A little thought for the game. I understand the issues obviously, but...

[ariaandkia]

Ok, right now there is this thing called Crysta. It has only one real use: Buying subscription and other things for your FF14 account. The money is already in SE's hands.

My idea? Make Crysta tradeable/giftable.

Let me explain what I mean by tradeable first: (And I know that this is the idea that many people would disagree with)

We have market boards right?

Well, we could add a second function to those boards where people can put their crysta up for sale and others could put up requests for purchase. There would be three values: Buying/selling, Price, and number.

Now, this won't be a direct purchase. Instead, let us say the current Sell price on Crysta is 1000 gil per crysta for the lowest sell price. Say the current buy price is 900 gil per crysta for the highest buy price.

If someone then tries to sell crysta for 800 gil, the person who is at 900 gil buy price will buy the crysta at the 900 gil price up to their maximum amount. They are paying for their priority in buying. First come first served if there are multiple at the same prices.
If those amounts remain the same, someone could later go and try to buy crysta at 2000 gil per crysta. That would result in them buying at 1000 gil per crysta until they reach their maximum or until the person with 1000 gil per crysta runs out before moving to the next. Again, paying for priority.

In these case, first come first serve regardless of price.(so if someone tried to sell at 800 and then another tried to sell at 900 and another tried to sell at 700, the 800 would sell first, then 900, then 700).

There are both advantages and disadvantages to this:
Some Advantages:
Less reason for RMT to exist. Risk getting banned by buying gil or do it legit?
Makes it possible for people to obtain service if they are on hard times.
Profit from Crysta sales goes to SE instead of bots.
Some Disadvantages:
May be considered a way to 'pay' to win.
Would require a bit of work to tweak it to work properly.

====

Secondly would be gifting. This crysta would not be given directly. Instead, the person with the crysta would select a service to gift to the other player. So say I have a friend who I want to gift an extra retainer for a month to. I would then, using their character name and server, choose the appropriate character (if there are two with the same name and server, (which there have been), that is when choosing matters. In order to prevent confusion, the selection would provide levels, appearance, GC, FC, whether they are on your friends list or not, and so on. It would even show their player message.

After choosing the player, I would then have a choice of gifting them various services. After selecting which services I want to gift and for how long (if applicable), I confirm it and they are given the service or services.

[KarmaCha]

This is called RMT

[Mook_Mook]

doesnt eve do this, you can sell subscription and basically play the game for free if you farm enough money

[coldreactive]

TERA went free to play trying this. Wildstar is currently doing this, but prices have not yet settled, and it's an insane price for getting sub time in-game. (Unless you're max level and do raids 24/7) Guild Wars 2 is doing pretty poorly with all of its new "Features" and offers RMT as well in-game. Don't get me started on how badly ArchAge has it.

FFXI is doing fine, as well as World of Warcraft. So... why do it?

[ariaandkia]

I have a feeling nobody bothered to look at the second thought and understand the intent behind my ideas.

[Kaze3434]

I have a feeling nobody bothered to look at the second thought and understand the intent behind my ideas.

seeing as how you pretty much described RMT and ways to support it, the second point died before it had a chance. rmt already farm/steal gil on a regular basis, and your idea would make it possible for them to make money faster buy selling and buying crysta. overall, this is one of the worst ideas i have seen all year to try to "support" this game. trying to give a gil price to crysta(real money) is stupid. the gift idea is also bad. all one would need to do is farm up gil, buy crysta and bam. you can get extra retainers without paying a single cent. for the good of everyone, realize how incredibly bad your idea is.

[Pantz]

It's true that there are games that do similar things to what you suggested. However, I have always reluctantly went along with it. Given a choice, I'd rather SE not implement such a feature. I don't want people to use RL money to earn enough gil and compete with me in getting personal housing.

[Gextiv]

Pay To Win.

Or

Pagar Para Ganar.

[SarcasmMisser]

Here is your brain, here is your brain on RMT. Any questions?