Buying vs Acquiring

[Turlo Lomon]

This is exactly what I tell my friends when they wonder why I buy stuff in bazaar. I use a measurement of 1kpp/hour (which is what I can get if I farm cash drops on the average).

Spider Silk: Competing against trackers in a very crowded zone, I can manage to get 1 stack of swatches in an hour if I am lucky. However, I usually buy swatches in bazaar at 25pp each. Why? I am paying half what my time is worth. It really is more cost efficient that way.

Recently, I subcontracted someone to make sacred tunare silk for me in bulk at 100pp/each with a total order of 600. I am a rogue. I can't imbue gems, so that would be additional overhead. I would have to spend a great deal of time on subcombines, etc. Over all, it may not appear to be the most cost efficient way of doing things, but when you take into account finding someone willing to imbue 600 emeralds, the pottery combines, etc, etc. it comes out to be worth my cash imo.

[Kronepsis]

Well, I probably have a different definition of price gouging than you guys then. Basically for me, Price gouging IS stupidity. Someone putting an item for sale at a high price that isn't going to sell when it isn't something like "I'm the guy that has Water Flasks for 1000000, use that to find me" is gouging. And no, as far as I can tell, those items are not selling at those prices. (It wouldn't be gouging if they did, it would be stupid buyers, as you said andyhre.)

When they vanish, they vanish in such a way that you can tell it wasn't bought off of their vendor (e.x. they logged out, or moved to a different zone). Even when it does vanish in a more permanent way, you know that it either did not sell at the price they put up or was a super lucky vendor find, because they don't bother restocking it after even after a month. Given how many EP flagged people there are, it's usually the first case, although more tradeskill-ignorant people have been getting flagged lately. If the item sells on a regular basis at that price, it drops out of the "Gouging" category and falls in the "Too-Expensive-For-My-Tastes" category, since, well, if part of my definition of gouging includes it not really selling at that price, I can't call it gouging if it moves now, can I?

Akisha:
I don't bother sending people who gouge tells. Their component, their price. I don't like it, I avoid making noise about it. Complaining about it would only make them more determined to keep it high, and really, I'm a VERY patient guy, even though it is annoying to wait. I don't like haggling as debating isn't really a strength of mine and I hate it when people try to haggle an item I'm selling (uh, yeah, I'm REALLY going to take an offer of 500 plat for a Black Sapphire when I just had 6 sell at 900 each over the past week, AND it's at the lowest price already anyway), so unless they ask me what I'm interested in paying or they start auctioning "taking offers for XXX" or something similiar, I never say and let the subject be.

And how it hurts things is the lemming mentality people have for item pricings--potential sellers see the price and naturally assume that it is worth that much. So when they put their components up, they put it up for that price and there is more waiting to do as you wait for them to come to their senses. Does it hurt me personally? No. But it is incredibly annoying to watch happen.

[andyhre]

Yeah, I would just call that an ignorant price setter. The high end stuff is not a very liquid market. Illiquid markets tend to have less stable pricing than liquid ones, as often each seller comes to the market without a great deal of knowledge as to the previous market clearing price. As a result, a market like, say, Vegerog Vine can often become a series of first-time-sellers trying to find long-time-buyers, and each one wanting to find the highest rpice that will sell.

When they guess too low, it's snapped up in less than a day, and you may never see it.

When they guess too high, it sits. And sits. And if you are unlucky, the next first-time seller comes to market and sees that price and does not know it has been sitting for weeks and picks it too.

But I find that those prices do come down, eventually, and I do bother to send a tell, sometimes more than once. And sometimes it works. And sometimes I get no answer but the next day they price it a little lower and it starts to move down.

Anyway, I agree with you that we define gouging very differently. Well, that's not true, in that I don't know how to define gouging, but when I here people talk about it, it's usually in the context of a price at whcih transactions have occurred, just that they think it was too high, rather than in the context of a price being offered that exceeds the market's willingess to pay. In RL, you don't see that too much.

[Akishka]

Oh I love to haggle! Not the 'your stuff is crap and should be given to me' haggle but the 'well, for these logical reasons, a better price for your item would be.....' is great

[LadyAnnaAnna]

The only thing I think I need to point out to this convo is this:
Prices are only going to get higher.
Its the natural evolution of a market and inflation.
Its going to keep geting worse until it crashes. The only way thats going to happen is if 1) prices get to the point that people literally CAN'T pay for items in the bazaar, or, 2) the devs do something to change the supply and demand of enough items drastically enough that prices fluxuate wildly.

the first option is a while off still i think and the second is not likely to happen at all. I'm mainly just mentioning this because I've seen discussions like this before and I don't think anyone has mentioned this yet. Maybe I'm just saying what everyone already knows and is just thinking, but figured I'd use my super-special talent of pointing out the obvious

[Lothay]

Just an observation:

* Prices for any commodity rise until people stop buying.

People don't buy grapes when they're $10 a pound, so no one prices them there. (This example exagerated for the sake of making my point.)

* When a price ceiling has been reached, the price stops climbing.

When vendors of grapes discover that no one will buy grapes for more than $5 per pound, grape prices stabalize at this point.

* Once a price has stabalized, competitors enter the market. Not always at this point, but I'm simplifying. They compete on price if the goods are identical, so they attempt to sell at a price below the current stable price.

This is where some folks make a lot of money by being the lower-cost alternative, and attempt to make up the difference in volume.

* This can drive a price down to the point where no one is willing to work to sell the item.

It now costs more to grow grapes than you can make selling them. You grow oranges instead.

* The cycle starts over once someone else starts on the up-swing portion of the cycle.

* Not all of this directly applies to EQ.

Someone with access to raw materials that you want but can't get otherwise will price stuff upwards until he finds a price you refuse to pay. Perhaps you decide you'd rather wait and get elemental planes access yourself, or you'd rather spend more of your play-time farming. He then sets his price at the highest level you will pay.

Someone else notices that they can get material "x" and people will buy it for price "Y". This person decides he can sell it for "Y-1" and still be happy with his profit.

This is how prices move up and down. There are more factors, and I'm not really an economist. But if you watch the prices in the bazaar long enough, you'll see the pattern repeat endlessly.

All the noise and shouting along the way are part of the entertainment.

[Akishka]

* The cycle starts over once someone else starts on the up-swing portion of the cycle.

For an excellent example of this, watch jade reavers for a while Price tends to bottom out around 8k, then you can't find them for a month, then they reappear at 20k and the cycle starts again.

[Akishka]

Oh and the other thing that I wanted to comment on. It seems like the vibe I'm getting from a few people is that the reasons prices are the way they are, that is 'too high', is because people are greedy bastards. Now, I'm not saying that there are not greedy bastards out there but its been my experience that sometimes its just a case of ignorance, as Andy said. Which is why I suggested talking with the guy. Ignorance can be cured

[Serenya]

And a lot of it is based on when a seller enters (or reenters) the market. For instance, when I acquired an elemental drop by happenstance (drop of pure rain I think), it was selling at an absurd price. I tossed it out there at that price and it sold. Should I happen to find it on a vendor again (as I have) I might or might not remember to check prices on my merchant. If I don't, it still might sell, or it might sit there till I notice and adjust. In this scenario, I might negotiate if you point out my price is out of whack.

The other possibility is - I bought it to use, but until I get the time to sit down and do whatever, I'm sticking it on my merchant at a silly (to me) price. If it sells, someone wanted it more then I did, and I made money. If it doesn't sell, I'll eventually use it as planned. Either way, I'm not going to negotiate the price.

[papyscott]

Hello there,

Economist by trade here also. I completely agree with the argument that gouging is nigh impossible in the EQ world. I might be able to find out your max willingness to pay, but there is no way I can coerce you come click on my trader LOL. There are little to no barriers to entry for most items, and you are basically seeing the time value of plat change as people get higher level and/or more plat enters the economy.

The baz market is not that efficient however except for the high volume stuff (like paddings, etc). Seller behavior in my experience does depend a lot on the prices other sellers currently are setting.

One person mentioned how the very high priced seller influenced the value that other sellers set. This certainly happens, and either ends up setting a new (higher) equilibrium price, or eventually prices drop back down.

However, you can use this seller behavior to your advantage. For example, I was the only human tailor for a while working on LoY robes. I started buying up all the essence of rathe I could find. Most of it was sub 5pp when I started, but I had a policy of buying if it was less than 25pp. Pretty soon the only essences left were 25pp and above. New sellers came in and priced at 25pp and I would have had to pay 25pp pretty much for each one if I had kept up that practice.

BUT, I changed my strategy. I didn't buy for a while and let the price drift back down to 5-10pp. I then started buying up the essence again, but I ALWAYS left one or two sellers (two is better) at 5 10pp. This ensured that all the new sellers that came in would set there price at 5 10pp. In the end I bought stacks and stacks of essences all at around 5pp instead of 25pp. I used this same approach for green goblin skins (working on chardok faction) and on other LoY robe components. Anytime you are a major buyer in a big market this approach works very well. It really just takes the seller price setting mechanism and makes it work in your favor (or you could think of it as mynopsonist power if you must :P)

Anyway, just wanted to point out that the behavioral aspect of seller price setting does not always cut against buyers

papy

[Footsore]

The other possibility is - I bought it to use, but until I get the time to sit down and do whatever, I'm sticking it on my merchant at a silly (to me) price. If it sells, someone wanted it more then I did, and I made money. If it doesn't sell, I'll eventually use it as planned. Either way, I'm not going to negotiate the price.

I often do this as well. I suspect it is a very common practice.

Also, the common theme of "greedy" traders doesn't make sense for a couple reasons if you examine it. First, it implies that the vendor in some way "owes" you his wares. That just isn't a logical assumption. Just because I have something in no way, form or fashion entitles you to it. Second, no one makes any pp whatsoever if something sets on their trader without selling. If one wants to make pp, they must set their wares at a price that WILL sell. If something actually sells at a given price then it wasn't too high. If YOU consider that price too high, that only means you were wrong. Of course, it is still a personal decision not to pay the price, but you shouldn't become too judgemental when you are the one who is incorrect.

The theme that components should be priced so that they support the price of the finished product is also invalid. If the ONLY use for the item was indeed the finished product, then the argument might be valid. But, this isn’t the case. You will note that the majority of the items that have the greatest markup are ALSO used for skillups. We all know we attach a value to skillups. The “inflated” price you see isn’t based on the value of the final product, but on the skillup value. Let’s face it; there is no value to the fine plate armor that helps drive the price of leather padding beyond its skillup value. One must also factor into the price of the finished product that not all of those items are being produced from components purchased in the bazaar. Some people actually acquire the parts by killing mobs, so their invested cost is much less than those who only acquire the parts off other players. And as I said before, no one has an inherent right to something someone else has, so one can’t assert that the price of the finished product should be different simply because they cannot acquire the components themselves. If everyone had an equal shot at everything, the value of everything would be nothing.

As for "gouging", the term and the practice apply only to things of limited availability but great NEED. (Need as opposed to want.) Raising the price of food and water following a disaster is gouging because people need them and have a much higher real motivation to buy them. You can't gouge on something someone simply "wants."

[Aneya]

BUT, I changed my strategy. I didn't buy for a while and let the price drift back down to 5-10pp. I then started buying up the essence again, but I ALWAYS left one or two sellers (two is better) at 5 10pp. This ensured that all the new sellers that came in would set there price at 5 10pp. In the end I bought stacks and stacks of essences all at around 5pp instead of 25pp. I used this same approach for green goblin skins (working on chardok faction) and on other LoY robe components. Anytime you are a major buyer in a big market this approach works very well. It really just takes the seller price setting mechanism and makes it work in your favor (or you could think of it as mynopsonist power if you must :P)

If you have 2 accounts one of which is a trader bot you can be even sneakier. You have your trader bot set the price of the market as low as you want. :P

[Muldamai]

I look at the pricing here as a complete open economy. No one sets rules at to what you can sell, how much you charge, and how long you leave items up for sale. On the flip side, since this is a game, a buyer truly does not need anything for sale (ie: food to live as in the real world), we only have wants when we buy. Any "rules" we think should apply come from our own backgrounds and prejudices.

I am one who rarely buys anything, and does heavy aquiring. I do not price items what anyone here would call gouging. but I do charge what the market goes for. If I charge what things are really worth, most likely I will be bought out by someone else and they can then raise the price. I have no beefs with what anyone charges in EQ. It's a game, and I have fun with Bazaar stuffs.

I also look at anything I do as 100% profit. I an interested mainly in cashflow, so I leave things up for 24 hours, then I lower the price, then repeat till almost all my items are gone. I find I am in money all the time, lets me jack around at the Casino, and really do whatever. If you find yourself low on cash, do what was recommended above and sell leather padding et al until your solvent again. I have been working my tradeskills for 4 years now, lowest one is 186, highest is 220. Not efficient as banging it out, but I have all my hair and haven't threatened anyone. Peace out

[slappig]

<snip I can't help but think of that huge markup as a gross injustice to tradeskillers, even though I know it's just the free market at work. <snip>

===> It's not a free market, it's SOE IMO. They apparantly have put 'stops' in at critical points that keep people from being able to acquire items in a reasonable time (like spiderling silk drop rates--which have not IMPROVED IMO-- or by making components needed for skill up paths inaccessible for most players (hynid tales for whip crackers in the 176-186 range for example). Sorry for the minor rant, but players who want to farm components have a heck of a time finding/obtaining them. I can remember too when '..50 platt was a lot of money [Verdandi]", but I could harvest and sell spider and spiderling silk, make my own padding, and get my own pelts and hides [ except for my fleeting quiver lol].

[Elyssanda]

Yesterday, it was worth my time to pay the bazaar price of 50P per acrylia ore item (small brick, large brick , & block all at 50p) from a Bazaar person... when I checked them today, they'd upped their prices to 75 per item.. so that made it not worth my time.. very simple. (working fletching and shadow tipped arrows.) I think it really depends on what YOU are willing to spend, and accept for your goods. I do farm my condensed shadows, but I have fun doing it. so to me that makes it worth it.. I am having fun.