Reactive tax rate?

People have been complaining a bit about the spread of goods - basically, it's Ul'dah or bust for retainers. What about having a reactive tax rate? The more retainers there are already in a city, the more the tax rate goes up. The less, the lower.

This would hopefully help with both removing gil from the game and also with spreading the players out more evenly amongst the cities.

Unfortunately, probably a bad idea. Your suggestion provides a negative reason to stay in Ul'dah, not a positive reason to support the other cities. SE has already been burned a few times by applying negative reinforcements instead of positives (e.g. SP surplus, anyone?).

If the tax rate could be adjusted to be lower in other cities when underutilized, that would provide positive reinforcement, but it probably wouldn't be enough. The perception is there that the other cities are "dead", so nobody bothers to visit those markets.

I'm sorry to only post a negative about your idea -- I wish I had some better thoughts in simple fixes to spread things out a bit.

Indeed, you idea, though great because at least its -something- doesn't account for the fact that Ul'dah is physically in the middle of Limsa and Gridania, and that the best leve, Dunsefolk, is out of Ul'dah. No amount of taxes will fix that. That is, imo, the driving force behind the migration to Ul'dah.

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Originally Posted by origamikitsune

Indeed, you idea, though great because at least its -something- doesn't account for the fact that Ul'dah is physically in the middle of Limsa and Gridania, and that the best leve, Dunsefolk, is out of Ul'dah. No amount of taxes will fix that. That is, imo, the driving force behind the migration to Ul'dah.

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True and i still love LL better :) even if Ul'dah have the better leves sadly you alway have to go to Ul'dah for gear and such ; ;

Surely it makes realistic sense, though? If no businesses start up in a nation and that nation wishes to get more businesses starting up in it, they offer lower taxes to encourage the nations to move their HQ's there. This would fit in line with that.

I always thought the reason for the migration to Ul'dah is because it's in the middle of the other two, and it's easier to move around in. =x Didn't know it was down to leves.

There are myriad reasons why Ul'dah has come to dominate the economic picture, but there is definitely a systematic bias to it.

1) The better leves are in Ul'dah, meaning if you don't base there you have to keep returning anyhow
2) Ul'dah is in-between the other two cities
3) The main storyline tends to coerce people toward Ul'dah (won't say more as it is a bit of a spoiler)
4) The layout of Aether crystal, market area, repair NPC, and Adventurer Guild are closer to each other in Ul'dah than in either Gridania or Limsa
5) The two R40 areas in Thanalan (Broken Water and Halatali) are in close proximity. Limsa isn't too much worse, but Gridania's two R40 areas (Treespeak and Camp Nine Ivies) are FAR FAR apart.
6) Ul'dah has three viable crafting guilds (Weaving, Goldsmithing, Alchemy), while Limsa has two (Blacksmithing and Armorsmithing) and Gridania has two (Leatherworking and Carpentry)

Probably a few reasons more that I haven't thought of. In the end, though, all the servers have migrated to Ul'dah. That speaks volumes, I think.