MMORPG Farming: Pro, Con, or Neutral?

[shoujoaifan]

I think we all need to take a break from the usual, bitter war over how much Nintendo/Sony/Microsoft currently-sucks/next-generation-will-suck, and discuss something a little more relaxing.....ethics and controversial practices in MMORPG's that is! ;)

Anyhow, where do you stand on this? Pro? Con? Or do you think its harmless in the grand scheme of things? (I'll post my thoughts on this later, I don't want to start this off on the wrong foot with the first post featuring my ramblings.)

[sdp]

there is nothing wrong with them, if people want to get obsessed with them then let them.

the thing that scares me away from them is after the 50$ investment having to pay monthly.

[mookie75]

I think we all need to take a break from the usual, bitter war over how much Nintendo/Sony/Microsoft currently-sucks/next-generation-will-suck, and discuss something a little more relaxing.....ethics and controversial practices in MMORPG's that is! ;)

Anyhow, where do you stand on this? Pro? Con? Or do you think its harmless in the grand scheme of things? (I'll post my thoughts on this later, I don't want to start this off on the wrong foot with the first post featuring my ramblings.)I'm not entirely sure what you're asking. If you're talking about the actions of people within the various MMORPGs, then I can admit that there are some things that irritate me over in Final Fantasy XI. I know many people complain about the people that sell gil (the name for the money in that particular game) over the net for real money. These "gilsellers" are often the same people who constantly camp the sites where rare monsters that drop valuable items appear. I can't say that I'm affected too much by that practice since I don't go after the rare monsters very often.

I DO get irritated while I'm doing things like mining ores though. In FFXI there are only a few areas where you can mine things. You basically run around to various spots in the zone where "mining points" randomly appear. If a point is there, you can go at it for a random number of attempts with pickaxes (I've had it range from 1 time to over a dozen). Well, as you can imagine, wandering back and forth in a mine looking for mining points isn't the most exciting thing in the world. Most people don't even bother, but I sell the rare and valuable ores and use the rest for crafting items. Anyway, what irritates ME is when I find a mining point, start picking at it, and then someone else (usually a gilseller), comes up behind me and ALSO starts picking at it. Maybe it's just me, but that seems so incredibly rude. I never do that to people....with the exception of people that repeatedly do it to me. :evil: How do I know the offenders are gilsellers? Well, I can't know for sure....but they are ALWAYS in the mine....and I mean ALWAYS....practically 24/7. I'm assuming they're bot programs since I can't imagine a human being having that kind of attention span. lol

Anyway, that's the biggest irritation for me at the moment. I hope that's the kind of answer you're looking for....otherwise I ranted for nothing. :sweat:

[ZeroFate]

I absolutely hate gold farmers. For one thing they kinda ruin the World of Warcraft experience. If you end up getting a farmer in one of your groups, you're pretty much not gonna finish that instance. Usually the gold farmers on my server are Chinese and don't know a hint of english besides "LOL" and "ok my friend".

A friend of mines even got his account stolen by a gold farmer a few weeks ago. We still have NO idea how they managed to steal his account but he was able to get it back after a few days. All of his items and money were sold (hours of work GONE) but he was just glad he got his lvl 60 back.

[Ben]

Actually this is turning into something of an international trade issue over here involving, who else, China. To wit:

http://joongangdaily.joins.com/200509/27/200509272233455579900090409041.html

September 28, 2005 ㅡ Every era has its own entrepreneurs and its share of shady characters, but the Internet age has spawned some surprising ways of making a quick buck.
The National Police Agency said yesterday that it had questioned 50 people and asked for arrest warrants for nine of them as part of a wide-ranging international plot to obtain and sell ― icons on a computer monitor that are used in playing a fantasy role-playing game on the Internet.
The police were not amused. They said that 60.5 billion won in revenue from the venture had been illegally transferred to China over the past two and a half years. That's $58.7 million, and not in "virtual cash."
The business scheme revolved around a popular online, multiplayer game called Lineage. Police said the group recruited thousands of Chinese online game players into the scheme after setting up 120,000 membership accounts in Korea using stolen Korean national registration numbers.
Game players can use both skill and luck to acquire weapons or other items that help them navigate the Lineage landscape, and those items can be transferred to other players. Some dedicated players are willing to pay, in hard cash, to acquire them.
The recruited Chinese players then joined the game through Korean servers, spending long hours online every day for wages of about 80,000 won per month. As their virtual possessions increased, they occasionally stumbled across a rare item worth a lot of real cash.
Agents in China got commissions of 5 to 10 percent on the sale of items found by game players they oversaw. In Korea, police said, the group had total sales of over 100 billion won to Korean gamers.
The affair gives a new wrinkle to complaints about "cheap Chinese labor," police said, adding that this was not the only instance of such activities they were looking into. They said the market for online game "equipment" was worth about a trillion won a year in Korea.
Police added that Interpol had been given the names of Chinese suspects. They added that they were still not sure how so many players in China were able to log on to Korean servers, which are programmed to accept only Korean Internet addresses.


by Kim Seung-hyun, Wohn Dong-hee <wohn@joongang.co.kr>

[mookie75]

Actually this is turning into something of an international trade issue over here involving, who else, China. To wit:
http://joongangdaily.joins.com/2005...0090409041.html (http://joongangdaily.joins.com/200509/27/200509272233455579900090409041.html)

September 28, 2005 ㅡ Every era has its own entrepreneurs and its share of shady characters, but the Internet age has spawned some surprising ways of making a quick buck.
The National Police Agency said yesterday that it had questioned 50 people and asked for arrest warrants for nine of them as part of a wide-ranging international plot to obtain and sell ― icons on a computer monitor that are used in playing a fantasy role-playing game on the Internet.
The police were not amused. They said that 60.5 billion won in revenue from the venture had been illegally transferred to China over the past two and a half years. That's $58.7 million, and not in "virtual cash."
The business scheme revolved around a popular online, multiplayer game called Lineage. Police said the group recruited thousands of Chinese online game players into the scheme after setting up 120,000 membership accounts in Korea using stolen Korean national registration numbers.
Game players can use both skill and luck to acquire weapons or other items that help them navigate the Lineage landscape, and those items can be transferred to other players. Some dedicated players are willing to pay, in hard cash, to acquire them.
The recruited Chinese players then joined the game through Korean servers, spending long hours online every day for wages of about 80,000 won per month. As their virtual possessions increased, they occasionally stumbled across a rare item worth a lot of real cash.
Agents in China got commissions of 5 to 10 percent on the sale of items found by game players they oversaw. In Korea, police said, the group had total sales of over 100 billion won to Korean gamers.
The affair gives a new wrinkle to complaints about "cheap Chinese labor," police said, adding that this was not the only instance of such activities they were looking into. They said the market for online game "equipment" was worth about a trillion won a year in Korea.
Police added that Interpol had been given the names of Chinese suspects. They added that they were still not sure how so many players in China were able to log on to Korean servers, which are programmed to accept only Korean Internet addresses.


by Kim Seung-hyun, Wohn Dong-hee <wohn@joongang.co.kr>

What I find truly sad is that there are that many players that feel they have to BUY their items and money for a video game. It's just like low level characters that want some high level to waste their day standing around and "power leveling" them so they don't have to rise through the levels like the legitimate players did.

Geez, if you have to buy your in-game money and items and cheat to gain exp....then maybe you shouldn't play MMORPGs. :shrug: