Here are the answers the Economy questions from the Q&A thread:
Q. Is is currency player driven (collect items → sell for money → buy other items) or trade driven (item ↔ item) ?
The economy is open and player driven. Players can buy and sell any items they choose for any price they choose. There is a single currency (called Coin), and all shop based interactions (i.e. buying and selling) must be done via Coin. Shops are made up of props called plinths. Players craft plinths and set-up their shops with items they want to buy or sell, and other players can come and interact with those plinths to do the transaction as and when they choose to. Each plinth can only offer one type of transaction at a time (e.g. selling Copper, or buying Oort Stone), so shops will have to be very specialised or very big. There is an option to trade items for items directly between players (which I believe is already in the game), but that relies on players being in the same location at the same time.
Q. Will there be an action house ?
There won’t be an auction house because we want the economy to be physical and location based, i.e. resources have to be physically moved to the location of sale, and traders have to physically go to shops to buy and sell. This encourages many different levels of interactions between players, from explorers and miners, to crafters, traders, shopkeepers, and portal creators.
Q. Where do we get money / items / recipes if there are no NPCs or quest giver ?
Here is a diagram showing the flow of money and resources in the game:
The money flows in mainly through a “salary” which is awarded for doing basic in-game actions (mining, building, crafting etc). If you want to get rich beyond that, then you have to trade. All the items in game are created by players from resources mined and gathered. The ability to craft things is gained through the progression system.
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