Gear up while you still can, inflation is coming up next

You're right, as long as ArenaNet doesn't change store prices, 100k will be worth more to NPC shop owners than 10k.

Over time, however, you'll probably be doing more business with people than NPCs, which means your 10k now will only be worth 100k. Your investments now won't do anything more than keep you afloat of inflation. Which is fine. It's better than piling that money under your bed and pulling it out 20 years later (by the Guild Wars calender) to find that the 10k is suddenly worth what 1k is worth now.

Honestly, though, I find the fascination with money in this game to be completely pointless, which is the fundamental reason for WHY it's getting such inflation. Money is worthless.

The only things you need are armour, and possibly dye if you don't find enough to trade for the colour you want. What else are you going to spend money on anyways? Weapons drop all the time and you can salvage most anything else.....

While I admit some people tend to like playing the merchant in MMORPG's I for one would much rather spend my time exploring and enjoying the views =)

<shrug> I dont buy from or sell stuff to real ppl. I only buy/sell from/to npc's. Not because of any price difference but because I have been totally turned off from buying/selling things from/to real ppl because of all the buy/sell spam. Real ppl can be aholes, npc's on the other arent.

See I told ya

I don't think inflation is going to be as much of a problem as you think it is.
Inflation exists when the supply of money rises... which is currently the case in the game because more money is spawned than is spent on NPCs.
However, you also need to keep in mind that items are being spawned just as much as money is, so the supply of both is increasing equally. As long as the proportion of the supply of money and the supply of items stays the same, there shouldn't be a problem of inflation. There's no reason to think that money will continue enterring the economy while items won't. If anything there will be deflation because the drop rates for items were recently improved.

What gold sinks are in this game again?

Right.

The good stuff is still obscenely rare, while people are finally getting to the later stages of the game where gold flows like water. Hence the prices on that which is truly rare and high demand (Superior Vigor) goes through the roof. Nothing surprising about that.

Peace,
-CxE

This whole discussion is pointless. It's based on the predicate that there will be a market for items at a later date. That's just not going to happen. This isn't a game where adding a nifty item to a character makes all that much difference. It's not diablo II where you find a SoJ and you're set. Nor is it DAoC where everyone needs that special artifact (or three) so they can actually play their character in RvR.

People are going to be leaving GW in droves when they discover that this game is not to their expectations. People who come expecting an economy, a society, a community, are going to be sorely disappointed. This game is about combat between teams of characters. That's it. Just because they borrowed some of the elements that make it look like a MMORPG doesn't make it so. And it doesn't make it a bad game... it's not. It's a great game. But you have to play it, not complain that the game isn't what you expected.

Gold will never be worth anything, because you can't win a fight with gold. Items will never be worth anything because you can get them for free.... easily. This game is not about aquiring stuff. It's about using it. You are very limitted in each "adventure" as to what you take with you. Having wowgeewiz equipment doesn't make that big of a difference.

Sigil prices are skyrocketing, and I bet they will never drop. The more people play this game, the more competition there is, and sigils become harder and harder to get. Good thing right now people have a max gold capacity of 100 plat, although I'm sure if ArenaNet raised that cap to 200k, we'd be seeing sigils go for that price.

I'm looking at this thread, and I can see that inflation probably is a bit inevitable. However, since this is a game, and I'd rather be an idealist than a stock broker while playing, I'm making it my rule to continue selling items at what I think is a reasonable price no matter what the market sells. That being said, most weapons I won't sell for more than 500 gold, and I'll continue selling components for no more than 10-20 per, etc. Why? Because in my small way it'll help keep the game new player friendly, and I think it's the right thing to do. If I really need cash, I can solo for a bit to buy that 15K end game armor. I hope newer folks will have the same fun I did while playing Guild Wars for the first time, and that means not intentionally gouging them. Any other takers?

And, I'm aware that my notions of economics may be skewed, but I hate it that some of my friends have spent 3k on a bow I could'a given them. Not sure if other folks can relate to that sentiment. What does everyone else think?

Right, you're waiting to sell the item for 10000G instead of only getting perhaps 4000G, which will be worthless by the time inflation comes along.