Suggestion #14508

skygrid eco

I would like to recommend a rebalance of the ExtremeCraft SkyGrid economy, with a particular focus on automation costs, item sell prices, the player-to-player economy, and the ability for players to fund large-scale creative projects.

There are currently four major issues that I believe are having a much larger impact on the economy than they may initially appear.

1. Large-scale automation does not generate enough ROI

The first issue is that the amount of shards required to operate automation becomes extremely expensive at larger scales, while the items being produced often sell for too little.

This means that even after a player has invested significant time, resources, and shards into building an automated farm, the farm may not generate enough income to justify the investment.

In my opinion, large-scale automation should be an investment that eventually produces a meaningful return.

It doesn't necessarily need to become massively profitable, and there should still be costs associated with operating automation. However, if a player builds a large and expensive automated setup, they should have a reasonable expectation that it can eventually pay itself off.

2. The lack of ROI is hurting the player-to-player economy

This is where I think the problem becomes much bigger than just automation.

When large-scale farms aren't generating a worthwhile ROI, players have less money to spend on other things.

For example, if someone spends a large amount of shards and resources building a farm but the farm barely generates enough money to cover its operating costs, they aren't going to have much disposable income left over to buy things from other players.

That makes normally useful and valuable items much harder to sell.

Spawners are a good example. Spawners can be extremely useful for progression and automation, but if players aren't generating enough disposable income from their own farms, they are less likely to spend their money buying spawners from other players.

The same applies to building materials, rare resources, equipment, and other player-supplied items.

This creates a cycle:

Low sell prices → low farm income → low player spending → fewer player-to-player purchases → less demand for valuable items → less reason to produce or sell those items.

The result is an economy where players can accumulate resources but don't necessarily have enough economic activity or purchasing power to turn those resources into meaningful player-to-player transactions.

3. It is also hurting the creative side of SkyGrid

I think this has an impact that is easy to overlook: players need disposable income to build cool things.

One of the best parts of a server like SkyGrid is being able to work toward large projects — castles, houses, towns, bases, shops, farms, and other builds.

But building these projects often requires purchasing large quantities of materials from other players.

If the economy doesn't allow players to generate enough surplus money, then those projects become much harder to pursue.

A player who wants to build a massive castle should be able to spend their profits buying stone, wood, glass, decorative blocks, spawners, or other resources from another player.

That spending is actually good for the economy.

It gives one player a reason to farm or gather materials, while giving another player a reason to spend their money. Both players benefit, and currency moves through the server.

Right now, the combination of expensive automation and low sell prices makes it much harder for that cycle to happen.

4. Recommended changes

I would recommend focusing on two main changes:

Lower the shard requirements for automation items and/or their fuel costs.
Raise the minimum sell prices of items across the economy.

The goal should not be to make every farm incredibly profitable.

Instead, the goal should be to create a situation where:

Automation investment → reasonable ROI → disposable income → player purchases → demand for other players' items → more economic activity.

Large-scale automation should provide players with a way to generate income that can then be put back into the economy.

A player should be able to build an automated farm, eventually recover their investment, and then use the profits to purchase things from other players or fund a large building project.

The bigger goal

I believe the economy should encourage players to build, automate, trade, and spend.

If automation doesn't generate enough ROI, players don't have much reason to scale their farms. If players don't have disposable income, they don't have much reason to buy spawners or other items from other players. And if there isn't enough player-to-player spending, players have less reason to gather and sell resources in the first place.

This ultimately affects the entire server.

By lowering the operating cost of automation while raising the economic floor of basic resources, ExtremeCraft could create a much healthier economic cycle where players have reasons to:

Build large automated farms
Invest in spawners and other expensive items
Sell resources to other players
Buy resources from other players
Fund large-scale building projects
Build castles, houses, towns, and other creative projects
Continue expanding and participating in the economy

The goal isn't simply to make players richer. The goal is to give players enough economic breathing room to actually spend their money.

A healthy SkyGrid economy should have money constantly moving between players. Making automation a worthwhile investment would help create that circulation and give players more reasons to participate in both the economic and creative sides of the server.