UNDERCUTTING....

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Originally Posted by Roaran

There was a quite thorough discussion of undercutting located here.

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Fixed the link for you

Under cutters will never realize they only hurt themselves.

Not really, if people don't have the time to compete and constantly change prices for a better deal theres nothing wrong with them undercutting so that when they do have time to play they can enjoy it.

who cares.. as long as i get rid of that crap on my retainer and the fastest and easyest way to do it is undercut by 50% or more.
If it ain't gone in a day .. then its too expensive.
Few gonna spend those rediculous prices some ask for an item , especialy when it's a lower level item you only use for a day or 2 untill you leveled up, and replace it with something higher.

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Originally Posted by Elexia

Even if it was a "free market" kind of funny how tier IV materia always hover around the 100-500k mark, I mean if it's a 'free market" why aren't people selling it for much lower than 100k? Obvious people know the worth of items, which is why undercutting is ridiculous when they do it by wide margins.

There's quite the difference between undercutting a mere 1k to try to sell more and undercutting by damn near 80% lol.

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You clearly have no idea what the term free market means. Just because something is expensive, doesn't mean it is unaffected by free market principles (such as: luxury goods, equilibrium pricing, etc.).

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Originally Posted by wolfsspirit

who cares.. as long as i get rid of that crap on my retainer and the fastest and easyest way to do it is undercut by 50% or more.
If it ain't gone in a day .. then its too expensive.
Few gonna spend those rediculous prices some ask for an item , especialy when it's a lower level item you only use for a day or 2 untill you leveled up, and replace it with something higher.

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Yeah, sucks for people actually trying to make gil. Even doing leves isn't a good source of gil anymore as they adjusted it (and barring the 100,000 leve history achievement one.) Some people actually gather and craft to...buy thing. Shocking I know. So while you don't care (which I guess is the mentality of a lot of people who play this game) others do it and it is quite annoying being undercut by a very large margin.

If you want to "just get rid of stuff" you do know there's literally hundreds of NPCs you can sell it to, right? Nothing is "too expensive" beyond the new materia which people seriously believe someone will buy for 1-4 mil for almost no upgrade in performance lol.

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Originally Posted by WinnipegJet

You clearly have no idea what the term free market means. Just because something is expensive, doesn't mean it is unaffected by free market principles (such as: luxury goods, equilibrium pricing, etc.).

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Actually I do, and people obviously know the worth of some items that it's pretty much unaffected by a "free market" since prices for certain things, as exampled tier IV materia generally stay in the 100-500k range. If they're trying to compete with each other, don't you think people would drop it even lower rather than having basically a set price range for it? It's hard to compete when you're selling at the same price as your competition >.>

Since isn't a free market basically an unrestricted economy? You'd think people would be more likely to undercut certain luxury items atm (Lightning Brands and Tier IV INT/Lightning materia are basically luxury now.)

Just How Wal-mart marks their prices 19.95 instead of what most stores sell it for of 19.99 :P.

one problem of having a sell history people begged for, well they have there AH now.

back in the good ol'days you could set your price in the marketwards and were able to sell for your price since no one knew what it sold for last.

Well, on Sargatanas, people were selling all the Felt Gear for ludicrous amounts, like Mahogany Pattens, cost about 18K to make and were selling for 60k, so i made a bunch of em, and some pants and other felt stuff and sold them for a more reasonable 35-40k. So i undercut by a lot. Same with Cobalt harness. Cost 30k to make and people were selling them for 100k!!! So i undercut by 50k to 50k. but then someone went ahead and bought out all the Undyed Linens and Electrum ingots en mass a couple days later and speared the price of them to about double what they were or more. So much for that. I could farm the ingredients, but i've got other things to do right now. :p

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Originally Posted by Elexia

Yeah, sucks for people actually trying to make gil. Even doing leves isn't a good source of gil anymore as they adjusted it (and barring the 100,000 leve history achievement one.) Some people actually gather and craft to...buy thing. Shocking I know. So while you don't care (which I guess is the mentality of a lot of people who play this game) others do it and it is quite annoying being undercut by a very large margin.

If you want to "just get rid of stuff" you do know there's literally hundreds of NPCs you can sell it to, right? Nothing is "too expensive" beyond the new materia which people seriously believe someone will buy for 1-4 mil for almost no upgrade in performance lol.



Actually I do, and people obviously know the worth of some items that it's pretty much unaffected by a "free market" since prices for certain things, as exampled tier IV materia generally stay in the 100-500k range. If they're trying to compete with each other, don't you think people would drop it even lower rather than having basically a set price range for it? It's hard to compete when you're selling at the same price as your competition >.>

Since isn't a free market basically an unrestricted economy? You'd think people would be more likely to undercut certain luxury items atm (Lightning Brands and Tier IV INT/Lightning materia are basically luxury now.)

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100k-500k is an "undercut" price. Think about how much these items cost when they debut (and subsequently how much they have fallen). Equilibrium pricing is a function of time, competing goods, and general inflation- Tier IV materia might stabilize around this range for the foreseeable future (equilibrium- supply and demand) until something better comes out (competing goods; price reduction- maturity and decline). The price may also wave with the cost of items on a whole (inflation/deflation). Look at how an item in XI changed in price (NOT value) from 2006 to the present. Or, for a real world example, consider the value of currency in Zimbabwe- I recently acquired a 100 trillion dollar bill for $5 on ebay (paying for the novelty)... the actual worth of which is about 2 cents. Back in 2005 a bus ride on Zimbabwe's public transport cost about 50 billion dollars.

A free market is in theory an unrestricted economy yes... the "invisible hand" guides it first and foremost. But in 99.9% of cases there will be some macro level controls that affect pricing. It's difficult to say for certain, but we probably won't see a dramatic shift in the pricing of these items until something superior comes out. Keep in mind, the principle of undercutting is based on the tradeoff of earning less revenue for a quicker sale. Such is why you see people undercut by 1 gil, 100 gil, 1000 gil, or whatever. People will not undercut an item to the point where it's undervalued because the free market will correct this.

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Originally Posted by WinnipegJet

A free market is in theory an unrestricted economy yes... the "invisible hand" guides it first and foremost. But in 99.9% of cases there will be some macro level controls that affect pricing. It's difficult to say for certain, but we probably won't see a dramatic shift in the pricing of these items until something superior comes out. Keep in mind, the principle of undercutting is based on the tradeoff of earning less revenue for a quicker sale. Such is why you see people undercut by 1 gil, 100 gil, 1000 gil, or whatever. People will not undercut an item to the point where it's undervalued because the free market will correct this.

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Hi Onion,

Great points. But I would say there are reasons we have the SEC and laws for Anti-Trust / Monopolies / Price Dumping, etc.

With the crappy way Price Listings are displayed right now (Top 20 Cheapest only), an RMT Corporation can easily load up 1 Char (with 2 Retainers) and price dump an item to control that market. They have an army of RMT / Bots at their disposal to price dump at super low prices and drive away real Crafters & Gatherers, and then control prices then.

Square has no one monitoring or regulating the markets. There are no Anti-Trust / Price-Dumping Protection schemes in place.

Overall I think there are a few different things being discussed here. Individual players wanting to get rid of their items or sell faster... sure they can undercut each other by various amounts and wage their little "price wars"... and then there are RMT Corporations / Bots / People with a lot of resources / multiple retainers on their hands that want to Price Dump / Control Markets. That's a bigger issue IMHO.

It's a pretty low activity game right now... but I wonder how much worse it might get once 2.0 hits?

See: Supply and Demand

I don't understand how people talk about a Free Market like it should actually exist in MMO's. A free market would tell me that if I can find a bot to do what other players spend hours doing, its the other people who are the suckers. If SE wanted a free market, they would allow 3rd party programs and tell people who can't code or purchase their own bot to suck it. We want a controlled economy that encourages people to do the work instead of cheating. I don't care what your real life opinion is on Economics, this is not the real world. We want people to actually enjoy doing work enough to pay a monthly fee and in turn help this game survive.

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Originally Posted by indira

one problem of having a sell history people begged for, well they have there AH now.

back in the good ol'days you could set your price in the marketwards and were able to sell for your price since no one knew what it sold for last.

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Sorry guy, I wasn't going to buy your overpriced crap anyway. I'll buy from the guy selling it for 100g less than you.

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Originally Posted by Themule

I don't understand how people talk about a Free Market like it should actually exist in MMO's. A free market would tell me that if I can find a bot to do what other players spend hours doing, its the other people who are the suckers. If SE wanted a free market, they would allow 3rd party programs and tell people who can't code or purchase their own bot to suck it. We want a controlled economy that encourages people to do the work instead of cheating. I don't care what your real life opinion is on Economics, this is not the real world. We want people to actually enjoy doing work enough to pay a monthly fee and in turn help this game survive.

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If SE wanted us to "do the work instead of cheating", then they would disable all inter-player trading, and all currency and purchases would be done via NPC interaction. The moment you allow players to trade or interact with each other, they're going to find a way to "exploit" the trading system to get the highest benefit. That is a tenet of how any economy works, whether its real life or virtual.

The reason why bots are banned is simply because SE is not okay with the idea that players can automate their gameplay. There are some MMOs that allow it, some that have come up with ingenious ways to thwart it, and some that opt to simply ban them. But banning bots does not make the rest of the economy any less of a free market.

And finally, if you think that virtual economies don't have parallels to real world economies, then you my friend are extremely uneducated. People write their Ph.D. theses on virtual economies, and the same laws and phenomena that happen in real world economies also happen in virtual economies.

Undercutting is a multi-headed beast for sure...when I started this thread, I thought it went without saying that bots are starting to really effect this economy because more and more people are doing it. But in reality, i'm really just annoyed with how much time i have to spend checking prices and re-adjusting what i'm selling.

Fine SE you don't care about bots, fair enough, I can deal and have. But don't screw me for not cheating AND make it extremely annoying to sell things...

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Originally Posted by Themule

I don't understand how people talk about a Free Market like it should actually exist in MMO's. A free market would tell me that if I can find a bot to do what other players spend hours doing, its the other people who are the suckers. If SE wanted a free market, they would allow 3rd party programs and tell people who can't code or purchase their own bot to suck it. We want a controlled economy that encourages people to do the work instead of cheating. I don't care what your real life opinion is on Economics, this is not the real world. We want people to actually enjoy doing work enough to pay a monthly fee and in turn help this game survive.

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It's not some easy issue though.
Blizzard had to hire real world economists to come in and fix the WoW economy
And even then, even amongst economists you'll have a hard time finding ones that agree.
Economy in general is such a vast and diverse subject with so many "professional" opinions that at the end of the day, most MMO makers decide to just let the market work itself out

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

If SE wanted us to "do the work instead of cheating", then they would disable all inter-player trading, and all currency and purchases would be done via NPC interaction. The moment you allow players to trade or interact with each other, they're going to find a way to "exploit" the trading system to get the highest benefit. That is a tenet of how any economy works, whether its real life or virtual.

The reason why bots are banned is simply because SE is not okay with the idea that players can automate their gameplay. There are some MMOs that allow it, some that have come up with ingenious ways to thwart it, and some that opt to simply ban them. But banning bots does not make the rest of the economy any less of a free market.

And finally, if you think that virtual economies don't have parallels to real world economies, then you my friend are extremely uneducated. People write their Ph.D. theses on virtual economies, and the same laws and phenomena that happen in real world economies also happen in virtual economies.

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LOL...not even going to respond.

No, of course you won't. You'll get on your high horse and think you're right, despite not having a single valid point or counter point.

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Originally Posted by Rydin

And even then, even amongst economists you'll have a hard time finding ones that agree.

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Bahahaha holy hell thats putting it *lightly*. Economists hardly agree on anything at all, except that an economy exists. Finding two economists in agreement is like finding a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.



On Topic: People should stop being butthurt about game economies. They function like real life economies, because all of its players grew up in an economic system. As a result, our behavior mimics the behavior of companies, corporations, etc. We are conditioned to think and operate this way thanks to the society we grew up in. Thats how the fuckin cookies crumbles. If you don't like it, play games from communist countries. I guarantee you'll find a very different kind of game market. And I bet none of you losers complain when you're shopping for mats and find expensive shit for half the price. You say "discount" and are freakin ecstatic. And you know what? The guy that sold it is happy as balls too. Everyone wins except the guy who didnt sell crap. And since you'd only complain if you were that guy, everyone complaining must just be *butthurt*.

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

No, of course you won't. You'll get on your high horse and think you're right, despite not having a single valid point or counter point.

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you either bot or you don't gather/craft...or you are incredibly naive. hope your phd keeps you warm at night when people stop playing this game.

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Originally Posted by Themule

you either bot or you don't gather/craft...or you are incredibly naive. hope your phd keeps you warm at night when people stop playing this game.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_logical_fallacies

Can YOU count how many you just made?

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

No, of course you won't. You'll get on your high horse and think you're right, despite not having a single valid point or counter point.

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Wolfie, Wolfie, Wolfie!

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_logical_fallacies

Can YOU count how many you just made?

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so you bot? or...i guess i don't get it ;-)

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Originally Posted by Themule

i guess i don't get it ;-)

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http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3...mqpso2_500.png

"A major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that group thinks they ought to want. Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself."
-Milton Friedman-

"There can be economy only where there is efficiency."
-Benjamin Disraeli-

"People want economy and they will pay any price to get it."
-Lee Iacocca-

"People do not understand what a great revenue economy is."
-Marcus Tullius Cicero-

"Economy does not lie in sparing money, but in spending it wisely."
-Thomas Huxley-

"My dog is worried about the economy because Alpo is up to 99 cents a can. That's almost $7.00 in dog money."
-Joe Weinstein-

Just some quotes to make you think (and maybe make you smile)

In the end, I just want a system in place that promotes an economy that is going to make people want to participate. At present I see things getting exponentially worse. You can say what you want about economic theory, but the goal right now is to attract people to this game. I've made the current system work for me, thats not the point. I want people to love this game so I can continue to play it. Unchecked botting, a bogged down UI etc tells people that they should play something else. I'm not trying to start a fight. I'm just a player who is finding less and less of an incentive to craft and gather in this game every day and I think there are some very real and fixable reasons why. If you disagree and think things are just as they should be, so be it.

I agree with you there, only because while their stance on bots and automation is a big fat "NO", they're not enforcing that policy as well as they should be. The less risky players don't do it out of fear of punishment, yet the ones that do it don't get punished enough. It makes for an economy that's hard to get into, which is a problem.

Whatever they decide to do with bots and automation in the end, they need to stick to their guns. Ambiguity is bad.

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

I agree with you there, only because while their stance on bots and automation is a big fat "NO", they're not enforcing that policy as well as they should be. The less risky players don't do it out of fear of punishment, yet the ones that do it don't get punished enough. It makes for an economy that's hard to get into, which is a problem.

Whatever they decide to do with bots and automation in the end, they need to stick to their guns. Ambiguity is bad.

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totally agree. well said. /hug :-)

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Originally Posted by Themule

In the end, I just want a system in place that promotes an economy that is going to make people want to participate. At present I see things getting exponentially worse. You can say what you want about economic theory, but the goal right now is to attract people to this game. I've made the current system work for me, thats not the point. I want people to love this game so I can continue to play it. Unchecked botting, a bogged down UI etc tells people that they should play something else. I'm not trying to start a fight. I'm just a player who is finding less and less of an incentive to craft and gather in this game every day and I think there are some very real and fixable reasons why. If you disagree and think things are just as they should be, so be it.

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Does the economy really pull people into a game?
Im not asking to be a douche. I really want to know? I know we can't speak for everyone, but do you think many people are drawn in by the economy?
Do you think these people look for simplicity or a more in-depth, feature-rich, goal-oriented economy?

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Originally Posted by Kiara

Hi Onion,

Great points. But I would say there are reasons we have the SEC and laws for Anti-Trust / Monopolies / Price Dumping, etc.

With the crappy way Price Listings are displayed right now (Top 20 Cheapest only), an RMT Corporation can easily load up 1 Char (with 2 Retainers) and price dump an item to control that market. They have an army of RMT / Bots at their disposal to price dump at super low prices and drive away real Crafters & Gatherers, and then control prices then.

Square has no one monitoring or regulating the markets. There are no Anti-Trust / Price-Dumping Protection schemes in place.

Overall I think there are a few different things being discussed here. Individual players wanting to get rid of their items or sell faster... sure they can undercut each other by various amounts and wage their little "price wars"... and then there are RMT Corporations / Bots / People with a lot of resources / multiple retainers on their hands that want to Price Dump / Control Markets. That's a bigger issue IMHO.

It's a pretty low activity game right now... but I wonder how much worse it might get once 2.0 hits?

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Hi! Thanks for your input. I'll respond in order of your points.

RMTs can control prices using the methods you described to an extent, but items still have inherent value. If they try to inflate the price of a Tier IV materia for some reason, people are likely to notice that the item is disproportionately priced with respect to other similar materia or items. I guess it goes back to how covert this manipulation is-- 10k will probably not be noticed, but 100k likely will and subsequently adjusted for.

There is no price regulation for sure. The closest thing to this is NPC prices for items that can be used as a benchmark/estimate for how much the market will be charging... but again, even these prices appear to have been arbitrarily selected, with no real account for actual supply/demand dynamics. As far as anti-inflation measures, there are only two basic tactics that SE used in XI and is likely to employ in XIV: gil sinks (such as the repair NPC), and gil seizures (banning of RMT accounts that horde gil). I guess the bottom line here is that we'll probably never see any sophisticated price controls/regulations put into place. This is an MMO after all; I don't think SE has budgeted to hire an economist to manage the XIV economies.

In terms of activity, an economy can't function as a market if there aren't enough buyers and sellers. This is a really complicated problem that I'm too lazy, and honestly, probably not knowledgeable enough to speak to. All I'll say is that with more people there are more transactions and a greater likelihood of normal market behaviours.

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Originally Posted by Rydin

Does the economy really pull people into a game?
Im not asking to be a douche. I really want to know? I know we can't speak for everyone, but do you think many people are drawn in by the economy?
Do you think these people look for simplicity or a more in-depth, feature-rich, goal-oriented economy?

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yes, i think this game has more potential for an engrossing supply side gaming experience than almost any other MMO to date. the've done a great job, which is why they should do everything in their power (which, as Winnipeg pointed out, isn't much) to defend and promote it.

I love the Free market system for melded gear, there is a way to differentiate the quality of an item there. For mats and common items, it's plainly frustrating having to deal with the constant hi's and lows.

But meh gotta live with it

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Originally Posted by Themule

yes, i think this game has more potential for an engrossing supply side gaming experience than almost any other MMO to date.

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You think it would be hard to recover it now? The economy is 19 months old now

Just rhetoric, but I wonder how this game would be if bots and other automation was allowed. A lot of resources would have to be put into creating viable resource acquisition models (including experience, seals, etc.), but it would make for a really interesting metagame (also probably because I'm a CS major).

Most developers though just find it easier and less costly to simply stamp out any kind of player-created automation in their games.

I aint gonna lie I undercut all the time and if i could make the darksteel gear i would sell it for 500k not 1.7 mil or more greed mofos lol. Seriously I only undercut if there are tons of things on the market and I just want mine gone. So if something is selling from 2500 x99 and I only have 12 of them i would sell them for 1900 so that they go fast.

Since Im not lazy and gather my own mats and am working toward all doh to 50 it matters not to me since mats are free for me.

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

Just rhetoric, but I wonder how this game would be if bots and other automation was allowed. A lot of resources would have to be put into creating viable resource acquisition models (including experience, seals, etc.), but it would make for a really interesting metagame (also probably because I'm a CS major).

Most developers though just find it easier and less costly to simply stamp out any kind of player-created automation in their games.

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Things would be cheap as hell, and things like HQ items would become standard due to the influx of materials. In fact, HQ would probably be required lol. Also, higher melds would become the norm due to easily replaceable (and cheap) equipment...and in some cases materia. The value of materia not obtainable thru botting (like ones from primal weapons) would likely increase a LOT as well.

UNDERCUTTING makes me happy that the economy is so much better than 11

price history is the real problem. it needs to go away.

Dude ppl undercut even when we had no price history word just got around this item was selling for this much and it still happened. Just a few ppl in here butt hurt they can't sell new items for 10 mil gil when none of the mats cost that much to make it.

I love when ppl use the line they are only hurting them selves. You can only hurt your self when you sell stuff more than what npc's sell the items for, or not making a profit at all, at the end of the day if i got all my items for free and decide i want to undercut you to make 100% profit i will do it >_>.