Economy Update!
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Economy Update!
Towards the beginning of the year, we asked everyone what updates they'd like to see come to Prism throughout the following months. One of the most popular suggestions was the Economy Update. Truthfully, the economy–which has, for the most part, been unchanged since the server's launch six months ago–was never the strongest quality Prism had to offer. The most common complaints we've heard revolve around the fact that money on the server is too easy to obtain and has little value outside of trading. That or, unless you had a shop, earning money was too much of a grind. Either way, a refresh was certainly in order!
It feels as though so much time has passed since we first announced the Economy Update; it feels crazy that it's finally here! So much time and effort have gone into this update, not just in new features but also balancing and updating existing ones. We're hoping the server will feel a lot less "grind-y" now while still adding value to the economy.
With that said, let's dive into the update. Oh, and grab a snack because this might be a long read!
- When we first announced the Economy Update, we created a poll and gathered feedback from the community. By far, the most popular suggestion was that of an auction plugin. Well, I have good news because now we've got one!
It's a simple system, really... Just hold an item in your hand, run /auction, and let the bidding war begin! Players will be able to /bid for your object, and after a set amount of time (or price-cap, if you set one up), the highest bidder will win it! The auctions are highly customizable and allow you to adjust the auction time, auto-buy, bid increment, starting price, and more! Auctioning provides a fantastic middle ground between trading and creating public shops. Plus, they're a ton of fun! You can read more on how to use this feature in-game; just run /help!
- If you know anything about Debby, you know her prices are a bit... off. Ever since the server launched, she's been stocking the shelves at the rickety ItemBarn. However, the prices there are sky-high for a place that smells like pigs. After plenty of consideration, she's agreed to adjust the prices of many of her items for the cheaper. Not only that, but Debby has also had some help with clearing out the silo just outside the barn, meaning she now has more room to buy items from players! Currently, her stock is limited, but it's a start! Oh... And just as a hint! If you have a ton of spare Bottles O' Enchanting, Debby would really like to buy them from you. She'll pay you quite a bit, too! Even if you don't have EXP Bottles lying around, you can use the /bottle command to convert your empty bottles and levels into Bottles O' Enchanting.
- If you're a player with a rank, you're probably more than aware of your rank kit's contents. They're cool at first, then... well, you end up with more than you know what to do with. So, we spiced things up a bit! Kit armor, tools, and weapons have all seen a refresh. So much has changed between the new and old sets that they really only have names in common! Each rank's kit has its own unique focus and abilities, and the items within a kit reflect that. Now there's far less of a hierarchy with rank kits (including the existing Prismatic Set); you may even want to mix-and-match to create the perfect set for yourself! So, what are these new attributes?
Quartz - Resilience Amethyst - Strength Sapphire - Resolve Emerald - Well-being Topaz - Agility
- It's an incomplete list, I know, but I don't want to spoil anything here! You'll have to play around with them yourself. So, how do you get the reworked items? From now on, running /kit will no longer flood your inventory with redundant rewards. Instead, each month you'll get a key that can be used to open new rank crates (just underneath /warp crates). Okay, but what if you don't have a rank? That's fine, too! Unlike before, we're making it possible for everyone to win rank kits! How?
- ...This is how! Crates have seen a complete redesign inspired by community suggestions. Our four old crates have all been retired in favor of three new replacements--Gem, Crystal, and Paragon (Plus, a brand new "Games" crate for chat game rewards)! These new crates contain much better items (no more custom-named bones to flood your inventory) and flat-out just include more items altogether. And, as alluded to at the start of this point, these new crates contain keys for the new rank crates. If you have any of the old crate keys (including past holiday keys), you can now trade these in for the new keys at the /warp Market. (We'll get into that soon.)
- Let's move onto another highly-requested feature: top voters! Voting really helps the server grow; as thanks, we already give everyone $700 in-game in addition to some vote keys. But obtaining the most votes for a given month? That deserves another award! In addition to some extra cash, top-voters will now win a few Paragon Keys depending on their place.
- The mall has been around for quite some time and currently serves to be the central place of trade on the server. However, this strength is also its most significant downside. As the "go-to" shopping center, anyone who has anything to sell currently relies on the mall for a plot. As it is now, there are few other locations on the server where players can buy and sell goods, and if you are an owner of one of these few places, it can be hard to compete with the traffic of the mall. This, in turn, limits creativity and what you can do with your pwarps considerably; if everyone goes to the mall to shop, what's the point of building a market town? But, sadly, this isn't the only issue with the mall. Though the problem has been better lately, a significant concern with the mall is the strain it puts on the server and on game clients. When fully loaded, the mall contains thousands of entities that can slow down game clients and–in worse case scenarios–the server. Over time, these concerns have only grown as the mall's popularity required new shops to be built. It goes without saying how this has made the mall challenging to navigate among its other issues. For these reasons, we will be phasing out the mall in favor of player-created markets and towns. This is going to be a slow process, so if you already own a mall shop, don't worry! You'll be able to use your shop for up to two months after this announcement. The only change at this point in time is that we will not be giving out any new plots; once a plot is vacant, it will stay that way! Hopefully, this will give everyone plenty of time to move out of their plots into a player-made market or into their own, if they prefer. Once the mall is vacant, we'll attempt fixing the above issues and, if the idea is still popular, reinstate the mall.
- Piggybacking off the last change is the addition of a new "official" server market over at /warp Market. However, unlike the mall, the market only contains stores run by staff members. This way, we avoid the risk of re-creating the problems of the old mall. Still, what's the point of making a market warp if players can't build there? Although we have the "shops" category in the /pwarp menu, the market's primary goal is to list a directory of player-made market towns right at the warp's spawn point! If you create a pwarp for your market area, we'll place a sign on a board at the /warp Market, which will teleport players who right-click it to that location. This way, the market serves as a "hub" to find other shopping districts without succumbing to the mall's issues.
- About a week before this announcement, we held a poll on our community Discord server. This poll allowed the community to vote for Economy Update features, and one of these changes was an update to the Jobs plugin. We've added a ton of new jobs to the server, revamped the jobs menu(s), and balanced some of the existing jobs. However, as stated in the poll, this change required us to reset all job levels. Though this may be seen as a blow for some, I hope the tradeoff is well worth it!
- Drop Parties will now consistently happen on Saturday evenings around 5-7PM (EST). This is a feature we have had planned for a while, but have never fully implemented. When the time comes, you'll be free to visit the DropParty warp and collect all you can!
- Loosely related to Drop Parties is the new Piñata Party plugin! (We love our parties on Prism Party. ;D ) A piñata will spawn every month at the drop party arena if a set votes threshold is met. Hitting the piñata will reward you with unique items, and killing it will give you even more. It's a lot of fun, so be sure to keep voting!
If you've made it all the way to the end, good job! For making it this far, we've got one more surprise for you... For this weekend only, we're making all items on our shop page 25% off! Enjoy it while it lasts!
That's all for the prior announcement. We truly appreciate all the excitement surrounding this update, and we hope you all enjoy the changes made. You may continue reading for other small changes we've made here and there that don't quite fit in with the central theme of this update. Otherwise, we hope you have a fantastic weekend and party on!
Other small changes:
All ranks have seen an increase in the number of slab shops they can create.
Added new items to the /vote shop!
/feed and /repair are no longer rank-specific actions. All ranks can now use this command; however, you will be charged $500 and $5,000, respectively, for using them.
Set the max-money limit to $5,500,000. (Subject to change)
Pwarps now cost $10 to use. This price automatically goes to the warp owner; however, they may further adjust the price if they desire.
Added new GUIs for /kit and /warp.
/hdb now contains a new "custom server heads" category, which includes our Rocki mascots!
AFK kick for unranked players has been removed.
Teleport cooldown has been lowered to 5s (from 15s).
Lowered number of max-allowed jobs for all ranks.
Made /feelings commands available to Quartz+.
Reinstated Dynmap. Visit it here!
Added new vote site to /vote menu