so


Another thing is Class unlocks. Should a level 15 have access to a car with a class of 4? Should a level 20 get class 5?
I think these need to stagger more especially as the current level curve, and even my suggested changes to said level curve, result in players once they reach level 20, very quickly unlock car from class 4 to class 5.

Beta has been online for a week and a half and already people are in the level 30s
I think class 3 should unlock at level 20, class 4 at 24, class 5 at 26 etc.
This does not include certain cars such as the drift cars, these should be made available at the lower levels.

Thoughts?
 
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100% with you JACK, that's how it should be

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I think class unlocks should be spread more evenly across an XP range, not a level range. Going from level 39 to 40 is like going from 0 to 35 if I recall. It's nutso. But other than that, I love the ideas here.
 
the upgrades cost too much and the way you though of it is fine for me...upgrades are really expensive atm. I've played the Beta a bit and I'm lvl 20 with almost maxed Corus (missing body 4) and the Cobra (stock for now). Now that I have the Cobra I realized how hard it to max it...also atm is damn hard to get decent RP without server bonus...you might say there is DW but I'm not that type of player ;) we should keep it more linear

Level 1-10 unlock class 1 cars
10-15 unlock class 2
15-20 unlock class 3
20-25 class 4
25-30 class 5
30-35 class 6
35-40 class 7 and so on

now the XP needed to lvl should be, as I said above, more linear...1568852101181.png
 
works for me. the comparison of time in vs payout are a bit obtuse though. i was on for an hour tonite and quit. 3 people in a sim room with 4 and 5 class cars....i DNF every race. next room is 3 ppl playing drift and wait on cork...all with drift cars and ghost off. NO t/a rooms at all. no racing rooms with lower level cars either. 2000 rp maybe in over an hour. i know this will be better in open beta, and i cant wait to have those rewards i donated 100 bones for! its back, and thats all i really care about. i havent been grinding 24/7 like these guys so i cant afford a cobra or drift car...its all good. im 43, own a home, and work full time, so there is no universe where i can out-hour any of these guys XD

ps i did try to get a race room going with lower level cars, but it never got off the ground.
 
The only mode worth grinding for me atm is D&W Cork. I'd love to see all modes have similar payouts, so one could feel comfortable trying any mode and not feel like time wasted or the mode is not worth playing. The upgrades for the cobra for instance are expensive yes. I'm at full stage 2 on cobra, level 20, while d1 hexen, c-racer, lion are all stock and the only cars I have and I'm at no RP again.
 
There's things like Cops n Robbers that people would love to play in Explorer mode but the payout for the time spent is not worth it. We've attempted tricks/jumps explorer room and the only thing that pays is pickups and Mass bonus. To have fun the mode is great and versatile but horrible payout so no one wants to play it unless its strictly a match or two for fun.

I remember playing with my mom like 15 hrs straight of explorer from tricks to CNR, long jumps w/items, tag etc. on HO and it was great and paid well. I don't have that time on my hands anymore with 3 kids, work etc but I feel it should have a time or mileage element for payout equal to other modes for the same time spent.

It probably would make sense for it to be mileage since the faster the car and higher level you will be, the bigger the payout according to the distance traveled in the same time frame.
 
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I did a test in Sim for 1 hour (I can't stand Arcade). I will assume that Arcade is faster. This was also in a room of 2 people (rank bonus of 10%). The RP/hour I got would be the same as getting 7th in an 8 player room for an hour. So it's on the lower end of the RP gain rate for Versus modes without drifting. I managed to get 7200 RP in 1 hour in Sim Versus with a Class 5 car. I estimate it would have been about 9000-9500 in Arcade with 8 person rooms. I did 13 completely unique tracks.

Start RP: 24373
Bought Balancer (-3800): 20573
End RP: 27792

The individual race payouts for the 13 unique races were: 680, 774, 547, 406, 427, 481, 596, 267, 687, 998, 508, 436, and 412

Longer races would increase the pay rate due to reduced time spent in the lobby and loading screen.
 
honestly I like it, I think it needs a bit more polishing and you need to take into account the body mods that you haven't factored in but its a good starting point. Yeah CYX compare that to a 5 min drift and wait on cork were you can get 1+k without boosters and in last place.
 
I think this is a very important change, and I like the idea. I'm not a teenager anymore, I work full time, I maintain a social life, and I have a relationship, I don't have time in my life to be playing a game endlessly for virtual items, nor will I let that happen. As far as I see it, games need to cater to me and my precious time, not the other way around. I don't buy into the "limited time" predatory sales, or endless grinds for pixelated products. If a game doesn't offer a good balance between working for an item, and receiving said item, I just don't play it. I have a feeling many players that backed PT feel the same way, just because project torque came to an end didn't mean we did, I'm all for it Jack. If a car's upgrades cost the price of the car I feel that's a good balance. I think in lower levels you'll feel as if you're actually making progression and be happy that you can reasonably take a stock car and make it fast, and a good balance for end game content that you do need to spend some quality time earning cash to upgrade an expensive car. Also, in game item malls should always, in my opinion, be cosmetic only. I like spending my cash on things I DON'T need, not things I DO need. This, in my opinion, has been the downfall of EVERY competing racing MMORPG that was online at the same time PT originally was, and many more MMO'S in general regardless of genre. Forcing players to pay to stay competitive is a garbage, predatory, and flat out dishonest strategy in my opinion. If you have to pay money to stay competitive at ANY game, it's not worth playing, imo. Make the changes, we have a shot at a proper, fun, balanced PT here, I'm with you on this one.
 
Thoughts?

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You do this and half of the player base won't return ever again. They won't even bother telling you this, they'll just leave.
Clearly it's useless for us to give you ideas, since you do exactly the same as Invictus - doing whatever you want. So I give up throwing in ideas. I'll just let you kill the game the same way Invictus did it.
 
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You do this and half of the player base won't return ever again. They won't even bother telling you this, they'll just leave.
Clearly it's useless for us to give you ideas, since you do exactly the same as Invictus - doing whatever you want. So I give up throwing in ideas. I'll just let you kill the game the same way Invictus did it.
if that makes you half of the players ;)
 
I think the reasoning for car prices vs cost of non-cosmetic upgrades is very fair and gets a thumbs up from me. As for the leveling and unlocking other tiers of cars, I remember PT originally was a long grind in the beginning to get to upper classes, so it should be stretched out if we want to enjoy the game for a while.
 
I think there is already some excellent input here, but as a CTF guy myself, i’ll go ahead and say what the rest of the CTF crowd is thinking.

And that is simply, that we want balancing between game modes in terms of earning rp/xp. As is, we’re forced into VS, T/A, or Explorer, and in my experience, at the moment, VS on Wangan nets the best earnings providing you are decent enough at drafting to win somewhat frequently.

I think that needs to be fixed. As Cyx mentioned above, we shouldn’t be discouraged from playing our favorite game mode simply due to rp/xp earnings. There has already been several different ways of doing this mentioned that could potentially work. I think i speak for alot of people when i say that fixing this issue alone, would make alot of people happy.

My suggestion which was time based earnings was quickly shot down with a reasonable argument that someone in a lower class car would earn more quickly than someone in a higher class car. And while I understand where you were coming from, everyone will have lower class cars, so i’m still not sure that’s an issue. If someone chooses to use a higher class car to grind, that’s on them. Either way, the method of balancing isn’t important as long as whichever is used, it makes all game modes close in earnings/hr.

Otherwise everything else mentioned above looks good to me. I agree with there being a larger gap between unlocking class 4 and 5 cars, as i’m approaching level 22 with 80k RP handy, i find myself debating on buying the Destroyer, or just waiting a bit longer and going straight for the Spiedo. But again, i trust yours and the majority’s judgement on how to go about fixing that as well.
 
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You do this and half of the player base won't return ever again. They won't even bother telling you this, they'll just leave.
Clearly it's useless for us to give you ideas, since you do exactly the same as Invictus - doing whatever you want. So I give up throwing in ideas. I'll just let you kill the game the same way Invictus did it.
Yea, i think you’ll be surprised at just how alone you are in this thought process..
 
такой экономикой вы убьёте игру. много игроков уже не дети, чтобы играть так долго в одну из своих, когда-то любимую, игру. проще тогда вообще убрать цены на всё. чтобы всё было бесплатно. единственное оставить уровни игроков и разблокировку автомобилей по уровню игрока. но и награду за гонку увеличить втрое тогда. чтобы не пришлось месяцами сидеть и зарабатывать на повышение уровня. именно из-за плохой экономики ранее люди и использовали дыры в игре. для того чтобы быстрее заработать, либо моментально получить машину и запчасти. подймайте об этом мистер Джек. хочется ли вам чтобы снова люди ломали игру и создавали читы. эта игра не является соперником современным играм. эта игра как антиквариат. в неё пришли люди, которые когда-то были моложе и с большим запасом времени играли в неё. сейчас времени нет столько играть.
 
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