How to increase plat cap for free

What do I mean "for free?" I mean "without increasing data usage".
Currently the money on each character is an unsigned long integer, which is 4 bytes, a max total of 4,294,967,296 (in copper pieces), or ~4.29 million platinum pieces. Which is a lot, but not enough to trade with high end stuff. And I think high end stuff should be trade-able without needing to make multiple transactions with possibly multiple mule characters, it is absurd.

So this is what I propose to solve the problem AND make the game feel more fantasyish:
Divide types of money into pieces of one hundred.
That is to say, 1 plat = 100 gold = 10k silver = 1m copper, rather than 1 plat = 10 gold = 100 silver = 1k copper.
The way to represent this digitally is simple, one byte each for platinum, gold, silver and copper with a 1:100 conversion rate at each step.
The total you could have is thus 255 plat, which is worth 255m copper, a full 16 times higher amount, and with the added value of going back to using gold as the main currency and platinum would only be used in rare and special trades which would make the highest currency also FEEL rare and special (as it rightly SHOULD).

I don't have an opinion on your post, because I have a migraine and couldn't read it. I just wanted to ask, so the platinum cap is not just an arbitrary number? I've always wondered why it is the number it is.

BTW, I support anything that would actually increase the cap.

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Originally Posted by Mastikator

What do I mean "for free?" I mean "without increasing data usage".
Currently the money on each character is an unsigned long integer, which is 4 bytes, a max total of 4,294,967,296 (in copper pieces), or ~4.29 million platinum pieces. Which is a lot, but not enough to trade with high end stuff. And I think high end stuff should be trade-able without needing to make multiple transactions with possibly multiple mule characters, it is absurd.

So this is what I propose to solve the problem AND make the game feel more fantasyish:
Divide types of money into pieces of one hundred.
That is to say, 1 plat = 100 gold = 10k silver = 1m copper, rather than 1 plat = 10 gold = 100 silver = 1k copper.
The way to represent this digitally is simple, one byte each for platinum, gold, silver and copper with a 1:100 conversion rate at each step.
The total you could have is thus 255 plat, which is worth 255m copper, a full 16 times higher amount, and with the added value of going back to using gold as the main currency and platinum would only be used in rare and special trades which would make the highest currency also FEEL rare and special (as it rightly SHOULD).

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Well in Canada we retired the penny.

So DDO could remove copper (and silver for that matter).
Then you would have Gold, Plat, Astral Shards, Astral Diamonds.
make them all tradable and business carries on.

First, you've increased the cap by devaluing the currency. Not to mention having to do all that bit shifting and masking every time inventory is accessed. It may be an efficient storage mechanism, but it's not really practical in terms of processing overhead. The sheer amount of re-factoring that would have to take place in order assure data integrity is staggering. Miss one and "poof" - Instead of 16M plat you've got 1 gold.

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Originally Posted by JOTMON

Well in Canada we retired the penny.

So DDO could remove copper (and silver for that matter).
Then you would have Gold, Plat, Astral Shards, Astral Diamonds.
make them all tradable and business carries on.

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We can remove the copper and silver from the GUI, but they'd still be there and the max is still the same. The fact that we even have to retire anything is good enough reason to increase the max.

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Originally Posted by sebastianosmith

First, you've increased the cap by devaluing the currency. Not to mention having to do all that bit shifting and masking every time inventory is accessed. It may be an efficient storage mechanism, but it's not really practical in terms of processing overhead. The sheer amount of re-factoring that would have to take place in order assure data integrity is staggering. Miss one and "poof" - Instead of 16M plat you've got 1 gold.

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Computers don't make mistakes there's zero chance of one miss.
It's a big refactoring to convert at first I'll grant you, but then it's just "if gold > 100, gold -= 100 platinum += 1", we thousands of those computations by running around in game. We're already doing exactly these refactorings when the actual number is converted into plat, gold, silver and copper in the inventory screen, overall it's probably less computation.

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Originally Posted by Mastikator

Computers don't make mistakes there's zero chance of one miss.

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Don't know much about computers, do ya? ;)

Really, it's a classic idea to save storage space. I used to use it all the time when SS-SD floppies only held 160k and bit shifting was faster than integer math. Now, it's a rather pointless exercise given all processors are quite good at integer calculations and storage space is both cheap and plentiful. If Turbine wanted to increase the plat cap, which they don't, and spend the hundreds of man hours re-factoring code, which they won't, there are far easier ways of doing so than bit-packing a long int field.

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Originally Posted by sebastianosmith

Don't know much about computers, do ya? ;)
[snip]

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Educate me, how does a computer make a mistake?

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Originally Posted by Mastikator

Educate me, how does a computer make a mistake?

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By doing what it's told, of course.

Looks like Astral Shards will take over?

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Originally Posted by sebastianosmith

By doing what it's told, of course.

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They make mistakes by not making mistakes.
What a great way to communicate. :/

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Originally Posted by Mastikator

They make mistakes by not making mistakes.
What a great way to communicate. :/

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Oh, youth - How I remember thee. :p

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Originally Posted by Mastikator

So this is what I propose to solve the problem AND make the game feel more fantasyish:
(as it rightly SHOULD).

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To be consistant with the current type and setting, being much much poorer would feel more fantasyish. How would one even CARRY millions of coins of any vintage?

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Originally Posted by sebastianosmith

Oh, youth - How I remember thee. :p

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I'm wondering how long it is going to take for him to get what you mean. *chuckles*

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Originally Posted by TrinityTurtle

To be consistant with the current type and setting, being much much poorer would feel more fantasyish. How would one even CARRY millions of coins of any vintage?

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You shouldn't be able to. It's a flaw of the game from the start.

Coins should have had a weight, gems should not have had a weight. Gems should also have sold based on !~90% face value +/- haggle.

THAT would have been true to D&D core rules going back to the beginning and it would have made those rocks actually meaningful (suddenly a 5000gp diamond is a lot more valuable than 5000gp of gold due to the weight), possibly even becoming a premium tradable commodity themselves.

But too late for that...

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Originally Posted by Mastikator

Educate me, how does a computer make a mistake?

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Data Integrity
Being told to make a mistake...

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Originally Posted by danzig138

I just wanted to ask, so the platinum cap is not just an arbitrary number? I've always wondered why it is the number it is. .

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Nope, its not arbitrary. It is the maximum size for a long int variable in a 32bit system. 4,294,967,295 (Binary value of 32 1's 11111111111111111111111111111111)

So our entire coin system is based on copper, thus 4.294 mil plat ends up being the upper cap.

For the first couple years of the game it would have been unbelievable to come up with 1 mil plat (even 1mil gold was quite something) in total on all your characters so there would have been no need to build anything more complex into the numbering system.

Or we could remove copper and silver and use gold as the base.

If plat cap is an issue, the solution can be very easy. Create an item that can stack up to 10000. Each singular widget is worth exactly 1 million platinum. Add an NPC at banks that allows you to convert 1 mil plat into a widget or a widget into 1 mil plat. You've just added a 1 mil plat coin to the game that can be traded between players without adding a new coin or messing with the current plat cap.

AH items can be posted for standard plat amounts or for high end items, players can post for widget amounts. The exact value of these widgets can be whatever. I chose 1 mil plat just as an example.

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Originally Posted by danzig138

I don't have an opinion on your post, because I have a migraine and couldn't read it. I just wanted to ask, so the platinum cap is not just an arbitrary number? I've always wondered why it is the number it is.

BTW, I support anything that would actually increase the cap.

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The platinum cap is most certainly not arbitrary. That number is instantly recognizable to those of us who know our way around a compiler.

That being said, I'll also say this suggestion won't work. I don't believe the game actually has anything other than copper in your inventory anymore. The first digit is copper, the second is silver, the third is gold and the rest is platinum.

Increasing the ratio between them would actually lower the maximum platinum because of this.