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I tried creating economic models like this for a video game I was trying to make, but inevitably the market would end up oscillating too much or the whole thing

I tried creating economic models like this for a video game I was trying to make, but inevitably the market would end up oscillating too much or the whole thing would crash. The idea was to allow people to exploit arbitrage, but then as they did that, the market would become more efficient and the player would have to find some other commodity to arbitrage. I spent more hours than I care to mention and trying to take as many factors in as possible, but doing quasi-realistic simulations is just hard. I think part of that is for reasons others have stated here, which is that there aren't a lot of people doing market simulation. Even the best simulations are going to be wrong, so what's the point.

saraid216 13y ago
Have you tried looking at how EVE Online does it? The idea you describe roughly matches my experience in it, though I was never a dedicated trader exploiting arbitrages. As a manufacturer, though, I'd often be able to ascribe price fluctuations to externalities like, "Alliance X just won a war in region Y and now they're consolidating their gains, resulting in purchases of lots of starbase construction materials, which I'm making." Or even simpler ones like "Corporation Z seems to have come back from hiatus."
mempko 13y ago
The market would crash, you mean like how it happens in the real world all the time?