Toons for Sale?

[Mcbard]

Originally Posted by Dunes [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Hey guys,

Anyone who has noticed any trend to my posts whatsoever knows that Im a pretty upbeat, non complaining guy [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

But I ask you all to take a look a the the EC Tunnel thread and tell me what you see there. When I glanced today, 8 of the 20 non sticky auctions were for toons. This trend has grown significantly just in the last 3 months, and before long thats going to be a problem. Now, Im no economist, but something about this trend makes me uneasy.

Atleast on ther surface, this seems to be a very "unclassic" trend, but times have changed and we play our games differently these days. Personally, Im a little undecided as to whether this is a good thing (why?) or a bad thing (why?).

Without ranting or flaming, what are your thoughts on this?

Why I think it's a bad thing:
1. In an ideal world I think the more people time put into their toon the higher levels/better gear it should have. This obviously doesn't happen for a number of reasons, but in general that's what I believe, and selling toons violates this.
2. Certain characters have certain reputations the seller may know about that the buyer may not. This could perhaps cause some conflict?
3. It seems like a very disrespectful thing to do if you've been in a guild a long time and people have helped you gear up and make your toon better and you're just going to sell it.

I can't honestly think of any reasons why I would think it is a good thing, but it's mostly none of my business since I'm not the one buying/selling characters anyway. I guess it allows people who are bored with their main to switch things up and get a little plat out of it? That's the only good I see coming out of it.

[Crone]

Where is a noob going to get 50k+ for a level 50? From their main.. and if they leveled one toon up to 50, and farmed 50k plat, you don't think they will be able to play another class at least well enough to not be retarded? Maybe I give p99 players more credit than they deserve, but it's not that hard to play a toon...

[Chanus]

The problem isn't that the bought toon will be played by someone who doesn't know what they're doing.

The problem is if toon selling is the way things are, then people will only be farming plat or powerleveling toons to be sold. This results in greatly reduced opportunities for truly new players or players who are less concerned about being max-level to find other people to play with. It is a contributing factor to eliminating a viable less-than-max-level game.

[guineapig]

Originally Posted by Winobot [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Gms wouldn't. It would have to be enforced/controlled by the playerbase.

Exactly! We could at least try to control the transactions that are made on the forums being making a character name a requirement. Most of the transactions happen here anyway and anyone with nothing to hide won't mind.

There is nothing wrong with purchasing a mage to farm with in your off time because your main is permacamped in sky. Why should you keep this a secret? Why shouldn't you be allowed to know if that lvl 50 mage used to be the biggest griefer on the server 2 months ago?

That's just an example. but anyway, if the majority of the server wants to avoide the shadiness aspect of things then this would be a good first step. Have a subforum or thread in EC Tunnel for character sales and make the toon name mandatory or risk having the post deleted. End of story.

If people feel the need to circumvent that then it's more work involved for them and tough luck, nobody cares.

[korrowan]

I still have no idea why any of this matters. The majority of people playing on this server have been dedicated to EQ and likely touched upon all the classes at one time or another. This game is not rocket science.

[Yak]

To me personally I think it's ironic because EQ Classic is a hard game where you have to work for anything and nothing comes easy. The reason they are for sale is the supply and demand. People are too lazy and want that certain class now and don't want to have to go through the leveling. They think because they caped out one class and played through the game, that the game owes them something and should be able to snap there fingers and buy a toon like that. You then will argue that it does take time to eran the plat. This is true but with some classes, like Druid and Mage it is easier and still way less time to level a toon from 1-50. It also ruins the spirit of the game of being able to have a reputation. I think too that people to level a class and get bored with it feel like something should be owed to them for their time. Personally I think this is as bad if people were selling plat for real gold. What's next selling accounts on Ebay?

[Teensy Weensy]

I think the GM's have enough on their plate without dealing with all this

[Yak]

Originally Posted by Teensy Weensy [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I think the GM's have enough on their plate without dealing with all this

Agreed! However, it is up to the community to respect the classic rules and not ask or sell accounts.

[Chanus]

There's nothing the GMs really need to deal with. Trading accounts for plat isn't against the rules.

[Crone]

Originally Posted by Yak [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Agreed! However, it is up to the community to respect the classic rules and not ask or sell accounts.

Classic rules? It wasn't against classic rules to sell accounts for in game money/items. So what rule are we talking about?

Edit: Oops, guess i'm wrong per mitic. Forgot that transferring to anyone else regardless of reason was against the rules. Never saw this enforced, EVER, but I did see the selling of accounts for cash enforced.