Problem: CE is too high in Crowns to sustain yourself without JK runs.

Solution: Less CE sinks, more Crown sinks.

What can you do with CE?

You can: Buy trinket slots, weapon slots, go deeper into Clockworks, revive, open Energy gates, fix the robot, CRAFT, and so much more. Also buy the end game.

What can you do with Crowns?

Buy recipes, materials, and CE... WAIT, you can buy CE? What the hell is the problem then? WHAT? CE is 6k+ and it won't stay in a fixed price for even a minute? Wait, the only way to sustain myself is to farm some hobo jelly? Mmm.. Sweet smell of sliced up jelly.

I still remember the time when i play this game.That time the CE price was 4K per 100CE.The price was about 4K to 3.8K.After that,the CE price when skyrocket!.5K for 100CE!.I'm mad but i don't mind because i don't usually buy it.After 1 month of playing (after the skyrocket) now the CE price when skyrocket again!

First time using the forum, so forgive me if i make any errors...
Problems with CE:
There are many problems with energy in its mist and crystal form. I will go over as many as i can, and give solutions for them.

1. Energy is a very harshly limited commodity for those that want extended play periods and don't want to spend cash.

My solution: Make energy more accessible without paying. The only way that CE comes into spiral knights is through buying it. I'm not saying that monsters should drop ce or anything of the sort. What I do suggest for the avid dungeoneer is to reduce resurrection costs. For stratum one, reduce the cost all together. Stratum costs 1/2/3/4 ce, etc. Stratum 3 and 4 are 2, then 4, then 6, then 8 ce etc? Stratum 5+6 could be 4, then 8, then 12. While not eliminating them all together, once u start dying a lot in a dungeon the prices can add up heavily after every 5th or so death.
Another Suggestion would be to have Mist energy increased, or replenished at an increased rate. The only real use for ME is for dungeoning, as you cant sell it for cr or anything. It would only increase the amount of materials/crowns/recipes in the game. Good!

Edit this once im done with dinnner.

Well, the only way to stabilize the CE market is if we create some sort of union where we gather players who are willing to help and hope to stabilize the CE market to an amount where everyone agrees.

Create a new post, or host a different website and have people interact with each other to gain the common goal; to obtain a CE price acceptable for everyone.

For example only buy CE at a price of 5k crowns.

*I think this is the best solution to help the CE issue on player base. The devs should be able to affect the market better.

So, I've seen Sinxeno's contest for the 40,000CE prize. I'm confused to why he's quitting, but I can't control his actions. So anyways, here goes back to my entry. Please excuse me for not using bold text because I don't know how on this site: usually it's just b with those marks around it, and I'm going off topic again..anyways, my entry:

The reason why I think CE prices are gaining is because of either:

1♥ Customers not buying CE and selling them, probably because they already got all they really wanted.
2♥ A jerk raising the CE price really high and customers actually buying them in desperate need to keep playing and going along with it.
3♥ No new features that leave a big impact on Spiral Knights.

Personally, number 3 is kind of like number 1. Since the alpha knights (I'm not one of them xD) have got everything they need, (some of them even have all the items and recipes in the whole game), they don't know what they can do next, right? (Personally, I would open shops in the forums, probably a UV or recipe one, and I'm going off topic again..), this is where my ideas for new features comes:

♥PvP System: Yup 8D Everyones been talking about it before, but now everyones talking about the CE raises and forgetting about their ideas for this. Remember? King of the hill, capture the flag, team v.s team, 1 v.s 1, etc? Well, here comes number 4♥ Not enough use of crowns. Since CE is pretty much used for everything, there's no reason to even have crowns if you bought everything. What if there was a leaderboard/high-score board? That some experienced knights that would crave to shine in? Or contests you can be in to earn a badge? Where does that badge come from? I haven't really thought about it, you players can think about it more since I'm just explaining the CE problem and solution. The whole entire PvP system will be based around crowns. Crowns, no CE, just crowns. The official contests that admins could hold for King of The Hill, might be with 10000 crowns as entry, with a prize as something like 5000CE or a badge of honor?

♥Pet System: I don't think someones mentioned this before, but a pet system! We have those mecha knight kits, don't we? That could be the start of it! It always breaks my heart when I have to let go of one, because I've bonded with it so much in those 3 minutes of terror of an arena. How about we keep one beside us? At start, we can use monsters as pets to make graphics a bit easier. Heck, even a tier 4 could exist now and be super hard, but easier with pets! You can equip them with weapons and they can level them up as well. Now, you're thinking: Won't the pets be strong then? They players can farm JK solo a lot and earn so much crowns! Well, the pets can be considered weak, right? Or the more powerful, the more expensive to keep? Maybe some food to be purchased by crowns? Dunno, this is up to the players because I'm just here for the solution. Crowns will be expensive to use in the PvP system (if there will be one but I heard admins talking about it in the forums so that's a good thing.) Then again, player verses player would be a little annoying, but I won't expand to that because I want to keep this as short as possible. The story behind it could be that the monsters turned into outcasts for having affection and admiration towards knights and banned from their home, hungry and tired, they seek the home of the knights for help. So that's it xD I apologize for anything I didn't explain too much because I wanna go to plan B. You're probably thinking: Oh no, there's more?! Yes, there's more >:]

♥Buddy Chat: Totally unrelated but I want a buddy chat >:0 AND tabs to switch between things like: *All, *Private Messages, *Guild Chat, *Buddy Chat. I hate scrolling up to see if I got any pms while I was loading into a new place.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~`Plan B

This is so much easier but I like plan A better because I like new features xD But that's it.

♥Turn revives into crown types: 5CE = 250cr. 10CE = 500cr. 20CE = 1000cr, etc. It could be changing the energy type into entirely only crowns to revive, or it could be a choice between using energy or crowns.

♥Have a: Strike! Refuse to buy any CE that is above 50cr for each energy, refuse to spend your crowns on items to make them a little bit more valuable. Then again, I doubt some people will even try.

♥Tier 4? I just have too much cons and pros in my head now, but I'm pretty sure you can imagine everything of it on your own.

♥Something to do that you don't need crowns or energy in? That way you can save your mist energy while having fun doing that something other than hanging out at the AH. Maybe a snipe room where everyone talks and gazes at the snipes inside? Something that you don't need to use anything in? I would go towards houses and gardens, cooking, shopping for your choice of colored armour, but it's too much xD

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*Well, that's it, for now anyways. I might post more entries after this one, but that's all I can think of for now.

I dug into researching for a bit.. used my economics studies knowledge... even daydreamed on how this game could stay alive and still hold its "free-trade" ideals.

Then it dawned on me. It IS just a game after all !! So.. we could set regulations anywhere thats needed.

Its easy to say my idea for a solution but its only based on the fact that there is no 100% pure cure for inflation other than government intervention.

Simple enough... But OOO would have to patch it in.

1) Impliment a "maximum % change" allowed per month, with set max/min values for the month. ( or week or even day )
the max/min buy/sell values should be fixed to x% >/< the previous month's (week's or day's) average "purchase" price.

EXAMPLE: Working with todays numbers as an example ( about 6000cr per 100ce ) and a Min/Max Flux limit of 16% for the following month....
The max/min tradable values would be 6000cr+16%=6960cr=MAXallowed :&: 6000-16%=5310=MINIMUMallowed.
Honestly, with CE valued as it is now, I say set the Min/Max on a daily basis at (6% >/< the previous days AvgPurchasePrice) ...

EXAMPLE: If 5000cr was the previous months "purchase" avg. (as an example) and our Min/Max Flux was set to 20%, then this months Highest
allowed offers to Sell would be 6000 and lowest 4000. The average purchase price would likely continue upward, but far slower, and it would
definately be a more stable economy. Especially if the Max/Min monthly values are clearly posted in the CE menu ... people wouldn't normally buy for
the maximum and this should keep the average sale price competitive, more stable, and also make the "CE trading" method of getting rich a little less
um.. tempting. Again, with the trade penalty at 2% and the volatility that traders look for, I vote for setting MaxDailyFlux at 6% of the previous day's
average purchase price.

2) Also, a 12 hour mist tank will keep people playing even if they can't afford CE. Maybe even do away with MIST being used in crafting, or sellable
like CE, but make it a 12 hour refill, that can only be used on elevators, so we can truly "play" for free.. and "pay" for the elite gear we're tired of
waiting for. With more energy to hunt with we'd play more to save up for that treasured CE. Those who don't mind paying cash... still will. But this
would only work in conjunction with CE price regulations.

3) This one might be cheezy and slightly off topic but... The crystals we collect from levels and turn in for like 3cr to 5cr are just silly. I've stopped
turning them in long ago, and nearly stopped searching for them in levels. How about giving players 1, 2, & 3 CE per crystal
instead of crowns. Artificially adding CE into the economy would help ease the inflation.. but its the traders that are buying and selling constantly that
are truly causing the CE crises.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Its important to note that no amount of CE that's added to the economy will make a long-term difference, unless it is such an immense amount that people no longer have the need to buy CE. Even if this happens, and those that don't "trade" in CE markets have no need to trade in CE markets.. ever... the traders have already established their means of aquiring wealth. They work amongst themselves buying low and selling high; manipulating a commodity without concern nor need for any of the "non traders". As long as there is profit to be made, or when sales earn more than the 2% penalty, OOO regulation is an absolute necessity.

... so
Those are my ideas.. feel free to play with the numbers but please give me credit for the ideas if any of them work out :)

In Game Name: Vysorn

A UI change to let people browse more than say, the top 5 on each side (this IS kind of like the auction house) would be nice.

Part of the "exploit" that pushed this was the fact that people are constantly competing for the top slots. That's partly why the wall technique was so significant of a move in the first place.

The only thing that makes this somewhat less viable is that it's one of the few things that OOO can actually directly do that can affect this whole situation.

The rest of the "problem" really seems to lie within the player community.

We can't exactly control the market if we can't control the players, that's my initial thought.

As for ideas:

Idea 1: Have the game control the market.
Set an active exchange rate between the two currencies.
Allow the buyers to purchase the other currency directly.

This would stop the oscillations of the price. The market will take a large hit initially, as players will not be able to choose what price they want and the supply will drop. Eventually however, the market will rise again and the exchange rate, now constant.

Idea 2: Scale the Crowns.
As the price of CE Drops or rises, change the amount of crowns people receive from dungeons. Neopets actually does this with Neopoints, lowering and increasing the amount of NP you get from games. This will allow people to maintain a small profit and keep people heading down the dungeons.

However, this idea is prone to manipulation, so not only would the amount of crowns need to be changed, but the prices of every single crown bought item, recipes, weapons, etc. This will ensure the value of the crown maintains with that of the CE.

Universal Idea: A history Board.
Show us more of the transactions from the CE market, let us see what the general price people bought CE at was, they do this with the Stock Exchange, and that allowed people to keep with the oscillations. Given most of the people playing this game won't understand it, it would help a little bit.

Example:
<4> batches of 100 CE was purchased at <6500> crowns a batch.
<10> batches of 100 CE was purchased at <6300> crowns a batch.
<1> batches of 100 CE was purchased at <6550> crowns a batch.
<2> batches of 100 CE was purchased at <6400> crowns a batch.
<5> batches of 100 CE was purchased at <6500> crowns a batch.

Would be under a history tab.

IGN: Sentiment

Agree Malyce, a little chart showing the price variation over the last x hours would be nice. But I guess most people wouldn't pay attention to that, and would just buy it anyways.

You guys make these energy threads and you keep making two mistakes, and that's equating any amount of crowns to crystal energy when crowns are a measurement of time/effort and that value in ce is constantly in flux, and that the price of 100ce in crowns should somehow correlate to the amount of crowns one knight can make using his mist energy badly in t2.

There isn't just paying players and free players, there's many gradients between and the closer to pure pay on the scale you go the smaller the population.
You vocal minority that keep making energy threads are the smallest and least significant minnows in the sk economic ocean, your voices are less then nothing. You spend 80-100me a day running from moorcraft to emberlight and make about 6,000 crowns.
Above you is the middle class, the players that spent $0.75 - $2.50 or whatever the lowest energy bundle is now and made a separate secret mule account in 2 star gear that funnels crowns to the parent account and/or players who have a wide social network with a full guild of 100 and a full friends list of 100 which they use to circumvent profitless lower levels in a tier. Sometimes they sell things they don't need and think themselves very clever for it. They use all 100-200me a day to make about 15,000-30,000 crowns.
Above that is the energy barons. These players use either a legion of alt accounts and far too much free time or abused the extremely low energy prices in the game's fledgling days to quickly exploit a niche in the crafting, materials, or recipe market after racing to end game content. They have hundreds of thousands of energy and millions of crowns, they rarely ever use mist energy for anything but crafting low star items looking for uvs in between monitoring the AH or energy board patiently waiting to eat minnows alive. Sometimes they run t3 in one of their flawlessly UVed five star gear sets for giggles.
Lastly and leastly, are the impatient people that just flat payed cash for a big lump of energy and used it in a flagrant & wasteful fashion to grab a bunch of five star equipment (or if they got into sk after the patch, 3 star equipment with recipes and materials for the 4 and 5 star and a heat amplifier to get them quick) and had a lot of fun with spiral knights the 3 or 4 weeks they played it. They are unaware you can even trade crowns for energy and they don't care.

The moral of the story being, the price of crystal energy in crowns will never go down. It may fluctuate mildly for a short time or stay flat for a long bid but it will never go down again. Not even a fraction of the completely free playing majority read these forums, so even if you all know that you're unimportant it wont matter. Every day thousands of people will see a banner add for spiral knights and spend a few weeks being minnows and they will squirm and gnash and lament but they will be minnows. The question is, now knowing this, will you resign yourselves to your 40 minute single run of play a day which you will exchange every week or 2 for a shiny new item or will you smarten up, stop making threads, go spend money to make money, and become one of the bigger fish.

I'll chime in with a few factors not considered for this spike in price increases.

1. BNP boycotts.

Because of the sweeping changes made in the May 17th patch, a big group of players (namely, the BNPs), are boycotting the game, either entirely or by not buying CE. This group of people, I'd wager, also hold large reserves of CE that they are not willing to disburse into the market.

2. Disgruntled longtime players making artificial walls to deter newcomers.

I do believe that there was a thread from a disgruntled longtime player telling all those who are not happy with the May 17th patch to destroy the CE market by inflating CE prices with artificial walls. I'm starting to believe that there might be more to the spikes in energy prices rather than just robber barons trying to profit off the newcomers.

3. The May 17 patch itself.

800CE for 5* gear... I'm not too particularly happy about the energy costs for crafting, to be honest. While I'll accept the need to scale back the number of people getting 5* Gear, I feel gipped for buying CE, since all that patch did was tell me that my CE is now worth less.

One part of the problem is with the patch itself. The other was with the way it was handled. But I'm just trumpeting old points best forgotten.

It'd be in the best interests of everyone if Three Rings were to scale down the energy requirements for crafting to somewhat reasonable levels, but that's the only real suggestion I can come up with at the back of my head. If anything, the devs reassuring us that CE is extremely valuable would actually be welcomed.

And while we're talking about CE transactional history, I do believe that we have to revamp thee CE market. Apart from adding trends and historical data, what would help stem the eventual inflation of CE would be to reveal the IGNs of the people who are trading CE. Adding this layer of accountability would certainly help the market immensely, as people would then exercise discretion against people who create artificial walls. If anything, apart from several guilds banding together to make CE prices affordable by actually funnelling money to buy CE, this would be the preferable option.

Because with rising energy prices and the "relatively" high energy requirements for crafting, I'm starting to feel that unless Three Rings pumps out new content every month, my CE is going to be worth less and less as time passes.

And if you see any bids to sell CE at 5000, it's me trying to stem the flow of hyperinflation.

And for those of you wanting a drop in revivication costs, the point of the increased rez costs per death is to emphasize the need for skill rather than cash. If you're really hurting for CE due to a bungled run, then it would be best if you learnt how to play the game well. It's a harsh and callous comment, yes, but learning advanced techniques aand equipping yourself properly actually HELPS in reducing the need for CE, barring JK and Vanaduke deaths. I do agree on halving Elevator costs, though. It might help if it was implemented properly.

If we're gonna lower elevator costs, then we do lower as we go deeper. Canonically, as one goes down into the Core, there's more, ahem, energy available, which explains why the monsters become a lot harder to kill. This should also be reflected in the Elevator costs. Why has no one mentioned this minor loophole is a bit of a mystery to me. (SO, for Depth 1-3, the Elevator costs are at 10 Energy, 5-7 would be at 9 Energy, and so on...)

Oh, one more thing. Remove the option to cancel bids for the CE Market. Let's see them try to drive up the prices... ... ... WHEN THEY HAVE TO COMMIT.

IGN: Drmchsr

So, I was just thinking about this. Crowns obviously fail at value against ce. And we have materials out the wazoo that have been devalued because there's just no way everyone needs 100 waste modules lol. What if a system were implemented so that you could go to the trader to obtain ce by using your minerals/mats/crowns at a set price, HOWEVER, you can only make the trade for say..200ce every three days. What this might do is allow for players to gain ce. This could create a competitor for the market. After all, if a player can get 200ce from the vendor (+ mist energy) , why would they go to the market unless they REALLY wanted to craft something immediately? This competition could keep ce prices in check and make crowns more valuable since people would be more willing to go to a vendor with a set price rather than go to the unstable market. I should note that my actual number of 200ce every three days is just a figure for explanation.

IGN: Clannad

Tell me what you all think. Am I insane to think that an in game vendor as an alternative supplier of ce would be beneficial?

IGN: Father-Creamy

I think with the blind auctions, it could lead to confusion and frustration. It seems like if someone is in a dungeon, and needs energy fast, they would have to go to the blind auction and play a guessing game - 4900... 4910... 4930.. 4960... 5000? And desperate sellers would have to do the same thing too, in reverse - 5100... 5090... 5070... 5040... 5000? It doesn't sound too fun not knowing if you're offering a few hundred less than the top offers, or a few hundred more than the cheapest price, and that many others are playing the same guessing game as you. This may lead to people spamming the trade chat with wanting to buy/sell CE to avoid the inconvenience.

Maybe another cause for the rise in price of CE is due to the 2% tax. To feel like the seller isn't losing any crowns in the trade, they place an offer of at least 200 more than the top buyer's asking price... and when the buyers start offering more, the sellers raise the price more to cover the cost of tax. Although it's meant to be a crown sink that nobody likes to pay, perhaps it would be best for the game if they took away the tax, and use a different approach to getting rid of excess crowns. This should make the seller's price and buyer's price to nearly touch each other, and make buying/selling faster and more convenient. Also, I usually see the 2% tax in games where the sellers don't see what the buyers are offering (and of this big of proportion), so perhaps by seeing what the buyers are offering, it may have ruined the balance the tax was suppose to create. (I'm going to add this to my previous post.)

Since I got time, I'm going to answer your other questions. :)

What do you think about energy system is flawed and why do you think so? (maybe it isn't)
-I think that pretty much all systems of currency are flawed, since it's hard to put an accurate price on a person's time and work, and also the products that are being sold. An example I would bring up is minimum wage vs. inflation - If you earn $5 an hour and candy bars cost $1 each, you can buy 5 candy bars per hour of work (before adding the tax). If inflation occurs and next year that candy bar is $1.25, and minimum wage hasn't changed, you can buy 4 candy bars per hour of work. So you're doing the same amount of work, yet your work is worth less.
On the flip-side, if minimum wage rises to $6 and the prices of candy bars stay the same, you can buy 6 candy bars per hour of work, even though you're doing the same job. So the same work you're doing now is worth more than the same work you did last year. Sounds flawed to me how they can't pin a price on your work that would have the same buying power throughout time. But, it still manages work (in a way), so I guess the energy system is as flawed as our real-life money system.

Where do you think the value of energy/crowns comes from?
-I think it starts out by how much crowns a person can make within a period of time, and how much energy is available for sale, and how much those people are willing to buy/sell them for. The result on an online game usually ends up with the who is trading in-game currency for pay-currency is earning pennies/nickels/dimes per hour.
I forgot how much people earn from Jelly Runs and how long it takes to do them, but let's say they earn 5k per run (depth 14-16), and are fortunate enough to have people to rely on able to do it 3x with 100 CE (not CE) and end up with 15,000 crowns. If a person buys CE for 5k per 100, they end up with 200 more CE than they've started with. If you take the highest amount you can buy CE in (20,000) and divide it by its price ($50.00), it comes out that each energy is worth $0.0025 (a quarter of a penny), then 200 CE is worth $0.50, which is a pretty damn high earning rate for a video game. It's possible that because of such a high earning rate from Jelly Runs by these jelly farmers, the prices for CE is skyrocketing as a result to balance out the game for the high-earning Jelly Runners (and not the average gamer). I guess another possible solution for reducing the price of CE is to reduce the earnings from Jelly Runs. (going to add this to my list)
Edit: Now that I think about it more after editing my previous post, these Jelly Runs are probably the main cause for the inflation! Most of the people in my guild are doing Jelly Run after Jelly Run... and with the earnings they get from it, they can probably afford to pay 10,000 crowns for 100 CE and still end up with 5,000 crowns profit (If I'm exaggerating the 15,000 crowns earnings, then scale it down to 12,000 crowns or something). So if this problem is removed from the game, then people should be able to play any map in their tier without feeling like it's a waste of energy, or feel like one gate more profitable than the others... and then there will be more people in other gates instead of coming across a "There are no parties available" message almost every time... and then this game will be played like it should be instead of most people going into one or two gates.
Right now, the population for these gates are:
Copper Bishop (with Vanaduke) - 75 (17%)
Jade Titan Gate (with Jelly King and Snarbolax) - 226 (51%)
Dark Pawn Gate - 50 (11%)
Sapphire Rook Gate - 92 (21%)

Do you think the interface of the energy system should be changed? How would you change it and how do you think it may alleviate the problem?
-Can you explain the question further? ^^;

Do you think Three Rings should limit the power of the "big players" and if so, how should they limit it without ruining their own sense of fun?
-I think the "big players" should have a moral responsibility in with their role in the game, but it may be wrong to tell them the "right" thing they should do to make a better community.

What are people's thoughts on mini-games or gambling [what kind of gambling (UVs)] for crown sinks?
-I don't think it would hurt too much to try, plus I've always enjoyed seeing a fun mini game arcade inside a video game. It would add a different & possibly fun feel to the game, and people could blow through their crowns to grind on a specific game to earn enough tickets to get a unique prize to show off.

I got a question: If the top offer is 5,800 crowns for 100 CE and someone else makes a lowly offer of 5,000 crowns... what would happen if seller makes a listing for 5,000 crowns? Would it automatically be sold to the top offer, or would it be sold to the buyer who posted 5,000 crowns?

So you're telling me the problem isn't that there aren't enough Crown sinks? Tell me, if you have 10,000 CE, why would you trade it in for Crowns? You can't do anything with Crowns because trading rare items is done with CE instead of Crowns. The only things you can do is buy recipes or materials but you can get materials yourself pretty easily so it's not really a problem. With CE you can do everything and you don't have to buy Crowns with it because you will get them while you explore.

Crowns sinks may not be the problem but people who have CE have no purpose to sell it because Crowns right now give nothing to you that CE doesn't.

I like blueprinces' idea of charging different elevator fees based on the tier (as opposed to lowering it altogether), much like how they charge different fees for reviving based on tier. I think Spiral Knights can live if they charge 5 CE for tier 1 to let the newbies enjoy the game more before they hit their first limit, and then 10 CE for tier 2, and 15 CE for tier 3... then all they would have to do is balance the profits people earn.

Personal Story:
I'm iffy about all of these economy formulas, since this is a game where people can pull money out of thin air, so it may be a completely different problem. I've encountered an economy problem similar to the Jelly King, but on a way larger scale on a small avatar forum site that no economic formula could fix. The problem was that the original owner released a new feature to sell the ores you get from mining for HUGE profits, which resulted in people (such as myself) earning a millions of gold within an hour (if they were dedicated enough and new all the little tricks to mine faster), while the price of gems (which cost $2 each) were around 25k. Well, that 25k per gem skyrocketed to 500k+ over the next few months as miners grabbed onto whatever they can before prices rise even more, and the people who didn't know it was caused by mining were outraged at the prices and tried to bring the price down by selling gems for 25k, while us miners thought 500k was a steal (considering we'd be earning dollars per hour through the trade), and that 25k was practically free. Well, it went on for a couple or few years, until the newest owner of the site finally put a limit on how much a person can mine within a certain period of time before they can mine again, which really killed the daily profits for the miners. I don't know how many people left that site specifically due to that situation, and now it's almost a "ghost town" site.

So the problem there was a huge money-making exploit, and maybe our problem here is just be a small money-making exploit that's a little hard to realize, but it's known since people flood the Jelly King gate. Also, as others said, crowns aren't used for much. If these 2 problems are fixed, then we could have a good & balanced game going on here.

So get this.

I have 30kce of crowns at my disposal.

I sell the 50kce I have in the market at the price of 7k per 100ce. Why? Because I can.

Obnoxious?

Hell no. Why? Because I own that CE. Worked hard for it by crafting and selling (which is now extinct as you all know)

The issue here isnt about inflation. This isnt about crown sinks.

Its about everyone's greed to actually make the game easier for everyone. Getting 5* items overnight isn't how the game should work. :)

But since there are arguments above that I really like.

I promise to not get the ce at 10k per 100ce.

I have no real solution to the "PROBLEM" that all of you are super scared off. ME is sufficient enough to give you a good hour of fun run in the clockworks. And then you stop.

The only real key to the game?

1. DONT BEG.
2. DONT COMPLAIN.
3. ENJOY THE GAME :)

It is a game. :) If you run out of ME, go sleep and do something more useful. Believe me and Sin, after you kill Vana. You wont find the game enjoyable. I just want to find a blackened crest, quicksilver helm/armor or a mewkat hat and I will retire from the game and maybe sell the rest of my CE just to keep the supply at least manageable. :)

Although, you can't force the CE owners to sell CE at a low price. Boycotting is the CE IS THE DUMBEST IDEA. :) Cause be real, you need it. If you think its too high. Buy with cash. :) I haven't spent a dime. Thats why I dont complain. :) If you have, then you have the right to I believe. But I doubt you'd be part of the complainers :) lol.

Anyway, keep the discussion up. At least your letting your minds work. :) I for sure know I will have fun reading these things. Kind of fun when you think about the subject matter itself. All these arguments for a game. :) Goodluck buds! :)

PS. SIN, LETS WAIT FOR UNBINDING SHOP :D DONT QUIT ON ME NOW :D

Let me put the solution #128 in an more easy language and a recipe:
If you are 000:
---
1) chose a mean price for 100CE people should roughly pay.
Lets say 6000CR for 100CE.

2)Use equation:
((gCR/day-sCR/day)/ mean price for 100CE)*100 - bCE/day+uCE/day=nCE/day.

and put new energy on the market every day (or minute or hour or what ever you like... shorter is better).
(you could even put more than this on the market and it should not make a huge difference . but this way you can variate the amount of CE around this value and see what is the best for the game. A dynamic market or price is more attractive than a fixed. Remember that as long as there is no new energy on the market and people are gathering crowns, the price will rise! This market still can be corrupted by evil people with enough crowns. They just buy all the new energy and sell them for much more. The only way to stop this to control the market even more by putting limits to what one individual can buy a day.Edit: For example, a player can only buy energy with the crowns he found the last 2 days)

3) Adjust the elevator or/and the revive fee for every tier:

Tier 1:
Lets say a newbie gathers about 4000CR/run WITHOUT buying stuff on tier 1.
Adjust the elevator (and even revive) fee to allow him 2 runs on mistenergy or 100CE.
Thus, a newbie can play and upgrade his stuff in a reasonable time (for each 2star item it will take him roughly 4runs=3hours of playtime.
you have to adjust to a value that make most people happy and willing to pay for CE at the same time).

Tier 2:
Lets say an average player gathers about 7550CR/run WITHOUT buying stuff on tier 2.
Adjust the elevator (and even revive) fee to allow him 1 run on mistenergy or 100CE..
Thus, he'll be able to play and upgrade his stuff (4 items) in a reasonable time=200h playtime to 4*.
(for each 4-star he needs to gather 77500CR (5000+12500+(200+400)*100) and this will take him 50 runs each 1h)
And another 280h to 5star.
People how have a urgent need to play tier 3 or get powerfull items will have to pay. for example: casual gamers with a job.

Tier 3:

Let him gather >7500CR/run
Adjust the elevator fee that he can make one run with 100CE WITHOUT dieing.
You can do the math by your own.

You can't say what is the right amount of CE/run because you dont know what people are willing to pay for the game (or CE) and it's hard to forecast the dynamics of the Bazaar.

This is only a first order approach to the problem.. You need to adjust it in time...

(PS: not a native speaker)

I think the best solution is to add a Mist Energy shop(untradeable) that stays at a fixed price depending on which tier you are at. This way you don't have to wait for CE sellers to hit a low Crown per 100CE price=no market stalking. Other things like crafting and extra slots would be done with CE and I doubt the profits would change for OOO. Then OOO could add some more CE sinks and further increase their profits without killing all their free players. Free players won't be able to complain unless the fixed price is over priced and they will be able to play the game.

3000 for Tier 1.
4750 for Tier 2(Jelly King farmers... <_<).
5250 for Tier 3(don't know how much money Tier 3 players make since I'm not there yet).

Once you get the required equipment to go to the next tier you will be counted as that tier and can't go back to being counted as the previous tier.

EDIT: Since Mist Energy is shared between account on the same computer/IP, then bought Mist Energy would not be shared to prevent abusing of the cheaper Mist Energy.

This is our situation. At the time of this writing, Crystal Energy (CE) costs are over 6,000 Crowns per 100 CE. When I first started playing, CE was at 4,500 Crowns per 100 CE. In the past few weeks, that price has gone up around 100 Crowns to 400 Crowns a day like clockwork (pardon the pun). This is a problem for many reasons. The first of which is that it is difficult for new players to get a foothold in the game. The limit to how much a person can play is disappointing, so the Crystal Energy Market comes in to play. However, the price of Crystal Energy is, at the moment, much higher than any new player has or can get readily. When new players first start out they are only allowed to venture into the first tier of the Clockworks, which is around 7 levels [1]. They can easily go through the levels because of the Mist Energy in the game that works the same as Crystal Energy, except that it replenishes every 22 hours [2]. These players can then buy or craft 2-star equipment using the Crowns that they get from their expeditions to get to the second tier of the Clockworks, which go down to Depth 18 [3]. The major issue here is that, in order to be able to venture past Emberlight, a player needs to have at least 4-star equipment. 4-star equipment, as a standard, costs 2,500 Crowns and 400 Energy (Mist or Crystal). This requires players to buy Crystal Energy from either Three Rings by using real-world money or from other players for Crowns on the Crystal Energy Market. Based on my own calculations (at the current market cost, 6,300 Crowns per 100 Crystal Energy), getting the equipment necessary to venture into Tier 3 would cost 166,800 Crowns in alchemy costs alone (making 2-star, 3-star, and 4-star equipment). The high price of Crystal Energy also makes even venturing into the Clockworks a financial issue. In most cases, one does not get over 6,000 Crowns by using 100 Energy in the Clockworks, with the possible exception of bosses. This statistic makes the actual use of Crystal Energy useless and defeats the purpose of Crystal Energy.

Why is the Crystal Energy Market price steadily increasing? This is a question with multiple answers.

1. The necessity of Crystal Energy. Because Crystal Energy is required in order to progress through the game, it is needed by everybody. This is a simple case of an imposed demand of a product.

2. The psychology of Spiral Knights. Spiral Knights is advertised as a "Free to play" game [4] with the option of buying more things. This representation makes the player, who may be attracted to Spiral Knights because it is free, possibly unwilling to buy Crystal Energy from Three Rings with actual money, so they choose the only other way to get Crystal Energy which is the Crystal Energy Market.

3. The freedom of the Crystal Energy Market. The prices set to buy and sell Crystal Energy on the Crystal Energy Market are all set by the players. Players can post any price and as many of a certain price that they want, provided that they can pay it. Players can also withdraw offers freely. This can be exploited extremely easily. For example, suppose that I have 50,000 Crowns and 10,000 Crystal Energy that I want to sell, but I don't like the price that I can sell it at. I can post dozens of the same price to buy that is significantly higher than the current highest price but lower than the lowest price to sell. This creates a "wall" of offers. Other people, who also want to buy Crystal Energy quickly, but cheaper than the lowest price to sell, will then cancel their previous bids and place an offer that is higher than my dozens so as to put themselves on the top of the list and the next to receive Crystal Energy. As more and more people do this, the offers to buy Crystal Energy steadily go up. When I like the price, I sell at the direct price, which will be inflated from the original price.

4. Inflation. There are many sub-topics of inflation that are relevant to the rise in Crystal Energy prices. In economics, there is a theory called "demand-pull inflation". Demand-pull inflation is described as "when an aggregate demand in an economy outpaces aggregate supply." [5] In terms of Spiral Knights, demand-pull inflation could be described as so: the more popular Spiral Knights becomes, the more people will join. The more people that participate in Spiral Knights, the more Crystal Energy is needed (see section 1 for necessity of Crystal Energy). Assuming that the player will not buy more Crystal Energy from Three Rings, as we do in Section 2, there is a maximum amount of Crystal Energy that is being used in the game. When somebody uses Crystal Energy in a situation other than the transfer from one player to another, that Crystal Energy exits the inter-player system and the amount of Crystal Energy in the game decreases. There is also the "quantity theory of money" which states that "any change the amount of money in a system will change the price level." [6] This is applied to Spiral Knights in the form of Crowns. When a player obtains Crowns from the Clockworks, buys an item from an NPC vendor, crafts an item or in any other way spends Crowns outside of a trade, that player is altering the amount of Crowns that are in the Spiral Knights economy. When there are more Crowns, the value of a Crown decreases and, alternately, when there are not as many Crowns, the value of a Crown decreases. (Note: with the exception of the information on demand-pull inflation, all information in this section comes from [6])

There are multiple solutions to this problem:

1. An update of the game that makes any offer to buy Crystal Energy non-refundable or refundable but with a heavy cost. This solution would stop a majority, if not all, of the cases of market manipulation through creating an offer "wall" and exploiting player psychology. This solution would also, however, make it more difficult to get Crystal Energy because there could be many better offers made after your initial offer, and you couldn't withdraw the original offer and make a new one.

2. An update of the game that sets a limit to the number of offers a player could make in a set period of time. This would also stop the "wall" technique of market manipulation while also eliminating the problem of inadequate offers. (Note: Solution 1 and Solution 2 can be used in tandem or separately.)

3. Eliminating the Crystal Energy Market and implementing an "Energy Standard". This Energy Standard would be a fixed price of Crystal Energy that would not change and could be used at any time. This eliminates the profiteering of Crystal Energy and makes it used for its original purpose. (Note: this solution comes from the concept of the American Gold Standard [7])

4. Setting a limit to the number of Crowns in the system. This would be done by using the Crowns that "exit the system" and re-inserting them into the system via the Clockworks. This creates a set amount of Crowns that can be utilized and makes the value of a Crown static. The issue of new players entering the system could be solved by either having them start with no Crowns, taking some Crowns from the Clockworks and giving it to these players, or by setting the number of Crowns in the system proportional to the number of players. (Note: this solution comes from the concept of wage controls [8])

5. Eliminating the entire energy system, both Mist Energy and Crystal Energy, and letting Crowns be used for what Energy is used for (elevators, crafting etc.) This would throw the entire problem out the window and let players play the game that they want to play using one standard currency. There could also be an option to buy more Crowns with real money so as to keep the minor profitable aspect of Spiral Knights for Three Rings.

[1] http://wiki.spiralknights.com/Clockworks
[2] http://wiki.spiralknights.com/Energy
[3] See 1
[4] http://www.spiralknights.com/about.xhtml (under "Game Features")
[5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demand-pull_inflation
[6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation#Causes
[7] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation#Controlling_inflation
[8] See 7

I hope this all helps!
also, in the off-chance that I win, my character's name is Golgomath ;)

@ "keep thinks as they are":
This will not work.
you are looking at a dynamic system.
000 needs to get keep the stream of new player and potential payer as high as possible or the real world will make there service (server+gamedev etc) unaffordable.
If you keep everything as it is the stream of new player will drop because they will not pay after playing a so called free game for 1h.
If the price keeps deteriorating at roughly 3% a day, this will happen sooner as u might imagine.
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=plot+6000*1.03%5Ex%2C+x%3D1..30+
price vs days starting with 6000.

@smashx90
1) "the more popular Spiral Knights becomes, the more people will join"
no. If that would be the case and everything would be fine. The attraction of a game is linked to the willingness of potential payers. New players will only be able to play their mist energy and see nothing of the game and will not pay for the game.

2) Never never never never use wikipedia as a source in a serious scientific paper/article what ever.
Wikipedia is a link of sources. Wikipedia dose not create any new thoughts, it is collecting. Wikipedia does change. Wikipedia has no author. Wikipedia can be a plagiarism. ... And never cite wikipedia unless u are writing about wikipedia ...

What about OP who has 40,000CE? :P

Just to toss out one thought...

The only problem worth solving here is that individuals with deep pockets are able to manipulate the market by posting huge buy and/or sell walls, and thus drive the psychology of other, smaller, more desperate buyers/sellers. I have two solutions, intended to be used in tandem.

- Have the crown cost paid by the listing individual, one way or the other You want to list CE for sale? You want to put in a buy offer? You pay 2% of the crown price - offered or requested, and if you unlist, you don't get it back. This would serve as something of a crown sink, would encourage people to use the "buy/sell now" option, and would fairly seriously discourage people from putting in large numbers of bids that they never really intend to see filled. At the same time, the 2% isn't really going to be significant to the sorts of people who are actually doing this as a way to convert moderate quantities of crowns into CE or vice versa. (Noting that someone else came up with more or less this idea first)

- limit the number of buy/sell offers you're allowed to post at a time to about 10 or so (total - so if you have 5 buy offers, you can only have 5 sell offers. I'd make it fewer, but I feel like you should be able to make enough offers to craft 5* gear with a bit left over). If you want to really trade a large quantity in a short time, you can do it by taking offers that other people have posted. Most won't need to. This will mean that no one account will be able to put in a wall or more than 10 by themselves. Now, they can still drive the markets buy just buying up everyone's sell offers, but that takes *actual* resources, as opposed to vaporware resources that they can pull without cost.

Between the two of them, they cut down on the ease with which people can manipulate the market in a macro way, they serve as a small additional crown sink, and they give smaller players more opportunity to make money off of larger players (because if you want to work in bulk, you need to fill the orders of others, which makes it more likely that the highest offer/lowest request will diverge, which means that people who want to ride the middle with their 10 offers at a time will have more opportunity to make money doing so)

tl:dr version: pay the 2% surcharge at time of listing, rather than time of purchase. Limit number of listings that each person can make at a time. Make large-scale manipulations more awkward and more costly.

-----

Also worth noting that the current spike in prices almost certainly has to do with the new content - a lot of people are going to want to run it a lot, and then do a *bunch* of crafting to get shiny new 5* versions of all the new gear, possibly with UVs. All of this is a huge CE sink, and more of a crown source than sink. We may see prices drop back to the 5000s once that dies down.

In game name Thorf

@blueprinces

You're assuming that price will keep rising. It doesn't work like that. Eventually, people will stop paying CR and it will even out.

Only idea I have which could solve the current problem yourself and others feel is harming the game (Personally, I think it is fine because the market price is reaching an equilibrium point, and considering that paying players do pay with cash to buy ce the price will go up with very little demand of crowns).

Many players will suggest these following methods:

1. Crown Sink -- Only because they feel it will raise the importance of Crowns which will make the ce prices drop a bit. The only, negative of this is lets say the whole crown sink overall is worth hmm 300k Crowns in total most paying players will make the market low for about a week or two, but once we are all settled the market will rise up again.

2. Pvp with (Gambling) -- Lets think about this we can all say it would be pretty epic if player vs player happened and you can go 1 on 1 with other players and have basically (Staking) going on were both parties can bet on the fight. Example: Njthug vs Dogrock we bet 30k Crowns each that we will beat each other so winner of the pvp match will gain 30k Crowns or lose 30k Crowns. Now this sounds like a great example of crown sink right? But, I am just using my basic logic: If crowns are not worth a lot why would I want more of them? (Yes, I can buy ce, but really not worth it since I can lose the money which can already buy me ce, and I will have to re-do everything). People may gamble using Ce which will make ce prices rise instead of going lower.

3. Lowering elevator cost → Will most likely not happen lets me realistic Three Rings will not do this.

4. Increasing Me or the replenish time → I personally do not see Three Rings doing this either.

5. Some may argue that there is not enough Ce in the market, but this is not true the reason prices are low is due to a less demand of Crowns and a higher demand for ce.

6. Monthly Subscriptions → Yes, people will suggest this, but lets be honest this will not happen in my opinion. Monthly subscriptions are basically already in this game you have an option to spend 9.95 a month to buy Ce every month or even 49.99 a month to buy ce every month. I do not see a company destroying this in-game economy system especially since it works in their other games.

7. People may bring up a system to stop people to control the Ce Market. I attempted this back in preview to see if it is possible. I bought out both markets and started my own prices placing Ce at the cost of 15k+, and placing bids at 13k Crowns. This worked for about 30 minutes or so, but most players just posted offers to cell Ce for around 5k or 6k Crowns. The prices which are already meet at an equilibrium price is usually how the prices stay unless a huge demand change happens.

8. Players feel that boycotting and not buying Ce will lower the price, but the counter argument with this is cant Ce sellers stop selling Ce? The problem is that Ce is more useful (and always will be since it is worth real $$), and people will not stop buying Ce for crowns who are addicted to this game already.

9. Ce and Crowns wil never be equal value that would make Ce worthless and well Three Rings no money. Ce will always have the bigger advantage over Crowns (My opinion).

Personal View of Greed in this game:

Players argue that a person holding more than 20k+ Ce that they are greedy or that someone charging over 6k Crowns for 100 ce is greedy. Now the whole question is are the players who play for free greedy because they feel that Ce itself worthless? As a paying player in my view I feel 7k to 8k Crowns per 100 ce is reasonable price, but players will call me greedy for that, but I can easily argue that with that’s how much I feel my dollar is worth in the sense of crowns. Both parties want to get the most out of this game. The paying players want to get the most crowns out of their dollar and the F2p Players want to get the most Ce at the cheapest price possible thus an equilibrium price is set due to the demand and supply in the market. Greed is not controlling the market it is only supply and demand.

My Solution:

There is no solution to this problem because I do not see a problem. We can argue that the prices are way to much for the new players in this game some players call them (newbs), but they can save up crowns for 3 days worth of ME and still buy 100 mist energy. Okay, well now does that not sound fair? Why don’t players give out gear to these new players?

So this is what I think should be added which can help out new players will not change the market at all, but still keep this game going:

Runescape had something called Party Rooms (Party Pete):

Which allowed players to host drop parties: In these parties you can drop gear, money, and usables and players have to be lucky to pick it up. Now this would not change the game fully at all may not even change the market but it gives players an option to host “drop parties” which can help these new players out.

Another Idea: Which I think ultimately helps long-term and short-term:

Player Vs Player (WILD)

Runescape: (I added modifications in the Rs Wild to match with Sk)

We had something called the wild and in the wild once you entered you will lose all the gear you have equipped, but in Sk we can not have this happen (Trinkets can not be droppable and the items in your two extra or one extra weapon slot should not be droppable either). So what I suggest is a HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE Area for players to eneter I would say it would have to be the size of 8 Arcades. Each “wild” area will have entrances one for 1* to 2* gear another for 3* to 4* gear and the last one for 4* to 5* gear. So you have to have certain * gear to enter into certain rooms. (Basically a full 5* player can not enter 1* to 2* room unless all the gear they have equipped is 1* and 2*). So this is how it works, you enter the Wild Arena in entering you are risking the same amount like all the other players.

Have area’s in the map which are 1 vs 1 and areas which are x vs x (does not matter how many people attack 1 person). To show the difference in the areas it can be showed on the bottom right hand of the screen showing 1 skull as in 1 vs 1 and 2 skulls as in 1 vs 20+.

So this will improve guilds as well =)

How do the items drop? The person who does majority of the damage to the player who died will receive in-game mail (sent automatically to them) with the attachments of Weapons, Armors, Helms, and Shields they have on.

Drops:

All the item drops are unbounded, but to stop people from cheating the system buying Uv’s with certain gear which is already bound and getting past the unbound system they will add soon I would make it that only two items of the items worn will be unbound, and the same player can only kill you 3 times a day.

Entering/Leaving:

To enter you obviously go through the arena door once in the Arena there will be a 2 inch wall (which will be see through kinda like the ones you see in the game for example FSC when you have teh 4 buttons each button opens up a key, but the wall(see-through protects you from monsters aka Skellies). which is basically a safe area due to load time and such.

The safe area is always open so you can run back and forth in into it...will have the exit as well.

How does this help the market?

People who die will re-make their gear will or may need to re-buy materials which they need crowns for.

If the basic gear is lets say 3* or 4* gear to pvp in people will buy in bulk of this gear who like the pvp and due to this people can sell these items for $ which also improves the market.

Breakdown Example:

Basic Pvp Gear is: Dusker Set or Ash Tail Set:

Now players who die and lose this armor base will need more they can either craft it to re-gain a certain uv they had (mainly resistance uv's and higher defense uv's) which will cause those uv's to go up in price which makes uv crafters a bit more cash, and it can cause people who retain the drops if they wish to sell it a pretty penny. Also, if people end up buying bulk sets of these it will cause high demand of them which can cause prices to go up as well.

Drops will allow players to sell the goods at any price they wish and this is basically free crowns for that player.

I do not think that most players will use 5* gear, but mainly it will be 3* to 4*

I do not think this will change the market in a HUGE way, but it may help to change the market a bit.

In addition to this I would add the following:

I would make all the maps give more crowns but it would be a 15% increase of the current rate, and it would have to be for only the regular maps not jelly king and Vanna.

Overall:

Out of my two suggestions I guess the last one is the better one, and the first suggestion. My first suggestion basically allows players to pvp and gain items which they can possibly sell in the market to make cash.

Ign:

Njthug

The currency system in Spiral Knights (SK) is similar to that of another of OOO's games, Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates (YPP). Crowns and energy exist in the form of poe and doubloons respectively, yet YPP does not have the same outcry over doubloon prices as over here. Yet the same currency does not work in SK as well as it does in YPP because of fundamental differences in gameplay and design. I will use crowns and energy in place of poe and doubloons in some areas for quantitative examples.

What do you think about energy system is flawed and why do you think so?

From comparison of YPP and SK, the major flaws in this game are likely how free to play/new players are introduced into this game, similar payouts between tiers, and not enough crown sinks.
The two games handle new players, i.e. new knights, in a very different way from each other. In YPP, the only ways to make in game money starting fresh, are pillaging or navying. Both of these options take time to actually play the game, and depending on one's skill, can take a while to acquire enough money to purchase energy. Energy is never seen or touched by the new player until he or she decides to pay cash or buy off the market. A balance exists between playtime and energy costs because of this. In SK, the new players get started with a mist tank, which regenerates on its own everyday, requiring zero playtime. The 100 energy in the mist tank will eventually turn into CE one way or another. For many players, it will pay elevator fees, turn into crowns, which then buy CE. Whether the cycle takes one day or two days is the only variable. Crowns are injected into the game world without any cost at all in the form of mist.
Second, similarity between tiers reduces the need for skilled playing. Referring to the payout threads, levels before Basil pay little and those after pay a lot. The reasons to journey tier 3 (non-vanaduke) instead of tier 2 are primarily for recipes and materials, not extra crowns and heat. Stratums 2, 4, and 6 have similar payouts on a per level per type basis.
Finally, as Sinxeno said in his post, there simply aren't enough recurring or operating crown sinks. The only recurring crown sinks are taxes on both the auction house and energy markets. The major crown sinks are simply capital costs, e.g. recipes and 4-5* crafts. Once I buy a vog cub coat recipe, I will never have to spend that 25000 crowns again. Once I make a vog cub coat, I will never have to make another one again, and it is mine to use forever. In YPP, higher value items require a greater amount of poe (crowns) and those crowns make up a greater portion of the total cost of the item. For fancy items in YPP, the cost in crowns will far exceed the cost in energy, e.g. gold clothes, familiars. In SK, the crowns seem to make up a constant proportion of the crafting cost, from 2 to 5*, excluding recipe costs since those are bought only once per person.
YPP has an in game economy that is not present in SK to the same degree. The economy in YPP keeps the crown/energy relationship stable. From my experience on YPP, I have seen doubloons cost as low as 600 poe and as high as 2500 poe for one. Yet, equilibrium will always be reached, the price will never continue to skyrocket nor drop. Whether this is because people are buying less or the doubloon hoarders are selling more, I do not know for sure.

Where do you think the value of energy/crowns comes from?

I have to agree with Father-Creamy that it depends on how fast the average player can make crowns to buy energy. I believe the intention of using CE as the currency rather than subscription was to both make 4-5* equipment harder to acquire for free players and also as a way to speed up the acquisition of items for those who wanted to pay more.

Do you think the interface of the energy system should be changed? How would you change it and how do you think it may alleviate the problem?

The interface is fine, the problem is too many people are buying CE off the market and the amount of sellers cannot keep up. In YPP, making anything and doing anything will sink crowns, and a lot of them in fact. At every stage in production, crowns will be sunk. The primary sink in SK, the elevator fee, is energy only.

My solution would be similar to what other people have said in this thread, turn elevator fees from an energy sink to a crown sink. Make stratum 1 free so new players can get in with their proto gear, and introduce a fee from stratum 2 on, increasing as you get deeper by stratum. Naturally, the crown payouts per level will have to be rebalanced, but requiring crowns for entry and differentiating between tiers should keep CE from skyrocketing. Since CE can only come from people who have paid and are willing to sell, it does not make sense to me to have energy be the only factor that determines how much I can play. Especially since the reward I get for playing is crowns.