Kal-El replied as I was typing my response. I agree, even if we can’t get something set up for quests in game that can be done. I’d like to see quests that will help new players to get out. Learn things.
Heck I couldn’t even find my way home at the start. Now no problem, I go to level 1 and two and wander all over the place, some just to see bases. Some to find places to mine.
Good reply and a good example of the difficulties facing MMO design. If what I’m doing is limited to power gamers I am still ruining the game for more casual players by removing myself from the systems that make the game enjoyable for them (buying & selling.)
I no longer think a new coin source will convince people to start trading again. The source can be capped such that the amount benefits the average player more than the power gamer but it still will not give the power gamer a reason to sell their goods. If anything, they are being encouraged to horde further. I could have been convinced to part with my stacks of ancient tech a week ago, but after seeing LED blocks I’m glad I held onto them. This will reinforce my hording mentality going forward. The only thing that would make these players start selling is if they needed money to buy. But since they gather resources at 6x-9x the rate of other players, and they have tailored alts for every task, what would they ever need to buy!
Looking to your original question for “ideas to get the economy going and attract new players?” I think that limiting the abilities of the power gamers could work, but only if we agree that it is the source of the problem. Otherwise it will just be more nerf talk and gnashing of teeth and quitting. The community of players actively benefiting from alts has to decide if we want this game to be such that only the high skill players with the best tools live comfortably while the average player scraps to get by and is forced into exploitative positions which further benefit the power gamers. Or if we would accept starting a conversation about our alts with the intent of allowing more playstyles to flourish in the game.
Lastly I’m disappointed at the gymnastics which turns my optimistic assessment of another player’s capabilities into a supposed lack of empathy. Still, I will admit I was not thinking about players with physical limitations and now that I am, I have no shortage of empathy for the situation. And more important than empathy, compassion.
If you ever do get the urge to visit T4+ worlds I’m sure the community here can brainstorm some ways to make that possible. I have a hunter build which puts all his points into defenses and he can practically go AFK on high tier planets and come back to a 75% health bar. The only things he fears are charging wildstocks and elemental debuffs from elemental creatures. We may be able to devise an alt for you which has these high defenses and uses healing bombs. This would make a nice companion hunter for your son and greatly reduce the burden of death.
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Agreed, but playerdiven economies in sandbox games need… well… players. Maybe its time to rethink some of the initial strategies.
Has anybody suggested save quests. Like spawned noc citizens that need to be saved from mobs and give loot? Like an alternative to meteors?
About 2 months in, and I’m “close” to being able to do it all myself but still haven’t started cooking, brew crafting or forging/building the forge/making a forger. I basically have what I need for cooking minus earthyams, and probably do have what I need for brews. I consider myself casual, but anybody more casual than me simply can’t do it all.
i can see the need for NPC’s while yes the core concept is eveything is player made the current method for getting coins into the game is just not working and thats why the economy is dying you get coins form eather having a high traffic build or being lucky and haveing a shop with a loyal base selling goods to a shop seems to be a hit or miss thing right now with a lot of shops ether not keeping up with demand or just closing down
I suspect that BL has become like many cultures, the rich have the power, don’t want to give it up and so fight against anything that will take that power from them. This doesn’t mean that every person who was here from the start is a power hungry player who wants it all, riches, power and doesn’t care about the new players. I have met on here some who are fantastic people and want to see this game survive and help others.
it is the few who aren’t carrying, and I would go perhaps don’t come here often to read and see how bad things are getting. The increase of the spawns, of all players now getting a chance to get the desired items, gems and ores is helping, but is it too late?
More needs to be done to attact new players or get ones who left back. PR is one are they are also lacking in. When I typed in Boundless to get info, articles on the game I found links to site that were businesses. Not this game.
Maybe devs need to get online and look up this game, see how easy it is to find info on it.
More advertising of not what will come but of what has been changed to make it better for players so ones who quit will come back.
Promote the game as a great family game, one that parents can play with their kids. A lot of kids are better than some adults. My grandchildren, and it disgusts me, were at age 10 and 12 playing Black Ops, at age 14 and 16 are playing ARK, and loving it.
As to why they were allowed, military brats, they know what fighting and killing is so daughter saw no harm in it. I don’t agree, but that is me. There are age limits for reasons. It won’t turn them into killers or “bad people”. I’m old fashioned.
Okay, back on topic. increasing footfall won’t help much for new and low level players, there has to be a way for them to get coins so they can buy what they need. There needs to be something that will get them out going to other planets.
Edit: fixed typo attack to what it should have been attract. Big difference there, LOL
No need for NPCs to deal with this problem. I’ve been long wanting a solution to worthless inventory items as well, but instead of NPCs, we need a deconstruct method. Don’t wanna just throw away hundreds or thousands of blocks of refined stone in the wrong color for your build? Tired of chucking hundreds of worthless growth, now that you’ve harvested all the shimmer orbs you’ll ever get from them? Deconstruct it!
What this gives the player is up to the Devs and game design. It could be XP, coin, or another material used in crafting. The important thing is that the process of deconstructing takes LOTS of material, and therefore is very inefficient as a regular means of acquiring XP, gold or material. It’s really meant to be simply better than throwing it away. And yes this would affect prices and the economy, but only at first. After it stabilized, people would have more reason to buy previously worthless items (even if the value is poor, it’s something), and if the deconstructed outcome is coin, more money for the server.
EDIT: This could also be implemented as just new recipes, but the idea of getting raw XP or coin might justify a new mechanism, and keeping it separate from the already massive recipe machine lists, might be a cleaner approach when it comes to UI considerations.
EDIT AGAIN 
Last thought for now, the deconstruction should also be the same for each category of item. For instance, you don’t have separate functions or outputs for rock vs. stone vs. refined. It’s all just rock. So, deconstructing 1,000 rock will give you x. But deconstructing 1,000 refined rock will still just give you x. This way it’s still better to mass craft rock into stone into refined, for example, before you deconstruct. But it’s not required to do so, nor is it required that the devs make several different and potentially confusing outputs for the essentially the same raw material category. The process should be simple and clean. The last thing we need is in Boundless is another crafting mini-game or complex system.
I personally love NPCs in games. I would love to have a store keeper that waved Yarbo at people that came in. It would make cities and towns feel more alive 
Should they sell things? Eh, don’t really want them to sell anything that players can make. If they sold only items that were available via the NPCs then that would be cool.
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I would only want NPCS In the game if they gave quests. But how to implement that in a game where the core of it is strictly player driven yea probably will never happen.
The problem is not worthless inventory in my opinion, it is a lack of coin. Footfall does not provide a method where equal player effort nets equal coin. Footfall is designed around location and portals. If you eliminate footfall in its current form then the ability to sell resources to a npc gives every player a chance to make coin. You still would probably want to generate footfall for a player using your portal, but why do it for anything else?
I think the NPC in the Sanctum would be the perfect vessel for a “Player made” quest system. Just talk to him, and set your quest, with required coin.
Then every player can talk to him and see available quests.
Maybe a chest next to him, is where you deposit and pick up quest items/rewards.
It’s the most central location in the game that every player can get to, and an NPC that already exists. So no worries about adding In-Game NPC’s.
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think dev talked about it is they called it contract’s
Would be nice a form of contract between players, with expiration time
I need to apologize to a13o I was a bit harsh in how I stated he lacked empathy. Lack of knowledge doesn’t mean lack of empathy, so I could have given my info and not have made that remark.
Was hurting a lot yesterday, so wasn’t as willing to be nice in how I worded things. Not a excuse, generally I try to stay away from forums/communities so I don’t act like a B&^%h.
I came here to help me ignore the pain and was a pain in the rear to a13o, I am sorry to have been so snappish, you didn’t deserve that.
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I’m a relatively serious casual gamer and I can’t compete with a13o.
No worries, conversational text contains the least body language so we are all struggling to communicate effectively over this medium. Every sentence can be ready a dozen different ways in our heads. I try to assume positive intentions to compensate. Give everyone the benefit of the doubt on the 'net. I coulda done my part more too
If it’s coin the game needs, then deconstruction could give coin. That’s the beauty of it: it takes worthless items that nobody needs and turns them into, in this case, coin, which you argue is much needed by the community.
I think NPCs and quests would be rough. It would require dev maintenance and isn’t a core gameplay concept.
The main game is creative sandbox building and interaction between players. That aspect needs to be expanded further.