people ruining the market for certain items

[Ilona]

I saw this exact same thing happen on Rodcet Nife.

Only now, solstice robes are 50pp each in the bazaar

[kiztent]

Originally posted by Malodium
Um, im not exactly 'up in arms'. im just a bit ticked off, as anyone would be, including yourself, that someone has rendered my efforts to make some plat useless. Especially considering the fact that there was absolutely no need for that person to do so. he could have simply put the price a bit lower than us and still sold them.

No, actually I find undercutting to be a part of the free market. I survive in the bazaar by figuring out what people want, what they will always want and how I can get that at a price that's profitable. If I find that someone is willing to try and trash the markets I use, I can either drive them out or leave. I've done both.

Fact is, if *I* can make plat on something, anyone else can. I don't think I bring anything special to the table in terms of ability to compete - that's the fun part about EQ - ANYONE can compete in any market. Anyone can make a 250 tailor and sell solstice robes. I don't expect people to sit and let me rack in plat when they could be too. Certainly there are some markets that are tougher, and time constraints are still time constraints. If you wanted to, you could make a killing by powerlevelling an enchanter and selling mana vials for outrageous profit - at least on Stormhammer, I've had a monopoly for close to a year on that market - no one is willing to compete on price with me enough to break it, though there have been attempts.

I've set the price, the buyers like my price, the sellers find my price reasonable (at least they've decided it's not worth their time to compete with me on price), people usually leave the market alone. If someone decided to compete with me on price, I'd either compete or I'd leave the market.

Originally posted by Malodium
I think its odd that someone elses misfortunes actually makes you happy.

It's not your misfortune that makes me unhappy, it's your reaction to said misfortune. I find it amusing that you cry when the free market acts freely.

Originally posted by Malodium
And again I say, this isnt capitalism. Capitalism attepmts to allow everyone to make a buck, it doesnt allow a few people to destroy an economy.

No it doesn't. By destroy an economy you mean "make me work harder for my profits," and that's exactly what capitalism is. You decide how much your time is worth, and if you're not making enough money for your time invested you either reset your expectations or you find another way to make money. That is capitalism. Other people decided that the skill ups are more important than the profit, and are selling the robes to make back what they can. Their time is worth less than yours because they consider the value of their time in the skill-ups and not the plat. Find another market if this bothers you.

You COULD point out this is a fault of the game that sell back prices are crazy enough that a market could get that devalued. I'd agree with that, but it makes the market freer, and I sort of like it. You could point out that tradeskills are broken when the easiest items to make are the ones that you'd want to sell for the mot profit. I'd agree with that - I even suggested having "skill up recipes" with reasonable cost and sell back value but no retail value and "sales recipes" that require farmed to make profitable products at the last FF (and to be fair I'm not the first person to have that idea). But you didn't complain about the market design and tradeskill progression of Sony's, you complained about people undercutting your gravy train. That is capitalism. Regulation is not capitalism. I have no sympathy for you.

[Phabos]

I'm not 100% sure capitalism is the best term to use when describing the EQ economy. Capitalism leaves open the potential for economic regulation (see anti-trust laws). The best term for EQ would probably be laissez-faire.

Capitalism is the basic structure of the market, while laissez-faire describes SOE's complete lack of regulation, such as a refusal to set minimum prices, control price-fixing on rare goods, and so forth.

All this discsussion reminds me of a story dealing with price controls towards the end of the Depression. Congress was debating whether or not to end the program, and opinions were flowing in from all parts of the country on what to. One merchant's suggestion: "Keep the price controls on the things I buy, eliminate them on the things I sell."


Just a thought to consider when prices rise or drop, no matter which side of the market you are on.


Phabos Aphsion
Drunken Paladin of Brell
Tarew Marr

[Lothay]

Shows what happens when I try to post and spell at nearly 6am local time, after a long day's work.

I really should just wait in those cases and post the next day.

~Lothay

[Serenya]

With the solstice robes in particular, it is a case of someone using them to skill up, and NOT trying to get their money back. Instead, they just want more then they would get from a vendor. Someone posted the cost at 360pp each? At least 3 months ago on Tribunal I bought 30 robes from someone at 225 when the going rate was 400. I've sold about half of those at 400, and used a few more. There are still plenty of robes out there at 225, or lower, because some skillers really just don't care. Good for my tailorless guild when trying to get everyone the potc earring, ok for someone like me, willing to try to arbitrate, lousy for someone who needs to make their money back to keep skilling. It's not really capitalism, because a real company would go out of business, and it's definitely not socialism. I'm not sure how one could describe this economy properly with any word other then 'borked'.

[Malodium]

Capitalism is the basic structure of the market, while laissez-faire describes SOE's complete lack of regulation, such as a refusal to set minimum prices, control price-fixing on rare goods, and so forth.

Exactly

I find it amusing that you cry when the free market acts freely.

I hope you also dont find it amusing when a farmer gets run out of farming and loses his livelihood because someone in china can sell thier wheat for half the price.
Go ahead and laugh at my misfortune, they are meaningless, its just a game after all, i just hope you dont use your sacred cow 'capitalism' against all the run out of work people in this country.

By destroy an economy you mean "make me work harder for my profits," and that's exactly what capitalism is.

Nope, thats not what I mean, I cant sell robes anymore at all. The market is gone. There is no more work I could do that would allow me to make anything on them.

Look, this has gotten a bit out of hand, you have accused me of crying, but the fact is, I thought about what happened just long enough to write my initial post, then forgot about it. I logged on and gave a robe to one of my friends who told me he needed it because I could see I wasnt going to be able to sell any. I only had 4 anyway, and didnt even know if I was planning on making anymore.
It was the principle of the thing that bothered me, not my own losing out on a few thousand plat. I simply couldnt understand why someone would be so selfish, and not attempt to work with the rest of us.
Sure, there is nothing technically wrong with what he did, so you can defend his actions all day in that respect, what im talking about is higher standards of human behavior.
Trying to stomp on everyone you meet regardless of the consequences in order to make more money seems to be your idea of a good economy, but it sure bring unhappiness for many people, and that in my mind is immoral.

I'm not sure how one could describe this economy properly with any word other then 'borked'.

Agreed, and i wont say anymore

[Lothay]

The practice of selling a product for less than const to maufacture is called "dumping."

Thie pracitice of dumping is used to drive competitors out of a market leaving you the only supplier of a product thus allowing you to control that market.

Compaines which use this tactic often have other soruces of income that they use to get them through the dumping period. Then, once they control the market, they are free to increase their prices to make up for losses sustained earlier.

It does happen. As recently as the mid-1980's US firms were accusing Japanese electronics manufacturers of doing this very thing. The World Trade Organization found that indeed several companies were engaged in the process of dumping.

It can and does happen in EQ.

There is also the point of the "sale at a loss for a partial recovery." This happens in cases where a company can no longer make a product or wishes to get out of a market, or has failed to become profitable. Inventory is sold at a fraction of its value in an effort to recover something of the investment.

This happens a lot in EQ.

EQ, like it or not has baseline economic rules. The primary one is that the market is player to player for anything really useful. That's why merchants buy you Nifty_Uber_Drop for 30plat, and then ask for 10K for the same item in their inventory.

Some other baseline rules are;

• When buying. people will only pay what they feel something is worth.
• When selling people will try to get as much as possible.
• Everyone will have a complaint about some price somewhere.
• The player to player market is the only game in town for selling your stuff and getting a reasonable return.

[Arakni Spellweaver]

Originally posted by Malodium
The EQ market is so vastly simplified compared to real life that its easy to learn some basic lessons, but you cant take them too far.

Ain't that the truth. If I really worked at it, I could make 20K in a good week in EQ. I haven't figured out a legal way to do that in RL yet.

[kiztent]

Originally posted by Malodium
I hope you also dont find it amusing when a farmer gets run out of farming and loses his livelihood because someone in china can sell thier wheat for half the price.
Go ahead and laugh at my misfortune, they are meaningless, its just a game after all, i just hope you dont use your sacred cow 'capitalism' against all the run out of work people in this country.

Oh, heck I wa going to let this drop, but I really had to comment on this. Unfortunately, most of my comments are 4 letter words, so suffice to say if you think there's any comparision between you making plat in an imaginary game and real farmer, you need to remove your head from wherever you keep it and put it on correctly.

Originally posted by Malodium
Nope, thats not what I mean, I cant sell robes anymore at all. The market is gone. There is no more work I could do that would allow me to make anything on them.

As long as I'm responding, I'd like to point out that selling and selling for a profit are not the same thing.

Originally posted by Malodium
It was the principle of the thing that bothered me, not my own losing out on a few thousand plat. I simply couldnt understand why someone would be so selfish, and not attempt to work with the rest of us.
Sure, there is nothing technically wrong with what he did, so you can defend his actions all day in that respect, what im talking about is higher standards of human behavior.
Trying to stomp on everyone you meet regardless of the consequences in order to make more money seems to be your idea of a good economy, but it sure bring unhappiness for many people, and that in my mind is immoral.

Why not wrap yourself in an American flag and grab a slice of apple pie before slamming me as being immoral for daring to disagree with you. Jesus.

I explained why people sell at a loss, Lothay explained it.

I'm stopping now.

[Verdandi]

That's enough of that.