T1 players generate crowns? Really now? Maybe go ahead and take a pen and paper and write down how much you actually do from those runs before you jump the gun like that.

@jooozek
Each T1 player generates roughly 400 crowns for every level they run since most of them don't really know how to maximize crowns when they run. That's 4000 crowns per day per player assuming they stop running when they hit zero mist (as many seem to do because they don't yet understand they can buy CE for crowns and keep playing; and if they are only making 4000 crowns per 100 ce, it won't help them anyway.)

Multiply that 4000 per day by 1000 or so new players and you have 4 million crowns a day being poured into the economy. And don't tell me there's only 1000ish players delving right now, I know that. But it's not the -same- 1000ish players from morning to night. Well, not -all- of them are the same, especially if they log off after spending their 100 mist.

(CE Price: 6550)
Cycle 1 (On Mist)

D1-232
D2-242
D3-344

D5-1061
D6-755
D7-813

3447

Cycle 2

D1-232
D2-242
D3-344

D5-1061 (5326:End Mist)
D6-755 (-6550=-1224 )
D7-813

Net Gain:344CR, 80CE (5240)

---------------------------
6894cr (2 Cycles)
-7860cr (120 Energy)
---------
-966

Death 1 - 131cr
Death 2 - 262cr
Death 3 - 524cr

No Danger Rooms (often results in death to newbies, didn't see one anyway)
All breakables opened
No mats sold (players that either 1) need those mats for crafting or 2) Dislike using or don't understand the AH

As you can see, completely F2P players are essentially relegated to 2 cycles a day. Any attempt to run more is a net decrease in CR.

While I understand that the AH is a potentially good source for extra CR, I don't believe it's fair that it should be a requirement. Nor do I think it fair that the average 8-12 year old has to have a high school class in economics to understand why he can't play his 'free' game without losing money.

I am forming a coalition of players who are willing to dedicate their time and resources to manage the market for a fair ce / cr exchange.

http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/10694

Please post here or talk to me in game Captain-Teemo for more details.

I believe that as an unorganized group, the general player base will simply succumb to the forces that exploit our market, but through an organized effort of even a few ppl we can impact our economy on the same level they can. We are not asking any CE or USD investments to begin, simply that you are willing to dedicate some time and resources to this project.

Please read the thread for more details: http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/10694

solution:

Don't make offers to buy CE for the current price that it is, if everybody remove's their bids then prices would fall instantly, then the buyers would have the upper hand on dictating terms.
We the players and crown spending CE buyers must be in contact with one another to organize such a boycott and in effect kill the buyers market for CE. This would in effect 're-start' the market, would it not?

If the buying side of the market said,,
hold on we dont wana buy your energy for 6000+ crowns, 'everyone removes bids'.
The new bid price would be 0 (zero) in effect having no buying bids.
Then the sellers would have to reduce their prices to coincide with the price buyers want to buy energy for,
In effect returning the CE market to 'normal'.

@SConnery it would need to be more than just the forum readers to influence such a movement, but if the word can be spread far enough then it would have a very very very large impact. Although one downside could be:

That people who are controlling the high end CE market selling prices could in effect create walls on the buying side,
This would keep the buying side's prices very high even though nobody else is 'buying' CE in effect keeping prices high.

This being said why doesn't each player have a limit of 10 or 20 'ACTIVE' trades at one time to help reduce the blow.
So you have a maximum of 20 trades to buy, 20 trades to sell or any combination of 20trades between the buying and selling
This would minimize walls, since the top players couldn't post 100+ CE walls, and it would negate the effect of selling 100CE (bids) and then re-buying 100 more.

This is all just things i have thought in my head. sorry if i copied anyone's ideas.

@shidara At a certain point i believe that the amount/number of offers for CE to be bought ( the offer side, left hand side) will drop off, since everybody is competing to gain their 100CE first or to be the top of the pile.

As i have seen to be the case from my observations, i believe it will be much like the selling side of the CE market, once the market progresses about 100 Cr above the current offer. eg: 100CE for 6100 cr, then it jumps to say 100CE for 6200Cr the resulting offers above the 6200cr is like, 6300, 6600, 7000 since players dont have bids in waiting.

So if a large enough push from rich enough players were able to drive down prices effectively it could keep the market down for a period of time... and, lets say for argument sake, the prices drop to half of what they are currently Eg: the prices are 7000cr per 100.
If we worked together the actual losses for people who sell off all their energy could be negated, since if i have 10k CE i could sell it all off for 700K Cr, Then the other play will buy out 10K worth of CE driving the prices to 3500Cr per 100CE.
The player who sold up at the 'peak' would have 700KCr and buying 10KCE is only 350KCr per 10KCE in effect getting all of their 10Kce bakc and the player who drove prices down also..... to give them their 10KCE.
This would create a wall at the 3500Cr mark of 1000Bids.....

But the flip side, we would need a separate team of sellers selling at the lower price to then make a wall so that prices dont instantly jump back to the 6000cr per 100 mark,,
Hopefully that makes sense... and that everybody understands... this could work.. if my math and ideas work hahahaha.....

@Senshi :P Fair enough. Even so, though, I'd say economy's not among most players first picks for classes in high school :P. I know I never took a class like that, I just sorta picked stuff up as a I went along.

Spiral Knights does LOOK like a game a younger person would enjoy, I wouldn't be surprised if there were more younger people on than the ToS was, ah, hoping to prevent.

Let's see if I've got this right...

To manipulate the price downward, you'd need to start off with very, very large amounts of CE.
Then you need to reduce the buying side's prices, by filling all their orders. So you open the trade tab, go to where it says "Need Crowns?" And click the hell out of that button for several minutes.

Then, you visit the Market section, and with another heaping pile of CE, place a mountain of sell-CE-for-Crowns offers on the right side to match the new deflated price... for at least ten different very close price points surrounding your primary wall, so nobody can even see the old high prices.

It is doubtful that one person has enough CE to pull this off. I guess that's why you need several people doing it at once in a concerted effort.

And, of course, there is no guarantee that the new prices will stick.

The "problem" (if you view it as one) is twofold:
1) The energy market has a fairly large amount of inertia, and once it sits down at a new high, it tends to stay put until some rich guy tries to kick it in one direction or the other. The new recent highs demonstrate that- a couple of rich, bored players pushed the market up, and it has stayed high since.
2) The natural equilibrium of the energy market is somewhere just under what the average player is able to earn from using 100 energy in the Clockworks. Note that I say average, not median. The relatively smaller percentage of T3 players are raising that average by quite a bit, so what happens is that the majority of players (mostly newer folks) are left in the dust because they simply can't raise 70+ crowns for each CE they spend, and are thus restricted to mist (or forced to purchase with $). It is this latter point that is crucial- richer, geared out players earn more crowns for the CE they spend. It doesn't take a genius to see what this leads to.

Is it a "problem" like the OP says it is? Maybe I'm being a cynical bastard when I say it doesn't bother me, because I only have few pieces of 5* gear left to craft and a decent bank account in game (also a F2Per here). From my point of view, games like this come and go- if CE prices are the death of SK, so be it; I have plenty of things to occupy my time with, including healthier options like going for a bike ride. I've had many enjoyable hours of gameplay, and look forward to many more, but if that doesn't happen then I have no regrets either. Props to TRD for making a great game, and here's to hoping they'll think of a way to keep it alive.

OP, you can't "wall" prices downward. As soon as you try you'll instantly be liquidated as people simply turn your stock over for a profit. The system is at its own equilibrium. Unless you do something to disrupt the cause of the equilibrium any money that you dump into the market is just going to shoot out the other side. It's possible to artificially deflate a market like you're talking about but it's gonna take a whole lot more than 40k for a market this size.

Buyers cannot 'take control' of the market like this. You are asking for players to not buy CE above a certain price - that means -not buying CE- indefinitely. This is not going to happen - players that want to keep running and can afford it, are going to buy CE, they are not going to hold off in order to bring the price down for others. Players that want to craft are going to buy CE, they are not going to put off crafting indefinitely in the hopes that they can buy CE at a lower price someday. Players that want to ragecraft and auction off UVs are going to laugh at the very notion of putting off buying CE for any time at all - they're turning that CE around into a profit as long as their materials hold out.

When players are frustrated enough with the crown/CE ratio, they will run on mist only, ragecraft less as it becomes less or not profitable, plan personal crafting carefully and not wildly experiment with any 5* line that catches their eye, or possibly quit the game. All of these things happened when CE was over 7k, and will happen again when CE goes over 7k again (at which point the rise in CE price will slow because people are actually using less CE). The only thing that is going to stop history from repeating itself here is if three rings makes changes to the economy (reduced CE sinks or increased crown sinks) before then. And they should - the CE stable price should be lower than the price at which players start quitting the game because of it, and crowns should be important enough that people have an incentive to sell CE. The only reason CE is as cheap as it is now is a large influx of players buying starter packs - as those players are becoming all-UV all-5* geared T3 running players, they have no incentive to sell CE ever again and the ratio of new/old players is unlikely to beat the ratio that came from the influx that was the opening of the steamgate.

Ohhh such a newbie, I should have known better. Guess you cant sell the daily 100 mist and stockpile cash to buy it back later to upgrade your equipment. You can only do it by paying out cash per piece. For a f2p mmo this one can get pretty expensive if your not paying attention. So yea, i'll stick with level 3 and 4 equipment running JK once every day. Oh well.

Hate to be a buzzkill, wait no I don't but anyways, your never going to be able to keep the price down, no matter what you do. The vast majority of players don't read the forums.

Selling CE for cheap is only a temporary fix. The prices will just go back up. See, the problem is, people may sell for cheap, but those offers will be bought up very quickly. The amount of people buying low is much higher than the amount selling low. And eventually, the people who are selling low, will be buying back their energy, thus increasing the price again. Most people don't use real money as their primary source of CE, they use crowns.

As far as helping individual lower knights progress. This will only bring in more people buying energy with crowns. Thus increasing demand, and also prices.

Most fixes are only temporary. The only permanent fix, would be a "set" price on energy. Three Rings wont do this, because then they lose money. If prices go sky high, players wont have much choice but to buy CE with money, rather than crowns. If all of SK had an agreed upon price, where we ALWAYS buy and sell, then that would work, but it may take a lot longer to fulfill all the Energy orders, or vice versa.

... Can't we complain about something else for once?