Today I have finally added Currency and Merchant to Gemp-LotR.
I want to give you more info on how it works, so you'd have an understanding of what to expect. There will be no instructions here, as the screen is pretty self-explanatory.
Currency
In Game Hall and on Merchant screen you will see something like "200G 0S" on the right-hand side. This indicates how much currency you currently have. G stands for Gold, S stands for Silver, and 1G=100S. At some point I'll replace the G and S letters with icons of appropriate colour.
Earning Currency
When you register, you will be given 200G. Each week (after the first) that you log into your account, you will be given 50G.
This weekly bonus and selling singles to Merchant are the only way of gaining currency.
Spending Currency
Entry to tournaments and leagues will now cost currency. Most likely leagues will cost 50G, but I'm not 100% sure yet on the price.
You can also buy singles and boosters/collections at the Merchant. Normal (non-Reflections) boosters have a fixed price of 10G. Collections (Ages End, etc) will also have a fixed price, after they are added.
How is card price established
Merchant has a 30% spread. Spread is a difference between its sell price and buy price, so if a Merchant is selling a card for 10G, it will offer to buy it off you for 7G (70% of the price). Side note: Most real life card merchants have a spread of 50%.
Due to the fact I had no starting point for card prices, I had to make all cards the same price, based only on rarity. To avoid people buying cheap good cards, and selling bad cards high, in the first 30 days of Merchant operating, the spread is MUCH higher, but is getting lowered down with time, until it gets to the 30%. This is also something that real life card merchants do - increase spread for new cards.
Whenever a card is bought from Merchant, the price of the card increases by 10% and if no other operations are done on the card, it will slowly return to its price it was sold for after 5 days.
Whenever a card is sold to Merchant, the price of the card decreases by 10% and if no other operations are done on the card, it will slowly return to its price it was bought for after 5 days.
After the 5 days since last operation on the card, the card price will be slowly dropping over time. The card price will decrease by 50% after 30 days and will keep on dropping, until someone buys or sells the card.
Buy price for foils is double the normal value of a card.
Card availability
Merchant has an unlimited supply of cards. It's selling only non-foil/non-AI cards and only from the set they were originally printed in.
Card trading with other players
To avoid people cheating the system, for example with multiple accounts or scamming other people for good cards, I have decided to not introduce trading between players. Introducing such a system would require high maintenance cost (time) to try and track down people cheating, monitoring trades, etc.
Merchant card prices will (in time) be a good reflection of the card demand and value, so it should be enough to give you all the tools to acquire the cards you want and even enjoy earning some currency on card price fluctuations.
Trading in cards for foils
Merchant also allows you to trade in 4 copies of the same non-foil card (same printing and image) for 1 copy of a foil version of the same exact card.
Questions?
If you have any questions, just post them here.
Topic: Gemp-LotR Merchant explained - Q&A (Read 9736 times)
