So a bit of a deep dive on this.
1. We do not use any "Society systems" -- And for good reason. Meaning, there will be ZERO income from products that a player does not either harvest (Mining, Logging, Sap, Oil) and THEN sell to an NPC. I limit NPC purchases to only raw commodities, establishing the base rate of pay (BRP) for the economy by a function of: Raw resources Per Hour X NPC Sale Price = Base Rate of Pay..
The average for Lumberjack (Non Company) is $4.90 (Min) and $6.40 (Max) is $5.65. This is calculated by adding the two numbers together (4.90 + 6.40 = 11.30) and then dividing the sum by the number of values (2). Therefore, the average is 11.30 / 2 = 5.65. So for an hours of cutting timer, you can expect to generate an amount of $5.65 per hour at the BASE rate of pay.
NPC's buy cheap: NPC pricing for PURCAHSE (Them buying from you) sets the stage to be the lowest "Fair market value" of a resource item. For instance,
1 Hour Lumber Jack (Non Company) 4/11/2025 Banjo
80 pine logs -- .03 1.60
8 Oak Logs -- .11 .88
24 Pulp -- .02 .48
48 fibers .01 .48
24 Sticks .01 .24
16 Sap .06 .96,
1 honey 1 1
2 rubber .40 .80
Total 6.44
We can see that a single Pine Log (Easiest to get out of all base wood resources) sells for .03 cents directly to the St. Deni Lumber Co.
To the same respect, We intentionally SKIP the purchase of intermediate goods (Split wood, rough sawn wood) and then set the price for FINISHED goods and allow them to be purchased:
What this does is create a void of supply and demand, and also CAPS the market for semi-finished goods. For example, In order to make a Planed Pine Plank (Finished or T4 good) you need to:
- Split Pine Wood Log into Split Pine -- Requires investment/purchase of Log splitting Stump, and the processing time to split each log.
- Saw Split Pine into Rough Sawn Pine - Requires purchase of a Rough Cut Saw, and the processing time to saw each log.
- Plane Rough Sawn Pine into Planed Pine Plank - Requires you to work for a COMPANY (Resident of Blackwater) and own a planning table.
Buy setting the NPC sale price at X, we force players who sell the product to either MATCH, or Beat the NPC's price - Creating the margin cap for this series of goods. Unless a player is unwise with their spending; Why would the a player buy 20 boards of Planed board for more than what they can purchase it for directly from the NPC?
This logic creates the Minimum sale price, and Maximum BUY price for Base resources and Finished Goods.. Organically, we also set the margin cap for any tier of goods inbetween.
Dynamic pricing and economies --- SOOOOO... Beyond this market/margin cap that is built in --- There is not a straight forward way to automate amount of goods in circulation, and adjust NPC prices accordingly.. However... Once we are off and running, we can indeed run statistics (DataDog) to get a visual of what products are in overabundance, or lacking circulation.. That being said, we can easily modify those buy/sell prices to either cause hurt, or growth within that market. For instance, and to your point, we can modify egg "reward" rates to simulate an egg shortage, making them more scare. Though, eggs and other food ingredients will have NO NPC market... meaning if you want the effects of the best food, someone will have to source and provide those items!
For the most part, all items OUTSIDE of base resources are completely player driven... So if we take a Rolling Block rifle for example... The price on that can be super cheap if their is enough components being made and gunsmiths building them to inventory... OR, it can be extremely expensive if their is not enough components being made and gunsmiths ARE NOT inventorying them. To build a rolling block, you will need to interact with a variety of different commodity vendors/jobs, meaning you cant source it all yourself. It requires the best wood to make a stock, it requires the best damascus ingots to forge the parts, including advanced mechanism (A whole animal to craft on its own).. And THEN it requires a gunsmith with a gunsmiths toolkit and a special tool called a "Precision Tool Kit" in his possession in order to even craft it.
If you havn't got it by now.. The supply and demand for 90% of the products IN economy are all influenced by whos doing what, how much of the resource or product is in circulation, and how bad people want it. You can get 50% of the way their with base resources buy selling/purchasing from an NPC, but any high functioning item will require time to process and availability to craft!
Hope this helps.
