The ISK Balloon

  There is an interesting thread on the EO forums right now talking about ISK inflation and what may be causing it. I'm sure many of you have seen the constant rise in cost of goods, to the point where now a PLEX is on the market for around 500 million ISK while Tech 3 ship prices have shot through the roof.

  Much of the blame is being thrown at the feet of Incursions. CCP Soundwave commented to the effect that globally, Incursions are not a big issue for isk. Then an unknown posted a few interesting numbers that I am unable to find a backing for, so take it with a grain of salt

"Fun Facts:
In the month of Feb:
~8.6T ISK in Incursion Payouts
~4.8T in Mission Rewards + Mission Bonuses
~32T in NPC bounty

So of the combined Incursion/Missions/Ratting/etc ISK faucet
~81% comes from non-Incursion activity"

  So 32 trillion ISK in the game is being produced by nullsec activities. And of course the nullsec posters want decreased bounties and so on in highsec. Cute.

  In that same thread, the nullsecers seem a little hurt that more people aren't coming out to their space to play. And for good reasons, I'd say. If the space isn't full of bots, it will more than likely be filled by douchebags that accept you to corp and then blow up the carrier you just brought out. There are some nice people out there, sure, but they aren't easy to find in my experience. All I have run into is smack talk and epeen waving. I'm getting derailed, however.

  There is certainly an argument to be made for a lack of ISK sinks with the introduction of incursions. Running sites will reward the fleet with liquid ISK and CONCORD LP. There is a new faucet, but is there a new sink?

  CCP's logic to counter all this?

"Right now we're considering everything form increasing taxes to lowering bounties across the board."

In my opinion, CCP losing their economist is going to be the worst thing for them. Lowering the amount of isk being added will not do what they hope. The increase in isk amount is related to increase in goods cost, but they are not the same.

  So after all that blathering, what solution would I propose? I have a few vague ideas but I'm an designer, not a numbers man. Sadly, I can only comment on the issue rather than try to help fix it. But I know my readers are smarter than myself, so what would you propose if CCP asked you?

  I'm sure we will hear more closer to and at Fanfest, but I'm staying reserved on it. All I know is that it is getting harder and harder to play the game without having to spend RL cash to sub and still be able to buy ships.

  Eve...the only game I've cared about an economic issue. Lol
-Mem