Forums » Suggestions
Banks independent of Guilds
Guilds are great but it's sort of a one size fits all collection of associates. My suggestion is for independent banks around which other collectives can form, that can overlap multiple guilds, or no guilds, as the members see fit. An analogy would be a corporation but there might be a better or more general term.
People can belong to any number of these things, and membership in one is only known by the other members.
People can belong to any number of these things, and membership in one is only known by the other members.
+1 Should be easier to rob dat way!
I think Breazle made a plugin long time ago to create an independent bank system...
didnt work so well for people who put money in it XD
And by the way there is only one bank in vo. What is called guild bank is a shared account in vo Bank aside other personnal accounts
I think Breazle made a plugin long time ago to create an independent bank system...
didnt work so well for people who put money in it XD
And by the way there is only one bank in vo. What is called guild bank is a shared account in vo Bank aside other personnal accounts
Do it as a bot like Breazle made.
-1 for any development time to be spent on this.
-1 for any development time to be spent on this.
I have it on good authority that a comprehensive independent banking system plugin is currenly well under development. I look forward to when it becomes released....
TGFT had something like this once, the guy in charge robbed his clients and in return I scammed him for most of his monies.
+1
+1
I can't wait to see this plugin in action. Though to be perfectly honest, I'd much rather see the return of something like the old Scar Shop.
It's actually an extension of the Casino bank account system. The gameplayer plugin which interfaces with the casino has a bank module which allows for basic interactions with your account. You'd have to hold an account with the casino central bank to use the branch banks.
Among the first services being offered will be the ability to wire money to other players. PA council members (and others in time when I finish fleshing out the non-guild reconciliation algorithm) will all have copies of a branch bank with them which also communicates with the central bank. You wire money to a person through your interface in the gameplayer (or send the PM !bank transfer <amt> <toplayer>) then either give money to the branch bank (which also would have the effect of creating an account for you for future purposes) or the bank will earmark that amount of money for transfer to the intended person. The recipient only needs to be in the same sector as the central casino bank or a branch bank in order to receive the money wired to him. The bank will charge a small fee (haven't figured out what yet, but right now I'm toying with a fee of 5000c per 100,000c or fraction of transfer; I may eventually build a more graduated system), but you'll be informed of what the fee will be when you set up the transfer, so you can cancel if desired. The central bank is logging all account creations, deposits, withdrawals, closures, and wires, so there should easily be a high degree of transparency should anyone think my code is robbing them.
The reason I'm doing this is 2 fold: 1) I feel it will increase the use of the casino, which I think adds to the RP quality of the game, 2) This should make transfers of money between players much easier, allowing a greater amount of P2P trade (as we'll have a neutral transactional authority for managing them), as well as discrete payments between players for various purposes: hauling contracts, bounties, pirate payments, etc.
I want to build a more comprehensive banking system for VO. While I do hope PA can make some credits off of it, I believe this should be provided as much as a service as possible, rather than a privilege. I won't say "You have to join our guild" in order to take advantage of it. There will never be a "suckers" moment if I have any say in the matter. (and when I don't, someone will answer for cheapening what should have been a wonderful addition to the game)
The only thing I'm worried about here is that I'm currently unemployed and looking for work take up a lot of time. I'm a solution's designer and architect. I design software and algorithms. Been running into a lot of old fashioned ageism lately which annoys me. (yeah, it's illegal, but as a lawyer buddy of mine once said to me some 15 years ago "Under the law, there's the truth, and then there's what you can prove") That's made me feel a bit down these past couple of months.
I've been feeling a little burnt out lately, and this has been a huge project. Between all my currently open VO plugin projects, I'm up to 18 active ones ATM. I'm pushing to get this done as quickly as I can. I was hoping to have an open public beta for the casino with multiplayer games and the gameplayer this month, but I ran into some snags. (there's 1 bug I couldn't fix just yet, but it can be worked around) Once I'm done with that, I want to have the public beta (I'll need volunteers). The rewritten banking system has already been written into the casino bank. I would then just have to finish putting all the command interface components together. In fact, I've always intended to put all the beta testers names up in a separate tab in the gameplayer (as well as the notes). Hey, it'd only be fair, right?
Of course, if anyone wanted to help with some of this huge suite, I wouldn't mind sharing credit. It's been a massive project; one which will benefit our game enormously, but it's a lot for 1 guy working in his spare time.
Among the first services being offered will be the ability to wire money to other players. PA council members (and others in time when I finish fleshing out the non-guild reconciliation algorithm) will all have copies of a branch bank with them which also communicates with the central bank. You wire money to a person through your interface in the gameplayer (or send the PM !bank transfer <amt> <toplayer>) then either give money to the branch bank (which also would have the effect of creating an account for you for future purposes) or the bank will earmark that amount of money for transfer to the intended person. The recipient only needs to be in the same sector as the central casino bank or a branch bank in order to receive the money wired to him. The bank will charge a small fee (haven't figured out what yet, but right now I'm toying with a fee of 5000c per 100,000c or fraction of transfer; I may eventually build a more graduated system), but you'll be informed of what the fee will be when you set up the transfer, so you can cancel if desired. The central bank is logging all account creations, deposits, withdrawals, closures, and wires, so there should easily be a high degree of transparency should anyone think my code is robbing them.
The reason I'm doing this is 2 fold: 1) I feel it will increase the use of the casino, which I think adds to the RP quality of the game, 2) This should make transfers of money between players much easier, allowing a greater amount of P2P trade (as we'll have a neutral transactional authority for managing them), as well as discrete payments between players for various purposes: hauling contracts, bounties, pirate payments, etc.
I want to build a more comprehensive banking system for VO. While I do hope PA can make some credits off of it, I believe this should be provided as much as a service as possible, rather than a privilege. I won't say "You have to join our guild" in order to take advantage of it. There will never be a "suckers" moment if I have any say in the matter. (and when I don't, someone will answer for cheapening what should have been a wonderful addition to the game)
The only thing I'm worried about here is that I'm currently unemployed and looking for work take up a lot of time. I'm a solution's designer and architect. I design software and algorithms. Been running into a lot of old fashioned ageism lately which annoys me. (yeah, it's illegal, but as a lawyer buddy of mine once said to me some 15 years ago "Under the law, there's the truth, and then there's what you can prove") That's made me feel a bit down these past couple of months.
I've been feeling a little burnt out lately, and this has been a huge project. Between all my currently open VO plugin projects, I'm up to 18 active ones ATM. I'm pushing to get this done as quickly as I can. I was hoping to have an open public beta for the casino with multiplayer games and the gameplayer this month, but I ran into some snags. (there's 1 bug I couldn't fix just yet, but it can be worked around) Once I'm done with that, I want to have the public beta (I'll need volunteers). The rewritten banking system has already been written into the casino bank. I would then just have to finish putting all the command interface components together. In fact, I've always intended to put all the beta testers names up in a separate tab in the gameplayer (as well as the notes). Hey, it'd only be fair, right?
Of course, if anyone wanted to help with some of this huge suite, I wouldn't mind sharing credit. It's been a massive project; one which will benefit our game enormously, but it's a lot for 1 guy working in his spare time.
I'd help if I had any clue... :-\
I think any third party/centralized banking system would be a bad idea. No offense Keller, but it's just asking for problems.
I think instead of implementing independent banks, there should be tiers of guilds. For example, you could have [BR1] and [RED] in a guild called Serco Dominion. They'd have a chat that covers both guilds, as well as shared guild bank/other guild features. You could apply the same thing to [ITAN] with [TGFT] :D.
I think instead of implementing independent banks, there should be tiers of guilds. For example, you could have [BR1] and [RED] in a guild called Serco Dominion. They'd have a chat that covers both guilds, as well as shared guild bank/other guild features. You could apply the same thing to [ITAN] with [TGFT] :D.
Central banking is necessary to make any casino work properly, especially if one intends on players being able to play both inside and outside stations and from any sector. I spent a lot of time 2 years ago building the initial banking system for the casino. It's very solid, backs itself up, and keeps a log of all activity in case there are any questions. For the branch bank, I just needed to add reconciliation. That's one reason the branches are limited currently to PA council members. I know I can trust them, and reconciliation is easy - just make deposits or withdrawals from the guild bank to cover transactions. Eventually, the intend was to expand the branches to others trustable and who'd signed off an agreement of use with PA. Money may be easy to come by in VO, but people in here still take it very seriously. ;)
@the guild structure idea
There are only so many things we can do with plugins. We can't change the structure of the game. Guilds (for all their current warts) are what we have as far as structure. You could probably build some kind of data sharing plugin, but 2 things would have to apply: 1) all members of both guilds would have to install the plugin (which might be an issue in itself, due to some people not liking plugins, as well as many in VO maintain alts which aren't in the guild), 2) Data sharing itself should not clog all other activity. This can be mitigated to a degree by using a host outside VO for communications and data management, but this can lead to problems if there is any fallout between guilds comprising the larger structure. (e.g. if the 2 guilds split, they should both be allowed to use their own copies of the data) These are reasons I tend to shy away from externally hosted plugins if I can avoid them.
A few years ago, I experimented with a plugin called BigGroup, which was provided point to point chat data between group leaders and would echo any chat from group to group. Problem was that it flooded those leaders chat queues. This could have been assisted if all member plugins uploaded to a central database for processing, but the comm lag was awful. Furthermore, VO chat is limited to a single message (across all possible channels) every 350ms. This is a hard limitation; you can't get around it, even with plugins.
@the guild structure idea
There are only so many things we can do with plugins. We can't change the structure of the game. Guilds (for all their current warts) are what we have as far as structure. You could probably build some kind of data sharing plugin, but 2 things would have to apply: 1) all members of both guilds would have to install the plugin (which might be an issue in itself, due to some people not liking plugins, as well as many in VO maintain alts which aren't in the guild), 2) Data sharing itself should not clog all other activity. This can be mitigated to a degree by using a host outside VO for communications and data management, but this can lead to problems if there is any fallout between guilds comprising the larger structure. (e.g. if the 2 guilds split, they should both be allowed to use their own copies of the data) These are reasons I tend to shy away from externally hosted plugins if I can avoid them.
A few years ago, I experimented with a plugin called BigGroup, which was provided point to point chat data between group leaders and would echo any chat from group to group. Problem was that it flooded those leaders chat queues. This could have been assisted if all member plugins uploaded to a central database for processing, but the comm lag was awful. Furthermore, VO chat is limited to a single message (across all possible channels) every 350ms. This is a hard limitation; you can't get around it, even with plugins.
My idea about tiered guilds would be a suggestion for the devs, not a plugin :P.
Alexandria, you appear to have no concept of the development pace and/or priorities of the devs.
The guild bank has many of the features one might wish for from a banking system.
In order to turn a guild into a well featured "bank account", we would need a few changes.
- ability to be create and be a member of an unlimited number of bank accounts.
- A minimum membership requirement of one character to maintain a bank account.
- ability to invite characters that are currently offline, so that you could invite characters from the same player account. this would allow a player to share funds between all his characters. Alternatively, that each character created is automatically invited/joined to a bank account specific to that player account.
As it stands now, a few well thought changes to the existing guild system could result in a well featured banking system.
In order to turn a guild into a well featured "bank account", we would need a few changes.
- ability to be create and be a member of an unlimited number of bank accounts.
- A minimum membership requirement of one character to maintain a bank account.
- ability to invite characters that are currently offline, so that you could invite characters from the same player account. this would allow a player to share funds between all his characters. Alternatively, that each character created is automatically invited/joined to a bank account specific to that player account.
As it stands now, a few well thought changes to the existing guild system could result in a well featured banking system.
There goes DE again trying to make multiple (free) accounts easier for him to use. Shut up and pay for the game.
My free hive already has bank, a guild bank, and it does everything a free hive could ask for of a bank. My proposed suggestion would add nothing for my free hive.
You shot off your mouth without bothering to aim, and shot yourself in the foot. If your are willing to handicap yourself in vane hopes of injuring me, I will allow you to limp along. Or, check your hatred, judge the proposal on it's potential usefulness to subscribing players, and try again.
You shot off your mouth without bothering to aim, and shot yourself in the foot. If your are willing to handicap yourself in vane hopes of injuring me, I will allow you to limp along. Or, check your hatred, judge the proposal on it's potential usefulness to subscribing players, and try again.
Actually, DE, you're already WAY behind. Most of those features are already featured in the current casino bank. The whole point to having a central bank was so that people could wire money to anybody, not just those currently online. I disagree with multiple accounts however as I feel it's just adding complexity without adding any solutions, but I understand your point.
The casino bank manages its own assets. The PA guild bank is just there to provide backing for the main central bank. (i.e. profits from the casino are routed into the guild bank and losses are drawn from the guild bank) The intent was always that the central casino bank always maintained sufficient funds for all accounts to be liquidated. You deposit more, the liquidity in the bank goes up. You withdraw funds, it does down. It wasn't very complicated.
The casino bank manages its own assets. The PA guild bank is just there to provide backing for the main central bank. (i.e. profits from the casino are routed into the guild bank and losses are drawn from the guild bank) The intent was always that the central casino bank always maintained sufficient funds for all accounts to be liquidated. You deposit more, the liquidity in the bank goes up. You withdraw funds, it does down. It wasn't very complicated.
Any solution that uses a bot will suffer from the basic limitations of all characters, namely, that you must be in the same sector, or the same guild, to transfer funds to/from the bank/bot.
A bot bank may be a better solution than what currently exist, but it is still limited in contrast to what I am proposing.
A guild bank has most of the desired features of a bank account.
My free hive effectively has all it's banking needs met by being in guild. But this situation is almost exclusive to my free hive, as my free hive as no other use for being in a guild, other than the banking services.
Here is an alternative proposal, using bank bot(s):
Each guild maintains a bank bot, with all guild bank bots in the same sector.
At least one guild with a bank bot is an open guild. Anyone can join at will.
All the guilds with bank bots have fully open guild banks, meaning that any member can withdraw any amount. To protect guild funds, guild funds are held by the guild bank bot, and only transferred to a guild bank to fulfill a transaction request. All bots will accept transfers from each other, with routing information as to where those funds are destined to.
In this way, anyone that is a member of a guild can transfer funds to anyone else that is a member of a any other guild, and anyone that is not in a guild can join the open guild at least long enough to conduct a transaction.
This would require one bot per guild. But anyone, of any guild, can conduct a transaction from anywhere in the universe, by using a guild bank as a transfer method to/from a bank bot.
A bot bank may be a better solution than what currently exist, but it is still limited in contrast to what I am proposing.
A guild bank has most of the desired features of a bank account.
My free hive effectively has all it's banking needs met by being in guild. But this situation is almost exclusive to my free hive, as my free hive as no other use for being in a guild, other than the banking services.
Here is an alternative proposal, using bank bot(s):
Each guild maintains a bank bot, with all guild bank bots in the same sector.
At least one guild with a bank bot is an open guild. Anyone can join at will.
All the guilds with bank bots have fully open guild banks, meaning that any member can withdraw any amount. To protect guild funds, guild funds are held by the guild bank bot, and only transferred to a guild bank to fulfill a transaction request. All bots will accept transfers from each other, with routing information as to where those funds are destined to.
In this way, anyone that is a member of a guild can transfer funds to anyone else that is a member of a any other guild, and anyone that is not in a guild can join the open guild at least long enough to conduct a transaction.
This would require one bot per guild. But anyone, of any guild, can conduct a transaction from anywhere in the universe, by using a guild bank as a transfer method to/from a bank bot.
Copy other ideas much there DE?
If you'd bothered to actually read, what you just "proposed" is similar to what's being built with a serious exception. The difference is that it's individuals running the branch bank plugins that one need be in the same sector as. What you're proposing is basically useless in that all such "branches" are all in the same sector, defeating the purpose of having multiple banks. The whole point is to allow people to have money transactions in a certified manner. Since the banks would keep logs, any participant could easily request of the bank if a given transaction has been made or collected. The intent was to allow people to pay for stuff without necessarily being in the same sector. This was intended to allow for things like pirate transactions, paying for hauling freight, and taking out contracts on other players.
I am fully aware that any plugin based banking system will be restricted in the same manner as any player (since they'd be using the same VO client), but given the mathematics behind small world networks, we'd need considerably fewer people participating in order to provide effectively full coverage of the VO universe.
If you'd bothered to actually read, what you just "proposed" is similar to what's being built with a serious exception. The difference is that it's individuals running the branch bank plugins that one need be in the same sector as. What you're proposing is basically useless in that all such "branches" are all in the same sector, defeating the purpose of having multiple banks. The whole point is to allow people to have money transactions in a certified manner. Since the banks would keep logs, any participant could easily request of the bank if a given transaction has been made or collected. The intent was to allow people to pay for stuff without necessarily being in the same sector. This was intended to allow for things like pirate transactions, paying for hauling freight, and taking out contracts on other players.
I am fully aware that any plugin based banking system will be restricted in the same manner as any player (since they'd be using the same VO client), but given the mathematics behind small world networks, we'd need considerably fewer people participating in order to provide effectively full coverage of the VO universe.
Our systems are fundamentally different, in usage of a guild bank and givemoney.
I am using givemoney between bots, and that is why they have to be in the same sector, but then I use guild banks to transfer funds to players, so that any guild member with a guild bank bot can transfer funds to any other player in any other guild with a bank bot, from any sector to any other sector in the galaxy.
You require the player to be in the same sector as a branch. I don't.
And all of this seams like a workaround for removing the same sector requirement of givemoney. If we want to transfer money from any sector to any other sector, we should just ask the devs to fix givemoney, and skip all the bots.
I am using givemoney between bots, and that is why they have to be in the same sector, but then I use guild banks to transfer funds to players, so that any guild member with a guild bank bot can transfer funds to any other player in any other guild with a bank bot, from any sector to any other sector in the galaxy.
You require the player to be in the same sector as a branch. I don't.
And all of this seams like a workaround for removing the same sector requirement of givemoney. If we want to transfer money from any sector to any other sector, we should just ask the devs to fix givemoney, and skip all the bots.
I believe is good idea a Banking system ....in new games economy ...:)
Cheers...
Cheers...