I guess we can agree to disagree. I am speaking from business viewpoint, since that is what I have and that is what I have taught in the past.
The fact of the matter is the cost of the goods or services provided if everyone can do gather/craft/tame it WILL be lower than if it was had a more difficult barrier of entry. It's basic supply and demand. I don't think anyone is going to try and debate that?
You can debate time, sure, but every game has time involved in it. I can't think of a MMO that didn't take "time" to do anything. "Scarcity" or resource? Look at the map, it literally tells you where the resources are (AND has a clock telling you when to come back)... in UO it was completely random at least, with the top tier having like 0.0025% chance or something ungodly low of being mined or chopped. It would literally take you weeks if not months of mining/chopping to get enough material of resources to craft with (with a grandmaster gatherer which took a lot of time to level, and time to mine the rare resources), or if you wanted to sell them, each ingot would be priced like 1500 gold per, again, because the ability to farm that material was so damn rare. That difference, btw, is what makes the price higher, because not everyone can craft the material that takes skillpoints, because not everyone has skill investment.
I made my second tier mage armor in fractured pretty quickly because all it involved was farming spiders in one area. Heck I even enchanted all 5 items or whatever, just with material I had from farming "stuff." The cloth comes from giant spiders, the crystallized magic came from the other spider, both in the same area. I am not sure what you're talking about when you speak of time or scarcity of resources in this game. The map literally lists where to go, and the resources tell you when they're going to respawn again!
Seems to me that folks are betting on people not farming basic crap in this game. Which to me, they most likely will anyway just to learn the spells from the mobs or at the very least earn KP. If you want to learn mana drain, attack spiders. Spiders in the same area drop the same crap you need to make higher end mage gear. lol. They're already there. Are players going to throw out the crafting material because they're too lazy to ride back into town to craft? If you are betting on that to increase demand, yeah... I'm not taking that bet. Are you? =P
It doesn't make sense...
At the end of day, you can discuss time, travel, harvesting, whatever, IF there was a more difficult barrier of entry, those goods/services WOULD cost more. Period.
"Selling leather armor set, 500 Gold"
"Nah I'll just spend 30 min farming, earning KP, earning abilities and craft my own. Thanks"
"Enchanting mana regeneration - 250 gold per item!"
"Yeah, I think i will just walk over the enchanter table and do it myself."
"Selling tamed horses! 50 gold!"
"Yeah I have 6 in my backpack from when I was riding to X area on the map to mine ore. I just stopped and cast a net on them. It took like 20 seconds each."
In all of these examples, because there is literally no barrier of entry, players are going to most likely say no and do it themselves. Now if there was a barrier to entry, KP, talent points, something, now the future buyer has to debate, do I want to spend all the time to gather this stuff, AND spend the points to enter that barrier, ie crafting X, OR do I want to spend gold to get leather armor, mana regen, or a horse, and press on hunting bandits or whatever.
@FibS -I never said UO or any game for that matter was inflation proof. I said that game had a more balance supply and demand, same with Albion online, and they do and they will with the current fractured game. And I am taking about classic UO, there was no insurance, try again. Also since you stated repairs, only the skilled crafters would repair, which again, created a difficult barrier of entry, and folks were able to make a career repairing items, and selling their repair deeds. Again, another example of barrier of entry driving supply and demand. Oh gee, "it takes hours to farm gold ore." "Hours" Wow mate, I'm taking about MONTHS and you're talking about hours... lol Also to note FibS- in Albion online, the T7 and T8 resources are all controlled by guilds, AND there is a barrier of entry of having the skill to MINE the ore or CUT the trees. In AO, you also have a gathering SET or armor and gathering tools to increase your chances, again because the material is so rare.
You speak of this game as a "glorified MOBA" well, that's NOT how the devs are selling this game as. LOOK AT THEIR WEBSITE. It literally talks about different careers; "Crafters and Merchants", "Farmers and Shepherds", "Miners and woodcutters."
Best,