What would the effect of SC items becoming tradeable be on the economy?

I'm just curious. >.> I think it sounds pretty win-win if all the SC items were tradeable. Krono broke the "selling in game items to other players for cash" barrier (in a limited but sneaky, launder your own money way) so heck, why not? People who are strapped for cash can farm plat, people who are working too much can sell SC items. It would fluctuate massively during sales and SC events, but ya know, more money for SOE = more content, better hardware for the game to run on, etc... (and those pesky dramas about who ripped off who in unsupported SC code or SC item gifting for plat would disappear.)

Alternatively, why not make Krono have an option to use it for SC instead of game time? Or create a new token item that stands for SC the same way krono stands for game time?
Why not make a similar token item like krono so players can buy/sell expansions?

I see no reason not to. already people can "gift" sc items to other people provided both accounts are gold- which in effect allows a person to sell the gift for plat. I truly don't see the difference other than less people being ripped off by unscrupulous "gifters"

it'd be like them offering triple SC & letting expansions & subs get bought with SC n_n

Please explain. Someone buys an SC card and puts item purchased for SC on broker. How does that equal triple SC? Someone with plat and not $$ buys it, it's pretty much same as krono effectively.

ok maybe i was wrong ;| ;p

but my feeling was that it'd be needless market saturation from accounts with unused SC...

...like, if someone wanted the item badly enough, they could have it gifted to them or purchase it from their own SC pool.

though in reality i guess im wrong? ;'{ ehehe.

Oh...Players like me who get 500 SC per month and only ever spend it on char slots (which never seem to go on sale anymore since they're a "service") could get some plat. Hrm. Not that I need plat. Got more than I know what to do with as it is.

is there a cap on character slots or nay?

Don't think there's a cap on char slots. Heard of some silly numbers too, like over 30.

Wish I could give you a definitive answer on that one. While I have over 50 toons, they are distributed among three accounts. The most that I have on a single account (not including characters on the Test Server) is 22.

lmfao, that's pretty krazy bruv O_O

I think this would really hurt the game. If SC items were tradeable then there might be an initial flurry of sales, but at some point the market would get flooded.

The difference with krono is that they are a consumable. And gifting SC items has the bonus that they are non-tradeable once received by the buyer.

From a business standpoint, SOE does not want to get into any situation where another company (i.e. Walmart) is controlling their revenue stream. If there were any way to convert SC into subscription time...then you just watch for Walmart sales or double SC weekends or similar events and you stock up on subscription time for cheap. Then the revenue stream dries up and SOE has problems. I know a couple people that still have a year or two of time remaining from when you could buy gold time with SC.

As long as all SC items are atunable.

How do you handle housing items though to prevent it from being resold? Place them in crates?

As long as items become account bound once they are equipped / used, I see no problem with it. In general I think I like it but I question if it causes more problems for soe's fraud department.

I've been out of game for a long while...how often does SC go on sale? I know there was a 50% off on the fourth, but a one day sale isn't going to disrupt things for long. Personally I don't think that they should mess around with an item. Let SC be transferable via the trade window. This game needs a little more character interaction anyway (out side of guilds). I'd restrict it to gold members though.

Also, do the expansions ever go on sale? or is Age of Discover always going to be $40? I made the mistake of actually buying some SC on the fourth not knowing that I can no longer use it on expansions. Oh well...not a big deal. I'll find something to spend it on (I only bought 2500 for $12.50)

I say open the SC, or just the SC items, to trading...then just stop the discounts of it or reserve them for special days...like the July 4th holiday...and bring back using SC to buy expansions. If I am subscribed long enough to get enough "free" SC to buy an expansion, well, I think I deserve it. Well...maybe let some one pay up to 50% of the cost via SC. I know the expansions are a lot of work, but anytime SC is involved there has been some funds paid to SOE in some manner.

SC goes on sale around 5 or 6 times a year.

Expansions never go on sale. They only get included in future expansion packs. They've been a big source of income for SOE and having them and subscriptions available on SC was a big mistake that cost them a lot of money. Your subscription pays for continued development of the game as well as all the technical costs associated with running an MMO. You don't deserve anything other than what they offer and they offer quite a bit already.

This can already be done effectively through gifting, why spend the resources coding in something that is already available in game via another mechanism.

I personally believe the real focus of the OP post is being able to buy expansions with SC, see the OP's second part of the post.

This is a redundant application that imo is a waste of developer resources.

People already turn plat into SC when others sell the SC card codes in game. These other ideas would be redundant.

Well, I don't know...would they rather I bought the expansion using 50% SC (which would either come from at least four months of paid subscription or else most likely purchased at $.01 per 1 SC), or I could not buy it at all. I don't have the last two expansions...and I may never. However, I would have at least one of them right now if I could have used SC to pay for half of it...maybe both.

Or how about this, keep the base cost of the expansion the same, but let SC be used to buy the "upgraded" version of the expansion that gets you some extra goodies.

I don't believe SoE would worry about that any more, just look at what happens in game each and every day, people get away with selling plat openly for things other than the SoE approved Kronos, people get away with openly admitting to account sharing, people get away with making a mockery of the naming policy and so on.

How about letting them get their money's worth out of all the work they do?

Just to give an example of how bad an idea SC for subs was, people were able to work the system and get a year for a little over a dollar. Around the time AoD was released, there was a triple cash sale and people were able to pick it up for a third of the price. SC for certain services is a mistake they won't be making again.

There has been at least two sales including character slots twice in the last few months with about 30% off IIRC
Father's Day and one from March.