I don't really see how this solves the problem actually.
When this new coin skyrockets aka gets pumped how will things be any different?
I would ask you a question instead that maybe could give an idea...
Where are the coins that were spent on land?
What I think i would have tried to do would be to try to deal separately with land deeds and actual rental as in paying the server bills.
Imagine land having actual value, for example each certain square or cubic area or volume of it is worth one litecoin.
In order for anyone to have acquired that land, one litecoin would have to have been frozen into a coldwallet representing the value of that land.
Who-ever owns that land owns that litecoin. If ever the server shuts down, that litecoin gets sent out to who-ever owns that land at that time.
In virtual worlds there is not just the matter of owning land but also the matter of having it fired up actively online reachable over the internet by players.
That is the "rent", or "land tax" or "cost of putting online for a span of time a piece of land that you own".
Land could gain in value if the server operator charged more for this month by month (or span of time by span of time) payment than just cost, so that a portion of each recurring payment can be added to the coldwallet frozen value of the land itself; for example 10% or even 50% of the recurring fee charged to players for putting online a piece of land they own could be desposited into the coldwallet that stores the sale/resale value of the land.
This way the server operator is not only always in a position to buy back all land but could even have land actually increase in value, such as by having NPCs who are willing to buy the land for something over its original value but less than the value it has accrued by paying bandwidth (being online) fees each month. (Land that is worth paying to have online is presumably worth more than land no one is willing to pay to put online.)
It sounds to me like your problem has arisen simply by failing to store the coins representing the actual value of the land in order to be able to refund that value or to be able to buy back that land. maybe you only thought about month to month rental type cost, the cost to have land actually loaded up online isntead of sitting on a DVD somewhere not actually vistable yet still belonging to its owner who just has not found it worthwhile to have it put online lately?
The fact that litecoins went up massively in value should have made you land go up massively in value, because basically each piece of land should have been a buried/frozen litecoin from the start.
instead it seems like you just used land as a pump and dump commodity and now are looking to create yet another coin as yet another pump and dump commodity, meanwhile where are all the litecoins that were sunk into the land? someone dug them up shipped them somewhere? The server admis did, maybe?
-MarkM-
Yes, actually you raise some good points. I'll try to address them all, but ill start by saying this.
"In order for anyone to have acquired that land, one litecoin would have to have been frozen into a coldwallet representing the value of that land.
Who-ever owns that land owns that litecoin. If ever the server shuts down, that litecoin gets sent out to who-ever owns that land at that time."
This idea is quite brilliant, but I'm unsure how I would go about implementing it. I'll definitely give it some thought because that is a solution.
As for where the coins are currently? They are still being held. For that matter the land still exists to this day. Everything is exactly how it was left before the server became a ghost town, coins included.
The way I was planning to address that was to offer an equal amount of the new game currency for the players to come back.
I might add that some of the players in the game were names that you would recognize, and there were no hard feelings when all of this happened. So I assure you there was no pump and dump situation happening. The largest depositors on the server are still in contact with me to this day, and I'm sure they would agree that my intentions were never anything other than pure.
Renting and buying both were always options on the server, the players chose to buy on their own. In fact nobody was compelled to buy anything since any random person could join and play without being required to buy land. It was simply an option for them.
As far as the spike in value, you would be right up to a certain extent, but the price went so high that we all felt the costs of buying land were unreasonable. Had there been some type of mechanism as you suggested it actually would have prevented it. Again, your idea is sound.
To finalize, no, i did not take the coins and run. They are safe and sound, simply because the primary goal was having fun in the first place, along with an open economy where everybody had an opportunity to make a few coins while playing (if they chose to) I would rather keep the contacts and friends, than take the money and run.
Thanks for the feedback, and I will absolutely think about how I can implement your ideas.