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I'm not saying that it's the case right now. I'm saying that it might happen when teams have accumulated enough money. It happened in bigger games than BB i've played. It even happened in World of Warcraft. You can't compare BB with normal economics.

Imagine E-bay being our only way of buying. And e-bay only acutions let's say, horses. Every week there will be a new batch of horses available to you. About 90% of them are stronger faster and more healthier than the ones on the market. The rich people will buy all of them. There will be none left of the new batch of horses. Either they get re-auctioned or they replace their existing horse who will be then auctioned for a similar price. You'll see that the replacements will replace the new batch for the same price. How is that not a way of controlling the market?

Sure, it's not happening now, but it might happen.

I keep hearing that these players are not that good, saying they are not double prominents or whatever. The fact that there rarely are double prominents is what make these players good in the eyes of smaller teams. You can't deny that these are one of the best players of the moment. Why not do this botification TL when these players are seen as mediocre at best in the eyes of ALL players. Not the ones in div 1. Like i said this is just boosting the natural growth of the game. Divisions will be divided let's say in season 8, natually. But with this feature it might happen in season 5. That's too soon since the game has a relative small community. Would you really want to give the new teams a sense of defeat right after they signed up? There is a chance that they will be placed in one of the high divisions competeing against allround resp. players with a mix of inept/awful/mediocre players. Losing doesn't really motivate the team to stay and continue.

I agree.
In fact, barely one season in, and I've yet to see a reason to go onto the transfer market and replace any of my players.
All I've done since join is sell and sack a few players.

I don't know whether I was particularly lucky with my starting roster, but if it weren't for the television games my club would fold (it appears to be quite difficult to sell out and cover expenses when you first start off, I have only just filled my arena the last game I had (unexpanded), and even then I'm not even close to covering fortnightly wages - once that 50k/week disappears, noobs are struggling).

You are struggling to survive. Meanwhile the top teams have it rather luxurious... They can throw money away like it's lunch money., because they'll earn it back easily with just 1 or 2 home games.

Edited by Riceball (11/27/2007 1:02:03 PM CET)

Last edited by Legen...Riceball...Dary! at 11/27/2007 1:02:03 PM

Recycling the better players gives the teams with more money something to spend their mountains of cash on and leaves the rest of the average players for the poorer teams to actually be able to afford.

The conseequence of this will be that money flows from new (poor) teams to old (rich) teams. Because the poor teams will buy players from the rich (thus giving them money), while the rich will buy from "outer space" thus not recycling any money to the poor team. In essence it is the kind of pyramid scheme economy that almost killed Hattrick.

Now, everyone knows that a pyramid scheme is a non-sustainable business model, so in the long run this would kill the BB economy too. However, I guess that it can be a good model to use during a short expansion phase, if the transission to a new model is made on time and this transission and model is known beforehand by the users. Is this how you plan to do it?

Because the poor teams will buy players from the rich

You'll also see that the premium cost is for players that are, again, really not that good. I slightly upgraded non-trainee positions at the expense of downgrading trainees, and overall it was a bit of a wash financially.

In essence it is the kind of pyramid scheme economy that almost killed Hattrick.

Killed hattrick? Sure the economy was unstable, but the relative purchasing power on the transfer list remains about the same. Now they just artificially injected money into the system which is driving some extreme, hopefully short term, inflation.

Training of mono-skill players, over-emphasis on one aspect of the game engine (midfield), and other issues, in my opinion, are much bigger and they are just now addressing them.

Seems like BB has set up a good foundation to avoid most of these pitfalls.

Edited by brianjames (11/27/2007 4:53:15 PM CET)

Last edited by brian at 11/27/2007 4:53:15 PM

You'll also see that the premium cost is for players that are, again, really not that good. I slightly upgraded non-trainee positions at the expense of downgrading trainees, and overall it was a bit of a wash financially.

If the players are really good or not isn't really important in this case, it is the actual flow of money from lower to higher levels that is the subject. Actually one of the distinguishing features of pyramid schemes are that the "product" often is of limited or no value.

I agree that there are a bunch of problems in HT that BB has handled, so it is looking promissing. However, the transfer crash did not have to do with single or multi skills it was simply a natural consequence of the pyramid scheme (even though the actual timing of the crash was influenced by the issues you mention). It will be interesting to see if they managed to put in their panic break just in time to save the game or not. But, let us leave that for the Hattrick conferences.

Recycling the better players gives the teams with more money something to spend their mountains of cash on and leaves the rest of the average players for the poorer teams to actually be able to afford.

The conseequence of this will be that money flows from new (poor) teams to old (rich) teams. Because the poor teams will buy players from the rich (thus giving them money), while the rich will buy from "outer space" thus not recycling any money to the poor team. In essence it is the kind of pyramid scheme economy that almost killed Hattrick.

Which is not strictly correct. With the recycling system, the money spent by the rich teams on recycled players has left the system. It's gone, never to be seen again. The rich team has something of value but that's as far as it goes. That asset also has a higher maintenance cost in terms of wages. It also means that the rich team isn't driving the price of the lower quality players on the market, as their focus is now on the better assets. The newer and poorer teams have the power to set the prices on the lower quality players which the bigger teams are selling, ultimately causing them to fall to a level that isn't as ridiculously high as it currently is.

Teams aren't going to miraculously have more money than before - there is only a finite amount in the system. If the richest team has $2million to spend on the best player in the game - two weeks ago that might have been a triple strong, now it may be a quadruple proficient. The triple strong player is going to drop from the $2million mark, which in turn will cause double respectables to be cheaper. Bigger teams are going to have to bite the bullet and sell at an affordable price - which ultimately gives newer teams more options.

Now, everyone knows that a pyramid scheme is a non-sustainable business model, so in the long run this would kill the BB economy too. However, I guess that it can be a good model to use during a short expansion phase, if the transission to a new model is made on time and this transission and model is known beforehand by the users. Is this how you plan to do it?

A pyramid scheme is something entirely different. The way a pyramid scheme works is to continually expand the base of suckers and filter the the money from the bottom to the top. It eventually fails, because there are no more suckers to recruit at the lowest tier. The way our system works is the other way round, money is inserted at the top and allowed to cascade down to the bottom - or disappear ( if a recycled player is bought ). The richer teams make no demands on the lower teams in the way that is the case in a classic pyramid scheme. The two systems only have shape in common, not method.

Commenting on the HT economy and the differences between our models wouldn't be right, and it's not the point of this thread. Everyone in hattrick has their own ideas about the failings of the system and the current regeneration. I don't think it is something that we should discuss in Buzzerbeater, there are plenty of threads over there on that subject.

A pyramid scheme is something entirely different. The way a pyramid scheme works is to continually expand the base of suckers and filter the the money from the bottom to the top. It eventually fails, because there are no more suckers to recruit at the lowest tier.

This is actually exactly how it worked in hattrick (not that it was suckers joining, just that those that discovered Hattrick too late had to accept the deal). As I see it the release of bot players should be seen in combination with a decire of fast expansion, and if so the cash flow will be that of a pyramid scheme. With that said, this is just looking at a small part of the economy, so it might be ""eatan up" by other factors. As I do not have enough insight on the complete macro level economy I cannot really tell if that is the case or not.

The way our system works is the other way round, money is inserted at the top and allowed to cascade down to the bottom - or disappear ( if a recycled player is bought ).

But in this case you are changing the cash flow from bottom to top level as top level will not buy players from (active) lower level teams but from bot teams. Yet again, this might not be a problem if the economy as a whole compensates for this.

I think the key difference between what we are doing and what hattrick has done is that revenue is being driven by what level you are at.. and since you do have the power to outcompete people at your level you can promote yourself.. without this mechanism the age of the team really is what determined how much money and how good you were. We are trying to create an economy in the long run where teams must spend all of their revenue in order to remain competitive at their division... those who spend their money well will promote and have more funds available, and those that don't will drop down.

I very much appreciate this discussion.. we have had many debates and have actually an economist on staff now analyzing these sorts of problems from a economic theory perspective. One thing i'd remind people in the discussion is that money is all relative in a market system... what matters is whether their are enough goods available that everyone can buy something that they want. We need to make it so that rich teams are spending all their money on rich team players, so as Oxidus says, poorer teams can afford to buy non rich team players.

The alternative is to try to build a system in which no team is richer than any other team. Without some sort of draconian systems in place to share revenue etc, i think this is an impossible task. We are hoping to setup a meritocracy where all teams in the same level are competing amongst themselves on an even playing field and can promote themselves to compete on higher levels.

I think the key difference between what we are doing and what hattrick has done is that revenue is being driven by what level you are at.. and since you do have the power to outcompete people at your level you can promote yourself.. without this mechanism the age of the team really is what determined how much money and how good you were. We are trying to create an economy in the long run where teams must spend all of their revenue in order to remain competitive at their division... those who spend their money well will promote and have more funds available, and those that don't will drop down.

I very much appreciate this discussion.. we have had many debates and have actually an economist on staff now analyzing these sorts of problems from a economic theory perspective. One thing i'd remind people in the discussion is that money is all relative in a market system... what matters is whether their are enough goods available that everyone can buy something that they want. We need to make it so that rich teams are spending all their money on rich team players, so as Oxidus says, poorer teams can afford to buy non rich team players.

The alternative is to try to build a system in which no team is richer than any other team. Without some sort of draconian systems in place to share revenue etc, i think this is an impossible task. We are hoping to setup a meritocracy where all teams in the same level are competing amongst themselves on an even playing field and can promote themselves to compete on higher levels.

Thanks for a great answer. If you manage to achive this it will be an excellent game. And as I said before, it really looks like you taken care of a lot of the issues that have gone wrong in other games.

if theres an economist working on this he should understand supply and demand, the supply of good players is so good right now that the price is getting driven down right? Am I the only one seeing guys who are top draft picks going for like 400k or less? This used to be the type of player that when he went out there all the big boys worldwide competed over, they dont have to now, they just wait for the next ones timer to start reaching a closeout. I also seem to remember seeing a player in the NBBA mention that he earned 700k a week. These players are dirt cheap to someone with that kind of income considering the expenses these teams are facing. Even with top rated staff I dont think theres any players with a salary of 10k out there, so they pay at most 200k a week in expenses. These players are EASY for them to get right now.

I guess my concern is that teams I have no hope of matching financially atm are going to load up on 18 year old studs all the way down the depth chart of their trainee position and get not only a financial advantage but a player advantage that won't be surmountable. The work they would have had to do even as a top tier team over the course of seasons worth or work they are going to accomplish in a few weeks, just in time for training to be accelerated for younger players.

Last bit to note, I had 2 other active teams in my bracket for D.IV last season, one ended up in my D III division, the one who beat me on the way to winning it ended up in a different one. I keep tabs on these guys because playing against them made the game fun and we generally take a bit of pride in how tough we considered our bracket to be. One of them is in a private league with several NBBA teams and has gone 2-1 against them so far, his only loss to the Demon Hoosiers. That is going to completely end, not because anyone in that division is a better player, just because they were here a bit earlier. So in a meritocracy based system, explain how that makes sense?

My point, exactly.

The economy needs to work long-term, not just be geared to the present moment.