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[Jimmy]

Balancing the economy comes into play through several mechanisms. Depending on the style of the MMO some are more palatable for the playerbase than others.

1. Taxation. Transactions in the game currency incur a cost, typically through an auction house style interface.
2. Consumables. Spending game currency on these provides temporary benefits for a limited time.
3. Gambling. Spending currency does not guarantee a return, but the return is usually rare or extremely desirable.
4. Destruction. During the course of play valuables risk being destroyed permanently.

Let's again look at the example of EVE Online for one of the most shining examples of the last point.

The Bloodbath of B-R5RB, Gaming's Most Destructive Battle Ever

I won't spoil the story since the link does a far better job of telling the tale, but ultimately the result is that players destroyed the equivalent of approximately $330,000 USD over 21 hours. And had fun doing it.

For the other points, most MMOs will have these mechanisms in place to counter player wealth generation. Gambling in particular is a useful method of eliminating accumulated liquid currency. Without a guaranteed return on player investment, it's possible to offer a limited time opportunity for players to attempt to gain a unique item. For example, each character in a game gets a free ticket during a special event. Trading this ticket in offers a chance at a list of items, most being standard consumables, some being rare items, a fraction being unique to the event. Spending currency allows additional tickets, meaning additional attempts for the rarer items.

For destruction, also consider the mechanism most RPG style MMO games use of binding powerful equipment to a character on use. This is effectively destruction of the item, since it's no longer in circulation in the economy. Since these games tend to evolve and introduce different items that offer competition for use by the same character, this allows the player to still play with their hard earned toys, but motivates them to play the same content for additional copies for their other characters.

However if you're looking to create a successful MMO, aside from balancing the game economy and ensuring revenue flow, you must address the most important point: community. Players will continue to play an MMO because their friends play, not because it's got a good game economy or competitively priced. Focus on building player relationships in the game and they'll keep coming back for more.

[DreamThorn]

Oh wow!  You seem very knowledgable on this subject.

I love the idea of MMORPGs, but have never found one that I could enjoy.  However, my experiences are from long ago, playing the kind of free* MMORPGs that we used to play here in South Africa.  In modern times the whole design of MMORPGs have wandered away from what I want to play.  The only MMORPG that I have played legitimately is Guild Wars without any expansions, up to the third act.

(*Free as in you use a hacked pirated client to log in to home-made server software running on cheap hosting.)

In my experience, the main barriers to entry is economy, community and cost:

1. A bad economy leads to inflation, which means new characters cannot afford to get started. (i.e. starting money = 100gp, starting armor = 10000gp)
2. A bad economy can cause certain economic activities to become useless. (i.e. Vendor sells potions for 6gp, cost to make a potion yourself is 50gp)
3. Power level differences automatically stop you from playing with your friends, since they play more/less than you and thus level up slower/faster.
4. Optional expansions also split the player base and limits the kinds of content allowable in expansions.
5. Shy people like myself find it hard to initiate conversation with random internet strangers while playing a game.

I want to rant on all the horrible/funny specifics of non-legit MMORPGs, but choose to restrain myself.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to design the kind of MMORPG that I would play, since that is clearly an untapped market.  The most promising of my design attempts so far:
1. Most of an auto-balancing economy with a wide array of player activities
2. A lag-resistant fast-paced tactical combat system that relies heavily on player skill.  (Progression is based on bragging rights maybe?)
3. A crafting system that is compatible with item damage, dismantling and customization.

Number 1 would solve the economy problem with a bit more work.  Your post will be very useful in my attempt to finish this part.
Number 2 will help to keep the player base together, especially if I can get my city-state idea to work out.
Number 3 is just interesting.
Pay2Expand sounds like it should be a good way to handle funding.

Overall, this is looking doable.  Still lots of work to do, though.  Design is just the beginning, after all.

[Muz]

I've only paid for one MMO so far - Mush.

I don't like the subscription model. With monthly payments, you're forced to pay for not logging on. What if I have work to do? What if I just plain don't feel like playing. Mush goes around this by having daily payments where you don't pay anything if you're not playing.

Mush also gives long term rewards for paying only one month. Starting players get 1 skill slot. Subscribed players get 4 slots. Former subscribed players get 2 slots and access to a VIP forum. If they don't like the advantages The slots aren't even necessary to play, because it's a cooperative game.

Money can be used to purchase items that give advantages, but they only get to purchase once per game, and the purchased goods come with disadvantages as well (e.g. energy bars give a lot of AP but also make you sick).

It works because you don't really lose out on anything. With almost every other MMO, once you start paying, you'll lose out once you stop paying. So people never start paying. Also with a lot of F2P games, the payers get an advantage over other players, so they're kinda hated. With Mush, the gold players are an asset to the team. Even if they're playing the villain, they end up playing a more advanced, more interesting villain with a gold subscription.