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Inflation is out of hand lets keep our colonists well paid. |
Yes! I support the art! |
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25% |
[ 17 ] |
Meh but I like the old prices. |
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74% |
[ 49 ] |
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Total Votes : 66 |
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 1:39 am
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 5:58 am
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I can see exactly where this is coming from - inflation makes money less valuable for items and even the most expensive items seem difficult to obtain, a price hike is not the only answer.
I do support the colourists and their hard work- and while I think it is fair to drop 2-3 Mill for a breed like an Ulun'Suti or Angeni, not everyone in B/C has money for the generators in the Cash Shop. For some, that is the only way they get gold. For others, they get gold posting, RPing, and socializing extensively. While Soquili offers many free events, not everything is free, and one such thing is customs - and everyone wants at least one custom in their lifetimes and some people work hard scrimping and saving for years to afford even one of the high-end Soq breeds - early on I remember seeing someone questing a Soq for 1.2Mill when 1.2Mill was a hard number to get and La Victore didn't really exist yet. To afford gold now, there's the matter of having a RL job and determining if you can afford Gaia Cash. Not everyone can do that, and not everyone is in the States or a location allowing you to buy Cash either. MANY in the B/C aren't in the States and while I support paying someone for good work, it's also important as a business to not exclude a portion of your customer base.
There's solutions but this might not be it. It might be a thought when acquiring a custom to perhaps tip your colourist if you feel the normal price is underpayment - this works in the Food Industry where many corporations in fact underpay their staff and include tips as wages, forcing them to rely on tips - something not guaranteed or even distributed fairly (some places have a tip pool that spreads between waitstaff and bussers, ETC) and it's important to know Soq staff do not ask for tips and tips began as an unexpected way to say thank you..
Another method is bribes, when and if they open again. Those are things named by you - offer large amounts, get a concept, basically, or breeding - and you can offer significant amounts of gold if you feel it fair or wish.
There are ways to keep colourists well paid, and not exclude others. Perhaps this may be an option as well?
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 7:30 am
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I do think that inflation has severely undervalued gold in the context of Gaia as a whole. If there are/would potentially be colorists out there who might get into breedables with the motivation of making gold (which people who are unfamiliar with Soquili but looking to get their name out there and make gold) then current pricing certainly doesn't justify the time that the colorists spend on the soquili, even custom pricing.
Tipping is great - be it for a breeding or a custom. But it shouldn't be expected, since it defeats the point. TBH, even in the food service industry when there is a flat expectation of tipping 15%, it also kind of defeats the point.
Anyway, tangent.
I know that most of the colorists in the shop probably don't do it for the gold. They do it for the credits and/or making the customers happy and/or sharing their artwork with an appreciative fanbase.
BUT, granted, the credit system is set up so that colorists get less credits for the same amount of work with customs because they are making a fair amount of gold as an alternate method of compensation. And in today's Gaia economy, that's not exactly the same.
I don't know if adjusting pricing is the solution. Gaia inflation isn't over. Unfortunately, very unfortunately, each Gold RIG they release tends to give higher average payouts than the last. Gaia's new administration is doing this deliberately to continue to encourage people who buy Gaia Cash to continue to do so to keep up with the inflation. Adjusting pricing now, even in theory, may be just as outdated a year from now. And it is going to continue to separate the people who have RL$ to spend for Gaia Cash vs those that don't.
But, unfortunately I do think that there is a problem, and I just don't have a good solution.
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 10:44 am
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 12:37 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 12:44 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 1:23 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 1:37 pm
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I'm super new to Soq and breedables in general, but I rather like Lyda's idea of trying to come up with new ways to reward staff and colorists, plus paid raffles. All the raffles. Please more raffles? : D
Money is not an issue for me as I run some pretty big priced shops, both graphics and artwork, so I'd be more than happy to help out with donations of gold or skill. c:
In my experience, you can really only push the prices higher so much. There's plenty of demand for Soq, so you technically could raise the prices a bit and not suffer for it, but there will be some grouching. But raise it too much and you lose out on customers because they just won't have the funds. It's difficult to know exactly where to draw the line with raising prices. Finding an alternative would, I think, be easier in the long run. Plus if you open up more opportunities to purchase, I will lay down the billion gold I've got stored up and hoard all the ponies. That's a billion gold for you guys right thurr! (I jest, lol. I wont' hoard. Not all at once anyway.)
Events are fun and freebie events are awesome, but you can also incorporate some contests/raffles/etc that require people to put in a chunk of change to participate. I understand it sucks to have to charge for some contests, but at the same time it opens up more opportunities for people who may not have the best RNG luck to tip the odds in their favor. Losing in raffles and contests over and over again isn't fun, especially when getting a Soq any other way is really difficult to do. And hey, it generates more income for Soq staff! Win/win?
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 3:44 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 4:02 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 4:44 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 6:01 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 6:16 pm
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slimycrow Since only seniors can do customs though, this idea is almost all addressed towards seniors. Just a little counterpoint <3
Hmm, that's a good point. I mean, in my opinion, if a jr colorist is capable of/trusted with doing breedings (in addition to all the other wishing star/freebies) I'd think that they'd be perfectly capable of doing customs (especially since colorists generally can put limits on what they're willing/unwilling (or uncomfortable with doing) to do in customs.
So customs are a privilege granted to senior colorists because of the gold they'd earn. Considering the inflation that's hit gaia, and considering that rookie colorist (that's the proper title for a step below junior colorists, right?) is a longer process, why not allow jr colorists to take customs, and work in periodic bribes and/or paid raffles as the new "reward" for seniors?
EDIT - elaborating: I think that this revision might kill a few birds with one stone - having a way for senior colorists to make big gold from time to time (which used to be the case with customs), have bribes as a part of seniors' regular rotation to allow customers to sometimes custom mutants (colorists can still decide to take bribe ideas based on concept rather than just the offer, too - which happened a lot before), and juniors can take customs, which opens up more custom opportunities for customers, and gets them some gold rewards. Plus you'd only have one "tier" of credits earned. Get them for customs/freebies/breedings, or don't get them (but don't have to spend credits) to take bribes/paid raffles? (Or change the credits earned to that to current custom credits)
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 6:39 pm
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Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2014 6:57 pm
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