As City of Heroes Homecoming tests long-awaited recycling rules for abandoned names and characters, I’ve been contemplating what to do with some of the names I’ve claimed but probably won’t use, usually because I have something similar or it just doesn’t work for any character concepts I’ll ever use. (I don’t need a cute pun name for an assault rifles character when I can’t stand the sounds/visuals of the powerset.) I’ve considered offering them up for sale for in-game currency, as that’s what folks used to do back on the live servers, but it feels a little weird to me. Something about the fact that it’s a rogue server makes me feel wrong about profiting off the community.
But apparently I needn’t be troubled with any of that as it’s a capitalist hellscape out there in MMO land still, as a recent thread on the MMORPG sub reminded me. The post – which I’ll note was removed from the sub because the poll itself was deemed toxic – asked MMO players whether they were OK with tanks “charging gold to run dungeons for strangers in a game with a tank shortage.”
It’s a can of worms, right? This is basically small-scale boosting without the RMT component, and it works only when the game’s group and role design has failed catastrophically, so it seems kind of ick to charge people for it.
And yet there are other forms of carrying that seem perfectly fine to me. For example, I never thought twice about paying a talented player for a run to Drok’s in Classic Guild Wars. It was something I obviously couldn’t do myself on a newbie toon but would seriously enhance the rest of that toon’s play experience, and the dedicated runners deserved every plat they got.
What’s the weirdest activity you’ve charged MMO currency for? Have you ever charged other players MMO currency for your company or your soft skills or your class? Is any of this OK? Where do you draw the line?
Every morning, the Massively Overpowered writers team up with mascot Mo to ask MMORPG players pointed questions about the massively multiplayer online roleplaying genre. Grab a mug of your preferred beverage and take a stab at answering the question posed in today’s Daily Grind!
