How to get money, in RPGs Options

[trasheater]

I was thinking of a new way to get money in my next game, other than just killing monsters.
Why would monsters carry money on them anyway? Unless of course it is a bandit, or a citizen,
but what dose a simple forest slime have to buy? Another thing, is that some games you have
to grind in order to get new gear, and potions. So I will list some ideas of how to get rid of grinding
for money for my next game.

[1] The player gains money only by completing quest, such as killing monsters, or delivering
something to NPC in another village.

[2] Monsters drop iteams that can be sold. (for example bat wings). The iteams could be
used to complet quest also.

[3] The player must pick a job in order to gain money, such as mineing, cutting trees, or
fishing.

Those are some of the ideas I have in mind to rid, or add some ways to getting money other than just grinding.
What do you think about these ideas,and is it a good idea to put 1-2, or all of them in a game, and rid
grinding for money? Would you even get rid of monsers droping money?
What are some ideas that you have used, or that come to mind?

[X-M-O]

It is my opinion that money grinding from monsters is silly, and would agree with your point.
The ideas you've mentioned are pretty much the only other ways to collect money in a game, unless you were to set-up some form of player management system where the player hires NPCs to do the work for him, and then he collects money from them. (But that would likely change the dynamic of your game entirely.)
Anyway, good ideas - better than money grinding. =]

[Klokinator]

[1] The player gains money only by completing quest, such as killing monsters, or delivering something to an NPC in another village.

Fetch quests: The bane of MMO's. It's been done before.

Many times.

[2] Monsters drop iteams that can be sold. (for example bat wings). The iteams could be used to complete quests also.

So pretty much what's also always been done.

[3] The player must pick a job in order to gain money, such as mineing, cutting trees, or
fishing.

Now this is interesting. Do you mean like a more normal RL kind of job, where you have to wake up on time, go to work, and earn money there? Sounds good, except most people play games to have fun after working their butt off all day, so it's like a complete slap in the face.

Just IMO.

[Titanhex]

This all depends on the emphasis of currency. Figuring out ways to make money can be fun so long as money leads to something worthwhile.

Before you decide how players make money, figure out some reasons for the player to want to make this money.

Also, consider alternate currencies. Maybe some items can't be bought with Gold Coins, some things must be bought with Red Coins, Cat Yen, or Trophy Dollars. Then pick the dynamic of earning this currency.

Minigames are always a way of gaining currency, as are Casinos.

Tournaments can be classified under a minigame, where a monetary prize is won by beating it.
Jobs are also minigames in some RPGs. Picking and selling fruits could be a job, as would hunting for pelts, loan sharking or mining rare gems.

Buying, Trading, and Selling could be a great way to earn money. Purchasing something from one shop and taking it to another when the time is right to earn a profit on the goods. Even trading items you buy with NPCs to obtain other items that may be more valuable at the time. It would be like a dynamic, changing market.

Also, bank systems or interest systems can be a way of earning money. Place money in a bank, then earn interest on it. Or hire an NPC who accumulates money based on the amount given to him. You have to wait a while to earn a profit on the money given.

Gaining currency should always be part of an RPG. Currency is a very usable and safe part of gameplay design. Building on it opens up a lot of doors. How you do it is up to you. So far there's nothing you've suggested that I would steer you away from.

[trasheater]

This all depends on the emphasis of currency. Figuring out ways to make money can be fun so long as money leads to something worthwhile.

Before you decide how players make money, figure out some reasons for the player to want to make this money.

There is so much in RPGs to buy.
Potions, weapons, armor, is the main things you buy in an RPG, but look at all the bigger stuff that
games had you buy. Such things like a house, you don't need it, but its fun to have. Some things
you may need to buy is an airship, or an boat to get to the next island.

Makeing money this way would be like makeing money by grinding, but giveing the player
a diffrent choice of makeing it.

[Sparrowsmith]

This really works me up in a lot of games actually.
You go into some LONG LOST RUINS, and the only money you get is from convenient chests and monsters that have been sealed away for centuries. You say to the developer, "Hey, how the hell do they have current currency?" and he'll reply "Well you come up with a better way"

Well okay. Let's think for a moment. In real life, what will you find in Long Lost Ruins, or Ancient Temples, or Crystal Caves?

[Show/Hide] What you find

Just a load of worthless crap

That's made of gold, jewels, another completely worthless materials

Now to be fair, most games do this. But you STILL find modern universal currency, and the 'priceless' artifacts are pocket sized and rack up next to no money.
Why not have one big score.

No money in the game dropped from enemies (not even the people) and no worthless treasures in dungeons (seriously, a potion in the middle of a forest?). Every now and then, your characters come to a point in the game where they can make money. These places are typically dungeons with hordes of incredibly powerful enemies. The further in you make it, the more valuable the treasure. To leave, you just select ONE big piece of treasure and you're automatically transported back to the local town, except you are x coins richer.

Like in real adventures, you get one nice healthy cash injection and then keep going. When you're running low again, you do another.
Of course, the enemies are naturally ridiculously hard so you can't just keep going in. Plus, they're in the middle of no where (hard to get to) which means they're not worth going in fifty times in a row.

Just my view, would be easy to implement though.

[IIomenII]

"Hey there's a chest in the middle of the woods! How did it get here?" says Billy the warrior.

"Thats a good question. Chests aren't easy to make you know. Maybe someone made a camp out here a long time ago and these were left behind."
says Sally the Mage.

"Out here? A camp? Town is just a few miles that way."

"Good point....so maybe they were outcasts! Or criminals! And they had to live in the woods! YA THATS IT! HAHAHAHAHA!"

"Ok well lets open it and see if there is something in it then."

"What? Why would there be anything inside of a chest? Doesn't everyone have little pouches that hold 99 of any item you put in it?"

"Another good point....you know I dont even know where I got that pouch. Do you?" Billy says with big wide eyes.

"My mom said all little warriors and mages are born with bottomless pouches." Sally says with confidence in her mother's wisdom. Then suddenly another adventurer walks up to them all excited.

"HEY LOOK! It's another chest! Man they are everywhere! Someone is littering up our lands with these giant chests! They in the forests, abandoned buildings. ancient temples, and even in my house!" Says the new face.

"Ya lets go tell the guards they should really pay someone to go clean all those up." Sally says with a lightbulb over her head. Then the group marches into town. Then a blonde spikey haired man walks up to the chest and opens it. He pulls out a sword of unparalleled power and throws it into his bottomless pouch then walks away from the chest and doesn't even close the lid.

So ya. I get what you fine people are saying.

[trasheater]

yes this is all true, thats why in my next project in ruins you find skeletons of past adventuers
who did not make it out alive, and finding rare long lost iteams in long lost ruins.

In a forest you find a bandits, or any onld traverlers camp site, and you decide to raid them,
or let them be.

[elliott20]

there are quite a few more ways for money to be made, it just depends upon the parameters of your game.

The GTA series allowed you to buy clubs and businesses that would generate cash on a timed basis. If your game had a time measure in there, you can let them own things that earns money that way.

X-Com allowed you to take alien technology, and tell your guys to manufacture alien technology which you could then sell back to the populace for a profit. i.e. Alien Alloy, 3000 to make, 6000 to sell.

Romancing Sa-ga 2 had an interesting one. Since your character is the ruler of a nation, he doesn't have to earn money himself. His kingdom does it for him. However, the passage of time only happens when you kill monsters. Every encounter you have increases the time counter, which also means your kingdom just earned some money based on the kingdom's income.

[Knot]

I actually have no problem with enemies dropping cash. Just like I'm glad that the heroes don't have to sleep regularly or how they never get the sniffles from walking around in monster infested woods all night. It's also wonderful how they can be healed by drinking random liquids and no wound is permanent.
For me, having to go to a shop just to sell monster parts instead of getting the cash straight away isn't worth the added little bit of realism. Towns get more expensive as you go, fiends get more powerful and people keep their doors open despite the apparent hostile world. If you want to anchor every single aspect of the gameplay in the real world you must be a genius or at some point you're going to start sacrificing fun for the sake of realism. As long as the characters and story are believable suspension of disbelief takes care of the rest for me!

However, Sparrowsmith's or the OP's/Titan's idea for some jobs may be fun because they actually add something to the gameplay. Wasting my time selling monster bits to resolve a minor realism issue amongst dozens isn't really worth it to me.

This post has been edited by Knot: Sep 7 2011, 03:13 PM

[vvalkingman]

I would just like to say that I love sparrowsmith's idea about having big scores spread throughout the game instead of random chests in the forest(omen that was frickin hilarious lol). Since we're in the creative commons I'll spit some storyline & gameplay that just hit me:

A group that is in the business of making money by whatever means necessary under the guise of a shipping company(ala black lagoon, cowboy bebop, firefly, etc) they hunt down bounties, transport goods(which can be dangerous, not your standard mmo fetch quest), treasure hunting(for something specific), etc etc. In all these cases, you perform a "job" whatever is may be and at the end of the job you get rewarded by your employer. That being the only time that the player gets money. Since money is so scarce, use it to upgrade your tools of the trade(yourself, weapons, transportation, etc etc) between jobs.

I would also like to point out how No More Heroes did it. You got money from your jobs(hitman and real life jobs) that was used to upgrade yourself as well as propell the story. The game was very well done imo.

Basically, any attempt to make a game alittle more realistic/logical(especially if the game is trying to be realistic and/or logical) is a win in my book.

[VoD]

You may ask why monsters would be carry money.
The answer would simply be that some monsters eat adventurers and their item bags and gold whole.(I can't imagine how a slime would exist in the first place, but it has to eat right?)
After killing them you would simply rip open their stomachs and find your spoils.
Though some monsters shouldn't be eating money anyways. They should have instinct to know what to eat or not. Eating money is like eating poison, unless it's paper money then maybe the monster thought it was a plant.(Like for whatever reason my dog likes to somehow steal paper money and chew on it.)

[Show/Hide] Off-topic stuff about boxes and Treasure Hunting.

Instead of boxes laying around anywhere you could put a bag/pouch with a skeleton or bone fragments next to it to represent a fallen adventurer. (Then the corrupted spirit of the fallen attacks you or not.)
Or maybe someone dropped money on the floor and you find that 1 currency worth coin. I mean people lose money everyday somewhere.

Also what about a treasure hunting mini-game? You somehow find a map to Great Pirate BlahBlah's greatest treasure and now you can go treasure hunting for treasure(s) that could be money or something useful.(Now you are a pirate, yargh!)

You could make an invention system, where your character uses material ingredients and make something new.
Then a guild or w/e rewards you for making a new equipment/item that's useful.(Yeah! You invented Slip n' Slide!)

Maybe some people have wicked minds and will buy beasts/monsters you capture for X amount of currency.(Like tactics ogre)
Or...
You could sell your character's body off to science or...

As for selling monster parts...I find selling parts to every any merchant you encounter weird. We don't know what the merchant does with that stuff. You could probably make medicine out of it but why would ever and any merchant know what to do with it?
I guess after playing Recettear I understand what those merchants do. They all buy items from you at 30-50% then sell off at 100-120% it's value.

No just because I mentioned Recettear you can't steal that game's idea of making your character running an item shop.

[Shinan]

[2] Monsters drop iteams that can be sold. (for example bat wings). The iteams could be
used to complet quest also.

Depending on your game this is actually exactly the same as monsters dropping money. It just removes one piece of micromanagement from the equation.

In fact that's the main thing to keep in mind when thinking about currency systems. Often an economic model can be loads of fun to play with. But usually as a separate game. If the game's about a merchant and economies then it makes perfect sense to implement different currencies and bartering systems. However if the game's about some guys out to slay some villain then a side-game involving trading currencies to make top dollar is at best a distraction and at worst an annoyance.

However I'd really like to play a trading game with an RPG touch. For example playing as a merchant that has to hire bodyguards for his caravan and meeting people in strange and exotic locations. That game would be about money and thus need quite the extensive money system.

Basically the idea is Keep it Simple. If it doesn't have to be complicated it probably shouldn't be. Though if your aim is simulation then complicated might be a good idea.

[Tsukihime]

Consider other things as well, like how dependent the game is on money, and consequently how much time it would take for me to acquire such money.

If I have to spent 5 hours killing monsters to buy a sword, you're probably not going to keep me playing too long.

Quests are always great, especially when there are many and they're small and take me too many places.

This post has been edited by Tsukihime: Sep 12 2011, 04:19 AM

[Scriptless]

Let's be honest. Monsters don't have jobs. You don't get money from them.
I know it's just a game, but still. I find it's a little bit over the top. Tasks from town, or a request to help someone for example would make more sense. Puzzles wouldn't hurt too. Some games incoroporate puzzle like battles to receive money which I find is always entertaining. The thing about games these days is that they tend to be copies of something else. Games need to have a bit of originality in them, but that's my only opinion. The ideas you brought up are always constantly being spammed in games. Would be nice to see something different.

Good luck with it all,

Script

This post has been edited by Scriptless: Sep 12 2011, 08:46 AM

[Tsukihime]

Let's be honest. Monsters don't have jobs. You don't get money from them.
I know it's just a game, but still. I find it's a little bit over the top. Tasks from town, or a request to help someone for example would make more sense. Puzzles wouldn't hurt too. Some games incoroporate puzzle like battles to receive money which I find is always entertaining. The thing about games these days is that they tend to be copies of something else. Games need to have a bit of originality in them, but that's my only opinion. The ideas you brought up are always constantly being spammed in games. Would be nice to see something different.

Good luck with it all,

Script

They are not "copied" from something else, they are simply implementing a common system.
There are three generic types of currency acquisition systems:

1: drop system
2: trade system
3: quest system

There are others that don't fall under these categories, but the majority of systems out there are one of these.
So you can say every game copied from the first three games that implemented these, but that's not important.

The ideas you presented has been used by other games already, so that itself would not be original, but who cares? It was still good enough for you to suggest.

Most ideas are re-used because they work. Or because devs can't think of anything else. Or it's just a cookie-cutter design that you adopt and focus on something else.

This post has been edited by Tsukihime: Sep 12 2011, 08:57 AM

[elliott20]

[2] Monsters drop iteams that can be sold. (for example bat wings). The iteams could be
used to complet quest also.

Depending on your game this is actually exactly the same as monsters dropping money. It just removes one piece of micromanagement from the equation.

In fact that's the main thing to keep in mind when thinking about currency systems. Often an economic model can be loads of fun to play with. But usually as a separate game. If the game's about a merchant and economies then it makes perfect sense to implement different currencies and bartering systems. However if the game's about some guys out to slay some villain then a side-game involving trading currencies to make top dollar is at best a distraction and at worst an annoyance.

However I'd really like to play a trading game with an RPG touch. For example playing as a merchant that has to hire bodyguards for his caravan and meeting people in strange and exotic locations. That game would be about money and thus need quite the extensive money system.

Basically the idea is Keep it Simple. If it doesn't have to be complicated it probably shouldn't be. Though if your aim is simulation then complicated might be a good idea.

There's one game that came pretty close to it. It's an old Japanese game called "High Reward" where you play a merc group whose family has somehow managed to rack up a debt in the billions of dollars. The point of the game is for you to amass money to pay off your debtors. (who are incredibly dangerous people, as it turns out) In the game there are a myriad of ways to gain cash. You can take missions like your run of the mill RPG (i.e. invade this city, rescue that princess, deliver this machinery, etc), or you can hire performers to put on a performance, or you can get your mercs to build fortresses and buildings in various cities, or you can buy and sell merchandise between different cities on the continent, etc.

It's not super sophisticated or anything, but it was actually a very fun game for what it was.

[bulmabriefs144]

I was thinking of a new way to get money in my next game, other than just killing monsters.
Why would monsters carry money on them anyway? Unless of course it is a bandit, or a citizen,
but what dose a simple forest slime have to buy? Another thing, is that some games you have
to grind in order to get new gear, and potions. So I will list some ideas of how to get rid of grinding
for money for my next game.

[1] The player gains money only by completing quest, such as killing monsters, or delivering
something to NPC in another village.

[2] Monsters drop iteams that can be sold. (for example bat wings). The iteams could be
used to complet quest also.

[3] The player must pick a job in order to gain money, such as mineing, cutting trees, or
fishing.

Those are some of the ideas I have in mind to rid, or add some ways to getting money other than just grinding.
What do you think about these ideas,and is it a good idea to put 1-2, or all of them in a game, and rid
grinding for money? Would you even get rid of monsers droping money?
What are some ideas that you have used, or that come to mind?

[4] Bounty for monsters, (make a number monsters killed variable, multiplied by the town's going rate per monster. (Poor starting town has multiplier 5 per kill, rich end town has multiplier 1000). When you get the bounty, set number killed back to 0. This is closer to an expanded system of how things currently work. This pretty much only works outside having monster sprites if you have a complex system that counts battles if you win using switches, and shut them off if you run or die. (A party exp system, can probably help in this regard, just put a Monster Bounty counter variable in when everyone's getting handed out party exp)

[5] Monthly paycheck (you'll need a complex time system, at the end of 30 days, reset time to zero).

This post has been edited by bulmabriefs144: Sep 12 2011, 05:36 PM

[Scriptless]

The ideas you presented has been used by other games already, so that itself would not be original, but who cares? It was still good enough for you to suggest.

They weren't suggestions, they were examples of some orginality.

everything bolded has been seen in at least 10 games or more

[1] The player gains money only by completing quest, such as killing monsters, or delivering
something to NPC in another village.
[2] Monsters drop iteams that can be sold. (for example bat wings). The iteams could be
used to complet quest also.
[3] The player must pick a job in order to gain money (part time jobs), such as mineing, cutting trees, or
fishing.

not saying it hurts to be old and retro, but take Minecraft for example, it's a big hit because it's different. Don't get offended by what I tell you, I'm only trying to help you.

- Script

This post has been edited by Scriptless: Sep 13 2011, 11:53 AM

[shinyjiggly]

I just had a crazy idea, what if monsters really did have jobs and money? I think it would be funny to stumble upon an office building in the middle of nowhere and see monsters in suits and ties sitting at computers and stuff.
In my game it's explained that the item bags found around the world were hidden by someone for a contest of some sort. I'm planning on having a couple of really hard to find item bags which all have clues as to where the contest person lives so that he can give you some sort of cool thingie (not sure what kind of thingie though). My game doesn't really have that many interesting ways to earn money besides the normal ones. Perhaps I should try to make some more?
Maybe since one of the characters becomes a lawyer in one of the chapters I can have them defend clients for money sometimes? (On second thought... Maybe not. No way do I want to mess with all those crazy events and mini-stories again...)
Maybe a mini-game that involves catching falling money for the price of a sometimes-found item?
But then again, maybe I don't need special ways to let others make money (or maybe I do?). Money isn't really much of a focus and through regular battling one can buy enough potion things for a little while if they don't buy a ton of the cool expensive things like 11 stat-uppers or new weapons for everyone. I find this to be pretty balanced for now but anything could use improvement.