Forgive me if I'm just tinfoiling, :tinfoil:, but this sounds an awful lot like another post requesting an extension of the charm line. Oh wait, I'm not, because this is the same thing, and grew out of that thread via asexual reproduction.
syduck:
I have a couple issues with the concept (of course). Much of this has already been outlined in the other post. But I'll play devils advocate here, as well, and point out a couple things I think are negative about this.
For one, do we really need another plat sink? We've barely had time to examine the effects of Pristine and BoE items on the market, and the changes to charms aren't exactly old hat either. The economy is, quite frankly, currently sucking on balls. The reason I can say that is because items and platinum aren't changing hands as much as they should be, and items aren't all going for the prices they maybe ought to be. Lets review the possible reasons for these issues. For one, BoE, though it may be a necessary evil, has really discouraged players from buying items. Especially items they might want to buy for alts. Another thing to think about is the fact that once a character gets into raiding, he pretty much never has to look at listsold ever again if he doesn't want to except for augs and pots. Thats something that requires some hard thinking. As for item prices, I believe a social phenomenon is at work. If player A see Yatic's Coat sell for 7k a few times, player A is damned well never paying more than 8k for it. It is very hard to get prices of non-tradeskilled goods to go up.
Allow me to pose another important question: Is money that is farmed for the express purpose of sinking into charms really part of the economy? Short answer, no. Long answer: If the player is tradeskilling and farming drops to sell on listsold, then yes, that player is affecting the economy in a positive way. If the player is buying items low and selling them high on listsold, then that player is affecting the economy but is doing so in a possibly negative way. If the player is farming cash drops to throw on his pile o platinums, then that money never enters the player economy and does not affect it whatsoever.
Personally, I think a big help to the economy would be another big "beefing up" of top-end tradeskills. Tradeskills are huge economy driving forces.
Next up: Is the answer to the economies woes really "Give a big upgrade to the top 5% of the server until they farm up another 200k?" If you ask me, thats starting on a slippery slope into the cesspool of "Live Game." If another plat sink is added to the server, it should be
consumable. Something that: A. Does not impact sales of tradeskilled goods. B. Is good enough to leech plat from the top end players, but is not SO good that it makes players in the middle or low end of the spectrum "crappy" players if they don't get it. And C. Is really expensive.
Closing thought (for now): Having your charm be customizable would be kinda neat. But then again, no other item in the game really is. You can say "lol augs," but the same augs are available for charms, and their uses by class are fairly clear cut. I can either use mana augs, or suck horribly. Hmm.
In other words, if my charm isn't very customizable, it's not a big deal.
