Spiral Knights - Auction is crap.

Auction is crap.

37 replies [Last post]

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:11

radiationate

Legacy Username

Seeing that a few materials that were particularly rare and in short stock were going for particularly low prices, I figured I'd buy out the stocks and resell some of them at higher, but understandable, prices, and see what happens.

Within twelve hours, despite the only source materials being at high prices, they've all plummeted down to mostly nothing again.

Shadow steel (5 star): 8000 to 1500
Silverweave (5 star): 5000 to 2000
Blighted bone (4 star): 750 to 150

I guess materials will always be pretty much worthless, a bunch of kids with no regard for profit, let alone breaking even, can't run an auction house.

Oh well. Was an interesting use of 15,000 crowns, I'll give it that.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:14

Nodocchi

Those materials are common,

Those materials are common, people got tons of those in their inventories just sitting around and can always get more by doing runs. What you see on the market is only a small fraction of the actual amount of those materials out there.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:16

radiationate

Legacy Username

Is that why there was only

Is that why there was only about 3-4 shadow steel, 6-8 silverweave and 10-15 blighted bones on the market (number of auctions, not number of materials), compared to 3-4 pages of everything else?

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:29

Spiral_Fox

Legacy Username

I think the actual number is

I think the actual number is irrelevant..

The problem with the auction house is people are willing to completely undercut you.

You say people have no respect for profit, but its more that they are willing to do anything they can to get whatever meager amount of profit they can.

The entire economy hinges on CE for playability. This means that if you want to play more than an hour, you need CE. If you want to make a weapon you need CE.

So prices can drop big time just to get CE.

Also what you forget is that there are probably more people who play this game casually doing runs on a daily basis just enough to get a few items, turn around and sell them.

Regardless of rarity.. if the item isn't in high demand it's useless. Odds are anyone who needs them can probably get the few they need if they save up tokens (Sorry if I'm mistaken, but for expensive Items i often look at tokens as a first resort. Fluctuation is garuanteed so you never know what may be "in demand" at the token trader that is "unheard of" at the AH)

In real life.. if people didn't care about gold, it would be worthless.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:28

Nodocchi

The prices could be so low

The prices could be so low people are not as motivated to sell them, it does seem like a large number of people put up more on the market as soon as they found out that prices increased.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:29

radiationate

Legacy Username

There's a difference between

There's a difference between undercutting people by 0.1-2.5% and undercutting them by 25%.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:30

Spiral_Fox

Legacy Username

So what? If I want to sell an

So what?

If I want to sell an item now, I'll sell it for 25% less. (although I don't do this, its a general mentality)

In game for 0.1-2.5% to really start adding up, you would need some HUGE numbers considering the AH takes 10% anyway.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:32

radiationate

Legacy Username

A massively flawed mentality

A massively flawed mentality at that.

Oh hey, I'll undercut this 25,000 thing by 1,000, it probably won't make that much of a difference in the end.
Oh hey, I'll undercut this 24,000 thing by 1,000, it probably won't make that much of a difference in the end.
Oh hey, I'll undercut this 23,000 thing by 1,000, it probably won't make that much of a difference in the end.

Suddenly, that 25,000 thing is selling for 12,000, and due to auction taxes/prices of putting it up, sellers lose large amounts of money.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:36

Trouser

There is indeed a difference

There is indeed a difference between undercutting people by 0.1-2.5% and undercutting them by 25%. One difference is that undercutting by 25% is more likely to result in a quick sale and less likely in being undercut oneself and possibly not making a sale at all.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:38

radiationate

Legacy Username

If people are going to

If people are going to undercut you, they're going to undercut you. They don't care if the person you undercutted was by 1 crown or 15,000.

The amount you undercut by does not improve your chances of something selling. All it takes is an undercutter happening to post an auction right after you do, and your chances are gone.

And then the cycle repeats and suddenly you have our worthless material market.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 14:51

#10

Spiral_Fox

Legacy Username

Yep, you got it. That and the

Yep, you got it.

That and the fact that people can play once a day and not worry about CE and sell materials, which create's a surplus due to casual gamers, making it more difficult for "hardcore" players to prosper.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 15:00

#11

Mohandar

@radiatonate

Time is also an asset. In your greed to get a single 25k sale, I might settle for 15k, convert the crowns to CE and go dungeon crawling, during which I have a good chance of finding another of the same material (or earn the crowns to craft another copy of the item). Whereupon I go back to the Auction House and put up my second mat/item for 15k...
In the meantime your item remains unsold; I have gained 30k (estimating that net cost of CE spent dungeon crawling is zero due to crowns/mats gained; in truth, net cost is actually negative), and if this trend persists (I may not be the only one doing this), you may lose your listing fee as well.

On the flip side, if you recognize that an undercutting war has erupted and driven prices below a perceived 'right' mark, you can capitalize by buying up underpriced items, and resaling them when the market goes back to normal. The auction house is incredibly volatile, and as they say, no risk, no gain. If you're not prepared to take some losses, you can't expect to make it big either.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 15:31

#12

Spiral_Fox

Legacy Username

"if you recognize that an

"if you recognize that an undercutting war has erupted and driven prices below a perceived 'right' mark, you can capitalize by buying up underpriced items"

This isn't exactly true.. you have to keep CE cost in mind which can make or break pricing.

Plus you never know who is selling items and willing to undercut you.

Honestly, It is one of those mixed bags, prices go down incredibly fast so goods are relatively cheap to get.

the problem this create's is that its harder to make money.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 16:52

#13

Pupu

Legacy Username

Sink

There are no high tier material sinks in the game.
Low tier materials are used for UV crafting, but high tier materials just pile up and are worth less each day.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 17:03

#14

Llamaboizii

the value of any item depends

the value of any item depends on the greed of the seller and/or the need of the buyer~

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 17:16

#15

Richy

I prefer people using the

I prefer people using the auction house over the mass amount of people who should be banned for standing around and saying SELLING! MATS! LISTS ALL MATS! and they do it 30 times in a 5 minute period. Either use trade channel or the auction house. Otherwise your going on my ignore list which I can proudly say is nearing 500 people! :D And I am reporting you ^_^

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 17:21

#16

Ightex

Is there a rule against

Is there a rule against advertising to sell materials outside the auction house that I'm not aware of that would require admin intervention?

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 17:23

#17

Sunless

Is there a rule against

Is there a rule against advertising to sell materials outside the auction house that I'm not aware of that would require admin intervention?

Spam.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 17:54

#18

radiationate

Legacy Username

Putting a blighted bone up

Putting a blighted bone up for 4 hours costs 100 crowns.

They're going for 70-90.

Enough said.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 17:56

#19

Sunless

Putting a blighted bone up

Putting a blighted bone up for 4 hours costs 100 crowns.

That

They're going for 70-90.

Enough said.

Hilarious.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 18:46

#20

shires1992

Legacy Username

I used to sell silverweave

I used to sell silverweave for 15000 cr, iron gears for 700 cr, heavy gears for 7000 cr and sun silver for 25000 cr. Good times.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 18:57

#21

Senshi

Legacy Username

How to resell on the auction house

If somebody undercuts by 25%, by all means, buy them out, and relist at just 1% or even 1 crown less than whoever they used to be undercutting.

The reason auction house prices are so low, though, is because if somebody is undercutting by 5% ... you can't buy them out and do that without taking a loss. Prices are too volatile to count on them ever going up enough to make up the 10% AH fee much less profit on top of that.

A chain of people undercutting by 5-10% drops the price -really- fast.

However, there are -many- people who undercut by 25%-50%. Go ahead, fulfill their wish for a quick sale and profit by relisting, but trying to buy and resell based on small undercut chains is a -bad- idea... even if it's evident that the stable price -used- to be twice the current price.

Also realize that gate changes can quickly change the supply side of the equation, which is one reason that undercut wars seem to suddenly crash a material's value. The introduction of buying UVs from gremlins for crowns also means people have an actual use for crowns other than CE, creating even more people trying to sell materials while at the same time... those gremlins with unbinding and UV changing have reduced the demand for crafting materials to some extent (perhaps not a huge extent given the cost of those services, but to some extent since there are now alternatives to recrafting a non-UV item and alternatives in UV-hunting.)

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 18:58

#22

radiationate

Legacy Username

I'd figure. Wonder what

I'd figure. Wonder what happened to make the entire auctioning community go autistic.

As it stands, under most circumstances, you lose more than you would make trying to put something up if it doesn't sell (with rabid undercutters, usually doesn't).

But what's really important is that under some circumstances, you lose more than you would've even made off the sale putting it up, as mentioned above.

There's really no fix for this, even if the costs of putting auctions up/10% tax were removed completely, it wouldn't stop people from collectively selling things for dirt.

So.. see thread title.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 19:37

#23

Nechrome

i got 2 blighted bones 25

i got 2 blighted bones 25 each, a shadow steel 5 ce, and a silverweave 1k.
all from trading, not bidding.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 19:38

#24

Richy

I don't sell mats at all

I don't sell mats at all really unless in huge bunches. They are all worth about the same in my opinion. If they range between 100-1k I don't see much of a difference. I miss the days when 5 star mats were worth something.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 19:48

#25

Eradicats

Legacy Username

You don't seem to understand

You don't seem to understand how economics works, so let me enlighten you.

The amount you undercut by does not improve your chances of something selling.

Yes it does. It reduces the likelihood of someone undercutting you, and increases the likelihood of someone buying it faster.

Truth is, what you are calling stupidity of everyone else for setting low prices is simply you not understanding that your materials are worth less than you think they are. Set your price lower, and the rate of people undercutting you will be slower than the rate of people buying.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 21:02

#26

Captain-Teemo

Funny that ppl post up the

Funny that ppl post up the listing fee for items that sell for less than it costs to list...

You get that fee back when the item sells. If you pay 10k to post items that sell for only 9k, when they sell you're still left with 8100cr profit (10% ah fee reduced after refunding full listing fee) so if you're gonna make money selling low price resources than that's how you do it.

OR you could drop your bid price to 0, and post only a bin price. This makes your fee dramatically lower.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 21:34

#27

radiationate

Legacy Username

@Eradicats: Maybe it's you

@Eradicats: Maybe it's you who needs enlightenment. Since you didn't read my posts, I'll just point out again that people don't care about profit, they look at the cheapest item and undercut it by 10% or more. Nothing stops the next person from doing the same, until the value is dirt.

@Shosuko: Factoring it even sells, did I mention a lot of undercutting always going on? The fun thing about listing prices is.. it needs to sell. A few undercuts plus the market's stagnant state and there goes the listing price. As for putting the bid price at 1.. are we really going to go there? People just bid war over such low price things, but it usually winds up selling for maybe 25% of the buy now price.

Hilarious.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 21:51

#28

Thrull

Legacy Username

Problem #1: there is a huge

Problem #1: there is a huge surplus of materials. Every player generates more materials than they can conceivably use to equip themselves, and as suppliers they will continue to undercut until the price is low enough for those demanding materials. Sometimes 1% isn't enough to pique the a buyer's interest.

Compacting this problem is the fact that UVs are now purchasable directly with crowns, so the mass-crafting market is drying up. Instead of using hundreds of materials to sift for UVs, people are more often trying to convert those materials directly to crowns. Even more materials on the market.

Problem #2: certain materials are not very useful. Or useless. Certain materials are worth almost nothing because in addition to there being a huge quantities flooding the market every day, there are almost no popular recipes that utilize them.

The first problem, general deflation, is not going away without a major revision to material drop rates, I feel. The game's existing material drop rate wasn't designed with an auction house in mind. It seems to have been aimed at facilitating ample crafting ability given a small group of trading players, say a circle of friends, with somewhat diverse interests in equipment.

The second problem, deflation in specific materials, could be marginalized by giving players some way to convert useless materials into something with value. I posted a suggestion having to do with this (http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/16364) that basically involves making materials convertable to shards, which I think might help stabilize general prices for less-used mats, since shards are used ubiquitously in crafting.

Either way, the situation is very different now compared to launch. We have many more players, way more efficient means of matching spoils with buyers, and a major change in the UV system. Some change is warranted.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 22:40

#29

Cobriliant

The reason mat prices dropped so quickly is because of the release of the UV rolling. People used to mass craft to try and get good UV's but since you can roll good UV's its not longer necessary to horde tons of cheap materials for crafting.

The reason why 5* mats and more of the rare ones are cheaper is because people can buy end gear items now with the unbinding. Also, the Crown to CE ratio which is the important one, dropped. With the introduction of UV rolling there was the addition of a large crown sink, which made crowns more valuable and CE less valuable. So really its the same value, just the face price is different.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 22:59

#30

Ailea

The reason materials are

The reason materials are worthless, is because there is no materials sink in the game. A fair amount of the items are used in only single lines.

And secondly, once people get 5* gear, they have no incentive to make more 5* gear.

Therefore more and more of the rare materials make it into people's pockets... and sit there. And collect dust until the next kiddie decides he wants to craft a Divine Avenger, when they dust off their Sun Silver, sell a single piece to him, then return to waiting.

And waiting.

Actually, go read @Thrull's post again. They said what I'm saying, except they did it much better.

Sun, 07/24/2011 - 23:21

#31

Afoxi

Legacy Username

Have the Auction interface

Have the Auction interface automatically suggest a price by averaging auctions for similar items, and judging by the amount of lazy people out there, people won't undercut as much.

Mon, 07/25/2011 - 01:38

#32

viper901

Legacy Username

Guess what guys it's a

Guess what guys it's a market. Prices are going to try to trend towards the equilibrium. They were too high to begin with by a bajillion. Your loss.

Mon, 07/25/2011 - 02:46

#33

Matuse

Legacy Username

Isn't that cute...you're

Isn't that cute...you're getting upset at other people for knowing more about the value of items than you do.

Mon, 07/25/2011 - 08:08

#34

Eradicats

Legacy Username

, I'll just point out again

, I'll just point out again that people don't care about profit

I actually lol'ed at this statement.

Learn the value of your items.

Mon, 07/25/2011 - 14:32

#35

cdn

Legacy Username

This topic comes up once in a

This topic comes up once in a while in every single MMO I've ever played with any kind of a player market. And it's always the same answer to - you cannot control the market on any kind of commodity, because:

1) Most normal people dumping their haul on the auction house care much, much more about getting a guaranteed sale than squeezing every last copper/crown/gil/whatever out of their stuff - relisting is simply not worth the hassle to these people.

2) Deep undercutting is a common tactic to force people out of the market.

3) Other people playing the market will see the spike in prices, assume someone is trying to corner the market, and will dump everything they have at a normal price hoping you'll buy it and then be forced to sit on it and eventually take a loss while you deal with #1 and #2

It doesn't help that in this game material supply vastly exceeds demand for pretty much everything except shards, as Thrull pointed out. It's still the same principle though - point #1 being the most dominant in such deflationary markets.

Mon, 07/25/2011 - 15:34

#36

halotwo

Legacy Username

The problem is that people

The problem is that people are often too dumb to realize the 10% auction takes all their profit, and then some. People keep undercutting 25k recipe prices down to around 26k, not realizing with the auction fee the minimum sale price to break even is 27777.

Mon, 07/25/2011 - 16:05

#37

Trouser

People keep undercutting 25k

People keep undercutting 25k recipe prices down to around 26k, not realizing with the auction fee the minimum sale price to break even is 27777.

Or, they may realize it well, and figure it's preferable to take a small loss on a bad purchase and get the bulk of the money back to reinvest in something better, rather than wait indefinitely long for prices to go back up.

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Auction is crap.