It's time to do something about our Money Obsession.

[Drix]

Back at it again with the giant essays gg

HAHAHAAHHAA

[Arslan]

Its all about the doh.

[Nathan]

No thanks.

[JDC]

@Kacper_Gorski

I suggest adding a limit to the properties of being able to own I.e 5 Buisnesses, 5 Houses?

This is something I want to see added. Exactly what @Julio. said:

I liked it back when you could only own one car, one house, one business etc. Meant you have to put a lot of thought into what you actually bought.

Not to mention that there's honestly no point to owning 18 houses. This is a server with limited properties, and you only need one house or bizz, a few at most. It's fine to get rich, but do people really have to be excessively greedy? No.

It won't change anything at all, absolutely nothing. (...) Roleplay doesn't even exist here anymore. (...) It's sad, that's why so many left.

@Satoshi:

The precise purpose of this topic is to discuss possible solutions. If you're just going to say "things are shitty, it's why people left and more are leaving, and we can't do anything about it" then it is best you either shut up or start contributing something substantial to the discussion. If we cannot do anything, what is the point of continuing as Argonath in the first place? Of being able to open topics like this and discuss ideas? Of being able to make changes?

In case you got lost somewhere in the wall of text, I'll repeat a point from the first post: this is something no single group or person can solve, and that we all have to do this together. Ordinary players and individuals will have to do their part by contributing to player interaction ingame, being the change they want to see, and participating in discussions about changes at the "higher" levels of player groups and HQ / scripts.

Instead of burying a community that isn't dead yet, try doing something to help, because you can.


@Stivi:

No, the purpose of property taxes is making sure players are playing to be able to keep their properties, because if they don't play, then they don't make money, then they can't pay tax, and then they lose the property. Really it's better than the old system, but I'll rewrite that same sentence underlining something important:

No, the purpose of property taxes is making sure players are playing to be able to keep their properties, because if they don't play, then they don't make money, then they can't pay tax, and then they lose the property.

Your premise on this point is exactly the same as mine. Property taxes are there to make sure properties are owned by active players, and "active players" presumes that the said players are playing to keep what they have. I don't see where the contradiction is here.

About the dickheads, ughm, yeah, you can call them whatever you want, but you don't know the reason why that happens, or how the server regulations kinda force you into, and then again it's pretty allowed. Also, this was a problem in RS4 too, but then it was in 3 months, not 2. So we're making progress, but this isn't an issue.

I wasn't talking about players who suddenly have to go inactive only for a month or couple of months, then come back. I was talking about people who haven't been active at all for a really long time and only login just to pay taxes and avoid foreclosure. They reap benefits that should only go to active players, without putting in any effort to actually play, which is completely unfair to active players.

Start removing people's cash on ban too.

This is a good idea. Assuming it is implemented to take more money from those with networth, with safeguards against this happening for mistake bans, it can discourage longtime players from rulebreaking and be a money sink: hitting two birds with one stone.

There really was potential for this server, now it's just a huge fuckup after fuckup, and people are trying to fix it, but I have the feeling that it's too late.

As long as there are people playing here who want things to improve, it is never too late. Unless we all magically lost our balls, then we can go beyond complaining and start participating.

And yes, while players are also at fault, responsibility is also on the HQ. But with current staff who are pushing for improvement (such as @Chase asking for input to fix the economy), our opportunity to solve things as a community has also improved. Let's make use of it.


@djole:

that's already a thing, taxes are calculated based on property value. which i'm sure you're aware of already

Picture out two players, one with a networth of ARD2 Million and the other with a networth of ARD 20 Million. Both of them should be able to buy a business that costs ARD1,900,000. For Player #1, the business will take almost all of his money. For player #2, it is a drop in the bucket and he can continue sitting comfortably.

The point made by @Rei and Chase was that the taxes should continue to challenge players even if you money-farm your way up to absurdly rich levels. Imposing taxes based on property value alone defeats the point of taxing more from those worth more; filthy-rich players still get the same taxes as somewhat-rich players, yet are hardly affected in comparison. That's why people can just farm a (couple) dozen million and sit their ass off comfortably for the rest of the game, which defeats the purpose of continuing challenges.


@TheGreasyChopper:

Pretty much this. There are a few people who contribute positively, however when you try to break the status quo of Meth, Weed, Kidnap, you pretty much get most of the groups/argonath playerbase against you.

Unless you are a sheep without a mind of your own who can only go with what others tell you to do, then you can keep trying. I am in the process of reviving Argonath Express to contribute to news / journalism RP on the server, with a few decent stories and a list of people to (re-)recruit already in line. You and everyone else can bring in more ideas too.

Creativity is driven by players bringing forward new ideas or breathing new life into old ones, and I hope people haven't forgotten about this already — it's what enabled us to create our community and make it last.

Back at it again with the giant essays gg

it's just like old times

Some things never change.

[JDC]

I propose we do nothing.

No thanks.

Care to elaborate? @Reckless @Nathan

[AK47]

Instead of burying a community that isn't dead yet, try doing something to help, because you can.

Isn't it dead tho, I mean peaking with 30-ish players and 70% is either doing weed, meth or being AFK

[Nathan]

Care to elaborate? @Reckless @Nathan

I work to earn money. I spend my money how I like. No further elaboration needed.

[Deka]

Isn't it dead tho, I mean peaking with 30-ish players and 70% is either doing weed, meth or being AFK

That's what you meet when you come online at Argonath's nighttime, but mostly people are still roleplaying in the daytime at least that's what I see now, and yes, either they are doing meth or weed that's because they don't have any choices because the server is dead at nighttime, and here comes the Money-Farming.

[JDC]

Isn't it dead tho, I mean peaking with 30-ish players and 70% is either doing weed, meth or being AFK

For this problem, HQ will also have to adjust scripts. But while they cannot directly fix players' mentality, they can either incentivize them into doing more things that require actual player interaction, discourage them from doing things that don't require it at all, or both.

Our dev team is a small group of scripters, limited in number. But they are plenty of us who can also think of improvements. We can start by contributing more ideas and solutions, which will better help the HQ to implement positive changes.

I work to earn money. I spend my money how I like. No further elaboration needed.

I did not say there is a problem with earning money and spending it as you see fit in itself. The problem is people doing it to the extent of a money obsession that compromises the quality of RP / player interaction on the server.

If you understand what the difference is but want to let the money obsession continue, then you are part of the problem. If you don't understand the difference, then think on it some more before you get around to helping.

[Nathan]

I did not say there is a problem with earning money and spending it as you see fit in itself. The problem is people doing it to the extent of a money obsession that compromises the quality of RP / player interaction on the server.

If you understand what the difference is but want to let the money obsession continue, then you are part of the problem. If you don't understand the difference, then think on it some more before you get around to helping.

That's a poor man's line of thinking: "Let's take away from the rich because they have already too much."

[JDC]

That's a poor man's line of thinking: "Let's take away from the rich because they have already too much."

Are you seriously using that to justify players' money obsession compromising the server's environment?

In case you forgot (which, as the member of the administration, you shouldn't) this is an RPG server, not a money-making server or the RL economy. Money should complement player interaction, the latter being what we are here for; not become the centerpiece of it.

I hardly care about my bank numbers, and I can easily money-farm myself filthy rich if I want to. Rather, I am concerned about the problem I pointed out above. And if you want things to improve, you should be too. But if you don't, then I will have to second-guess your willingness to help this community, because this topic is discussing a real, grave problem acknowledged by many from regular players up to our developers.

[Huntsman]

I never thought I'd see the day that VC:MP will become the second most active server, but here it is. Both IVMP and VCMP have taken over SA:MP when it comes to activity. I've went back to SA:MP a few times to try and find out what happened to the server I once loved so much, and it quickly made sense to me when I saw the only online cop being kidnapped by Gvardia's.

It's not just about the money, it's about the playerbase. It's about the mentality of the new playerbase and their lack of understanding. It is no longer about making the roleplay enjoyable for everyone, it's about making the roleplay enjoyable for YOU and yourself only, maybe your group as well. No communication, no understanding of each other, no willing to make compromises. These are not the same players I had so much fun with back in 2012-2015.

It's not the scripts that most people love to blame all of the SAMP's issues on. It's that your playerbase saw a huge degradation in quality since the veteran players and roleplay groups that used to make the server enjoyable left, and their vacancy was half filled with an influx of new players that do not understand the concept of what made Argonath fun - mutual satisfaction.

So in a nuttshell, stop blaming the HQ and stop blaming the scripts. It's your own fault, you chose your mentality to be this way. You chose that a Weedfield TDM is more fun than roleplay interaction, you chose that Mafia vs Mafia TDM is more fun than roleplay. Nobody chose it for you, especially not the HQ.

However, on the HQ's side, if they want to improve the situation, their very first step should be to remove the groups script. It makes no sense. What happened to building your "empire" solely out of your own resources that you put ROLEPLAY into achieving? Now when all you have to do is gather some members, do a few piss poor roleplays and you have yourself script support, no wonder nobody wants to Roleplay anymore when its not required to achieve something.

[JackDockz]

their very first step should be to remove the groups script.

Yeah. If you wanna be in groups, you can always role-play that like in ivmp. Change your name to the group and roleplay being a part of it.
Only the most noticeably active groups that roleplay should scripted with a regular check on their activity. Inactive groups are now just being used to hold vehicles and what not.
SA:MP has so much of potential but still the players ruined it somehow. There are literally so few players who actually concentrate on the role playing aspect of this "roleplay" server.
IV:MP and maybe even VC:MP has players who atleast try to roleplay whenever they can instead of just logging on to make money or to kill some other groups members.
Also, spending hours on a weed field and killing cops is no fun anymore even from the cop side. Every weed field that is discovered ends up in a shootout and its not fun anymore. Also its not like that cops should be exist as an army of men who have mission only to kill criminals. I have seen cops who are just here to kill criminals cuz they get free weapons.
I dont really care about money here, I am more into roleplay and interactions with other players because thats the reason i play this game.
But once again player mentality comes in the way and changing player mentality is not easy and i am damn sure that many of the money grinders wont even bother to take any kind of advice from this topic because they just have hours to waste in money grinding instead of having some fun and role-playing.

[Kowalski.]

I gotta agree with Huntsman on the scripts. I know that much.


If a group comes IG and role-plays a little, HQ will give em cars, HQ and more? What the hell?

That's like Maddy requesting rights for Callahan Security, just HQ would accept it 

Anyway, script support should be for huge groups like Sforza, TCL, R*, TeaM, Gvardia and others.

Someone can't make new groups willy-nilly and get script support for it just like that. What is the Server HQ doing?

[Hammer_]

Someone can't make new groups willy-nilly and get script support for it just like that. What is the Server HQ doing?

No one gets script support for free. You've to post role-play pictures and have to wait at least 1 month. If you don't have role-play pictures included with you for days, the group will be delayed, like us, many months after our group got scripted because of RP delay. So, just for your info, no one gets free script support.