There could be up to a million Chinese gold farmers
by Mike Schramm 
May 5th 2009 at 7:00PM
A new report on MMO gold farming claims that there are about 400,000 working in China on gold farming and trading, and that there could be as many as 500,000 to even a full million. Of course there's no way to tell exactly how many people are employed in the business (and the number almost certainly doesn't stay constant for long), but according to interviews and surveys done of business there, that's the number they've come up with. They also claim a $10 billion a year turnover, however, and that number seems way high, though remember that they're talking about all MMOs, not just World of Warcraft. The report has some other interesting information about how China does gold farming: there are a number of brokerages staffed by English speakers in the larger cities that handle the actual transaction, and then the farms themselves are usually outside the cities, where cheaper labor is available. Typical pay in the farms is about $140 a month plus food and board, working in about ten hour shifts, while pay is higher in the city-based brokerages. Most employees are younger guys, who play while drinking beer and smoking cigarettes, and lots of their ingame tasks are automated with custom-made and adapted software.Very intriguing. News of the report actually came from Kevin Werbach, who, as we've reported, is not only a WoW player but acted as the FCC's transition co-chair for the Obama administration. He's doing research for a talk he's giving soon in Philadelphia called "All I really need to know I learned in World of Warcraft." And we also hear he's set to be on an upcoming episode of How I WoW, so stay tuned for that.
As for Chinese gold farmers, no matter what the numbers actually are, it's clearly a huge industry, and one that is almost invisible even in the modern global economy. It's hard to believe that they really are going through $10 billion a year, but there's no question, from what we've seen of the farms and brokerages that have been studied, that there are huge numbers of people supporting the flow of virtual gold.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Odds and ends, Blizzard, Making money
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 5)
Magilina May 5th 2009 7:12PM
stop giving them dough and they will go elsewhere. its the few who buy gold who retain this industry.
Anon May 5th 2009 7:20PM
As a player who has bought gold before (not on Wow, but another popular, space-based, MMORPG) I will say that as long as the practice is not expressly prohibited by the ToS I would gladly purchase online currency again. It's a huge time saver, especially in games where the gold grind is mind-numbingly repetitive. Why spend 9 hours farming for gold when I can go work for an hour and pay someone in China a living wage to do it for me?
Frank May 5th 2009 7:39PM
...and Mr. Anon, that is why you, sir, are part of the problem.
Anon May 5th 2009 7:46PM
Frank (or anyone), could you spell out specifically what you believe are the issues caused by gold farming?
Eddyman May 5th 2009 7:54PM
Those gold sellers are the ones that are hacking people's accounts
tzivya May 5th 2009 7:55PM
@Anon:
I bought gold once in EQ, many years ago. Myself, I do not have a problem with the concept. However, the stigmatisation of it has led to it being very much a 'black hat' enterprise, both directly against the TOS and heavily frowned upon by the vocal community.
I think that's a mistake. As long as it is stigmatised, it's drawbacks will continue to be an issue.
The main issue, at this point, is /how/ most of these gold farms are getting their money. If you think they are grinding mobs/instances/quests, you are mistaken. Mostly, they are getting their gold through hacking and stealing people's accounts.
So the stigmatisation of WoW gold buying is, directly, responsible for the fierce platform of account stealing. How many people know someone who's had an account hacked? I would wager most people do.
There are two ways to fix it; the way Blizzard is now, where they halfheartedly cry foul and do what they can to mitigate it... Or they turn WoW gold purchases to be flat-out legal, and indeed start selling it directly themselves.
If I have a choice between IGN and Blizzard who I can give $20 and get 5k gold, there is no incentive to support IGN.
As it stands now, no matter how poor I get I won't buy gold, though, not because buying it is 'wrong', but because buying it means that I have directly colluded in someone's account being stolen from them.
Netherscourge May 5th 2009 8:19PM
"Most employees are younger guys, who play while drinking beer and smoking cigarettes, and lots of their ingame tasks are automated with custom-made and adapted software."
Well DAMN! SIGN ME UP!
d.hutch May 5th 2009 8:22PM
@tzivya while your suggestion to make legal gold purchases has some merit it WILL NOT end the chinese gold farming, they'll just lower their prices to less than Blizzard's. How do I know this? Eve has a system to buy ISK legally... but the spammers persist trying to lure people with cheaper ISK than what CCP offers through its in-game free market. A nice idea, but it won't solve things as easily as you portray.
ELECTRO hyena May 6th 2009 8:58AM
@Anon:
What about the fact that it's an unfair advantage? Yeah, the grind sucks, but if you want nice items you have to grind. If you're circumventing that you're essentially cheating.
There's a reason that shovelware MMOs like Flyff don't get any attention - the more money you give them, the more powerful you are. That makes the game not fun for people who want to, say, just play the game. By buying gold, you are ruining the game for the rest of us.
This is not even taking into consideration that they steal from both their customers and innocent players who never even bothered with them.
Yeng May 6th 2009 9:32AM
Hey, I want a job where I can drink beer and play WoW.
Ektelon May 6th 2009 2:42PM
Honestly, I feel the biggest contributor to gold farmers is Blizzard itself (indirectly of course).
As Anon said, he'd rather go do one hour of WORK than play nine hours of GAME.
Blizzard has tripped a fatal design flaw, in which a very important part of the GAME feels like WORK.
People will always be willing to pay someone else to do the things that they do not want to do. If that happens to be collecting gold in WoW, so be it.
How can they combat gold farmers? Simple: design your game so that players will WANT to farm the gold themselves. Make gold farming FUN. Make it a GAME. Granted, designing a "fun" virtual economy is certainly not so simple, but it is the only true solution as I see it.
Peter May 5th 2009 7:13PM
The thing is, with WOW... what do you really need gold for? I'm a pretty casual player, but basically everything I 'want' in the game requires tokens, badges, arena rating etc. Most mounts and vanity items cost some type of untradeble currency too.
I also don't see how you would effectively farm gold in WOW. Dailies are limited, and grinding mobs isn't that rewarding.
Nick S May 5th 2009 7:51PM
I was frustrated with farming until I started reading Greedy Goblin's blog, and really paid attention to the economy in which I was participating. As a miner, it seems impossible to undercut the hardcore gold farmers and make my investment of time pay off enough to be worth it.
Apply a little brain power, for example by having your ore prospected and the resulting gems cut, and suddenly you're making 50% more profit... then use the green gems and Crystallized Earth to make cheapy JC rings for disenchanting, and suddenly you're making 100% more profit.
It's all a giant head game. Do something others are too lazy or stupid to do, and you'll make money.
Justin May 5th 2009 7:16PM
In Northrend it's easy to make 250-300G a day from 60-90 minutes worth of dailies. Buying gold has never been more pointless. Doubly so with the stacking Argent Tourney dailies. Nothing like ripping through all 8 in just a few minutes.
mitch May 5th 2009 7:52PM
Second this. Making a killing from this. I powered JC a couple of weeks ago and burned through 4k gold. Made a bit back from JC and Inscription but I'm definitely glad I can smash out 150g of dailies in 15min with the Argent Tournament.
http://remainsofapaladin.blogspot.com/
Arcaria May 5th 2009 9:24PM
I hate it when people lie about what they do and how fast they do it. I'm sorry but you don't make 150g in 15 minutes doing Argent dailies. That means you somehow do 11 dailies in just over 1 minute each including travel time.
Even more doubtful when considering that 2 of the quests are spread around the South side of Northrend and unless you're server is either empty or you play in the middle of the night the commanders and lieutenants are fairly well camped.
Gorgzy May 5th 2009 9:41PM
@Arcaria
knocking off the argent Tournament dailies in 15 minutes is not entirely unheard of, it's very easy to do this, just find a couple extra people for the grp quest, and then do the rest of the quests together as well.
I usually knock off the Valiants and Champions first, then do the grp quest, omw to the south of ice-crown kill the scourge, then after killing the guys on horses i'll go do the weapon quest
this can take between about 15 mins - 30 mins, depending on how busy the area's are, but it's the grp quest that is the main one you have to wait for others to complete first.
Collecting Lumber and Stone probably only adds a couple mins, they arn't too hard if you choose to do them for the gold.
Jamesisgreat May 5th 2009 10:48PM
I DO play in the middle of the night (on EU sever but live in the US) and the quickest that I've managed all the Argent Tournament dailies is about 45 mins (doing grouped quests where it makes sense). I just don't believe you can do all of them in 15 mins - fetching the sword for the valiant quest alone involves at least 5 mins of buggering about!
It's still the best way of making gold though - and additionally, it's only a few more days until I get my Crusader title - yay!
Keyra May 6th 2009 11:10AM
"In Northrend it's easy to make 250-300G a day from 60-90 minutes worth of dailies. Buying gold has never been more pointless. "
I suspect that a good percentage of people buying gold are people who would wind up being killed the instant they stepped off the boat in Northrend, i.e.; characters level 20-40.
Quests - reward maybe a whopping couple of silver.
Bags - not enough space to carry all of the stuff that drops, so you need larger ones - that sell for 7 gold a pop on the AH.
Mount - by now, you're tired of running all over the place and falling asleep on autorun...but how much do you have from your quests and selling your loot? About 28 gold or so?
Here's where buying gold is the real temptation. You need bigger bags. You need more bag slots in your bank to hold all of that linen and silk you're finding (that doesn't sell for squat on the AH), and that winds up being another big chunk of cash (not to mention the bags to put there so you have the room). You need a mount.
And nagging in the back of your mind is the knowledge that you can plop down $10.00 for 500 gold on some site or other..........
I'm not advocating doing it. I'm just saying that the assumption that people can just go to Northrend and farm 300 gold in a half hour is dead wrong because when you could really use that gold is typically around level 30-ish, not level 80.
Falcrist May 6th 2009 1:48PM
Arcaria said:
"I hate it when people lie about what they do and how fast they do it. I'm sorry but you don't make 150g in 15 minutes doing Argent dailies. That means you somehow do 11 dailies in just over 1 minute each including travel time."
Step 1: Find at least one friend who is has unlocked the argent champion dailies. A group of three is probably ideal, though you COULD do this by yourself (it would take longer).
Step 2: Everyone picks up all the Valient and Champion dailies.
Step 3: [Among the Champions] + [The Grand Melee]
Have your buddies grab a mount and head to the champions' or valiants' ring. Your friend(s) will challenge a champion/valiant and you will DPS it down with them. Make sure the people who are mounted are using shield breakers and charges because the shield does reduce the damage you do. Switch off when your friend(s) are done. This method can be more than twice as quick if done correctly.
Step 4: [Threat from Above] and [A Valiant's Field Training] + [Taking Battle To The Enemy]
Do these on your way to Icecrown Citadel. AOE 2 of the packs in the area to the east of Ymirheim. Skip [Threat From Above] if you're solo and can't take it on alone. It's probably soloable for Warlock, Pally, Shammy, Drood, Priest, and Hunter (but it's a pain in the nuts).
Step 5: [Battle Before The Citadel] + [At The Enemy's Gates]
Very group friendly and very fast if you have 3+.
Step 6: Hearth back. Collect gold.
[Among the Champions] 23.23g
[Threat from Above] 23.23g
[Taking Battle To The Enemy] 23.23g
[Battle Before The Citadel] 23.23g
[The Grand Melee] 13.23g
[A Valiant's Field Training] 13.23g
[At The Enemy's Gates] 13.23g
Total: 132.61g in