Jagex has estimated that 40-50% of players buy runescape gold. I ran some estimates myself, and I doubt that is too far off. It occurs to me that a follow-on conclusion is that if 50% of players are gold buyers, probably it is also true that 50% of the posters in forums are gold buyers. I’m guessing that they have a different take on bonds than non-gold buyers. Real World traders also have a different perspective, too.
Non-gold buyers – some of these don’t buy gold because they don’t need it. They make more money than they spend. As a result, they may like bonds, because now they can play for free. Other non-gold buyers may be skeptical of bonds because they don’t think they will work. Still others would oppose them on principle, knowing they never bought gold, and not wanting to compete against those that do.
Gold buyers – Those that routinely buy gold illegally would have a very different take. They would consider bonds a joke because gold purchased legally is much more expensive. I would expect their take to be ‘Why would I pay more, I’ll just keep buying where I usually do’. They would consider bonds failed if they don’t create a price war with gold sellers. Secretly, though, some may fear that, now that there is a legal way to buy gold, Jagex will at long last take aggressive action against buyers of illegal gold.
Real World Traders – These are player that obtain large amounts of runescape gold, perhaps by luring, scamming, or hacking, and who sell it. For now they probably aren’t affected, and don’t worry about bonds, but in time they may also be affected.
As you read though posts here, it is interesting to think about the fact that the poster could be from any one of these groups.
My original post notes that players who never bought gold may ‘oppose them on principle, knowing they never bought gold, and not wanting to compete against those that do.’ I think this group is probably the most outspoken opponents of bonds. The other groups may not really oppose bonds, but rather mock them as overpriced.
Regarding the estimate of 40-50% buying gold:
It’s always possible to make your own estimate, and not hard to do, regarding the percentage of gold buyers. What percentage of players online would you guess are gold farming bots? How many gp/hour do you think that gold farming bots make? How many hours/year do you think gold farming bots run? Regarding the players that buy gold, how much gp do you think they buy at a time? How many times a year?
I plugged in my own estimates, and I decided that 10-15% of the players online at any point in time were gold farmers. My numbers also led me to think that the average gold buyer probably buys about 1/3 of the gold produced by a single gold farming bot in a year. Thus, my numbers came up with 30-45% of the players as the percentage of gold buyers. I was a little lower than Jagex, but concluded that their number here is not impossible. Depending on what numbers you use, you may conclude differently.