Regarding Selling

First of all, let me say that this server is, well, my Minecraft home. I've never seriously gotten into Minecraft enough to join a community and actively have plans for the future. For that, thanks.

Anyway.

After the introduction of a Resource Realm, JavaWarlord, Benislav, and I briefly discussed the benefits and purpose to an economy system on a server. Currently, it seems like people just don't buy things. Maybe it's just me, but this seems to be the case on a lot of servers that I've visited. Sure, players are able to sell things, but people would rather hoard or have the most money. No one wants to buy diamonds if they can easily mine them for themselves. Also, I find that I give away items to people who offer to buy them. It just doesn't seem to be worth the trouble to charge people when there's no point in having so much money.

We began to talk about adding novelty items for purchase. If I could buy some unique item with a huge chunk of currency, I know that I'd collect as many as I could to build a cool structure. Beyond bedrock, sponge, and cracked stone brick, I'm not sure what other possibilities are available. Titles? Capes? I really don't know.

To make my point, I should also mention my thoughts on the /sell command. As it is right now, when you /sell an item, you receive currency and the item disappears. This eliminates the benefit of selling to other players, because /selling is instant. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the same goes for the server shops. I almost wish that there was more of a benefit to selling, especially to the server.

Still with me? Here's my idea:

Allow server shops. I'm sure people will still use them, and it encourages villages and groups. Allow players to purchase novelty items for huge prices. Expand the server shop at spawn, but make the prices much lower. Remove the /sell command or reduce the prices significantly to keep people selling to each other. Lastly, use the resources that are sold to the server to build structures at spawn. I'm sure administrating leaves little time to relax and build, so maybe designate a player or 2 to be the server builders.

To summarize my point, I'd like to see a benefit to selling to the server shop. I'd also like to see the server improve as I contribute.

I agree with most points here.  /sell is another command that was never really meant to be used, but unlike /back and /nick, it's not one I'm too keen on allowing people to use just because they've been allowed it in the past.  I see the economy as a central tie-in to the community, and that's how I'd like it to work.  I'm going to work on removing the ability to remotely use /sell, and I'm very interested in compiling a team of people who wish to overhaul spawn.  Up until this point, spawn has really been a few projects in the center by Cheese and my (with the generous help of joe and Astri,) building of the rail station.  I really am interested in seeing who'd be up for helping out with spawn.

I, for one, would be delighted to help with spawn. Do you think it would be good to permit the builders to only use those donated/sold items?

I don't know who suggested this - maybe it was Java. It would be nice if we could purchase blocks for claiming. I know that I'd love to build more, but I'm limited by block space right now.

As far as purchasing goes, you should be able to.  Try /buyclaimblocks.

I agree. I don't really see any reason for the server to buy or sell any physical items that anyone could get on their own. Physical items should only be sold / traded between players.

The server selling items that CANNOT be normally obtained? Great! I can get behind that. Also, the server should sell non-physical items such as (for example) land blocks, /back, and /warp functions.

Now, the only part I am still mulling over, with players exchanging money and items, and the server providing money sinks, how do we get new money into player hands?

I think iConomy allows wealth to grow over time, but I'm not sure this would cause much other than inflation.  So far, the main purpose of the server shop is to act as a money sink and generator, mostly the latter.  Beyond that, I'm not exactly sure.  As far as selling non-obtainables in the server shop goes, this is something I've been totally up for for a while.  I was very much planning on selling saddles and name tags after the next update, as I think that making them dungeon-exclusive is interesting for single player, but practically useless for multiplayer.

i agree

I am all in favor of an active economy, I am more of a person that likes to build over long sessions and am not one to be found in the mines.  That being said, please be aware that in my case as it pertains to Minecraft add-on's, I know nothing.   I literally have 1 diamond currently, and the idea of being able to buy items is appealing to me so I don't have to stop building.  I was browsing the /help menu (which obviously doesn't exist on the XB360) to try and find out how to get things rolling, but I couldn't figure it out.     I wanted to buy a saddle so I could get one of the horses near the spawn while they were there.  Is there a thread that clearly lays out the commands and intricacies of the mods; I don't need my hand held, but I do need to know what it is I am specifically using.  

TL:DR -  There is a lot of intrest on my end, just lack of understanding how it works.  

                                        "Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, Simplify, Simplify!"  - Henry David Thoreau