Release Date
NPC Market Balancing Update – How It Works
We're rolling out a balancing fix to the NPC market, and thought this was a good moment to explain how it's meant to work.
The NPC market offers products that seedlings can buy from NPC vendors (the actual vendor characters will arrive a bit later). These items are available in societies and act as a fallback option if a society isn't manufacturing them.
The NPC market runs on both buy orders and sell orders:
Buy orders – NPCs purchase items from players at a set price.
Sell orders – NPCs sell items to players at a set price.
Our Philosophy: A Player-Driven Economy
Seed is built around a player-driven economy. We want players to create businesses, manufacture goods, and trade with each other. The NPC market isn't meant to replace that; instead, it acts as a support structure or "frame" to keep the economy functional, especially in situations where players can't produce certain goods.
That's why NPC pricing works like this:
NPCs sell items at a price much higher than it costs to make them.
NPCs buy items for a price much lower than their manufacturing cost.
How We Set NPC Prices
Every item in the game has a base value, which we calculate using several factors. But in simple terms, it breaks down like this:
We start with the "cost of labour"—the time a seedling spends harvesting or manufacturing the item.
We assign a seed coin value to each simulation hour of seedling labour.
This value starts low for new seedlings but increases as they gain more skills.
This system ensures that the NPC market never outcompetes players, but still provides a safety net so you're never completely stuck without access to essential goods.
This also means that whenever we make changes to the balancing, players should expect to see these prices fluctuate.
Hotfix Implementation
Early in the play session, we noticed a flaw in our base value calculations that skewed prices. This hotfix corrects the calculation and will hopefully result in a better experience.
We appreciate all the feedback we've received on this topic and will continue to monitor the economic health of the game.
Gisli Kondrasson
Creative Director, SEED
