Things to address in 2.0: Open Descending Price Auction will not work

Jinko touched on something that it somewhat accurate.

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Originally Posted by Jinko

Many companies in real life maintain competition whilst still making a profit, video game economics are different in that someone can sell an item for less than its value and not have to worry about the consequences, in fact in FF14 many items produced are actually worth less than the value of the materials to make them, this almost never happens in real life.

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The worth of those items is a little more complicated. Usually the item itself hold little value to other people, but for the crafter, it holds great value. More often than not these items are used in levelling up, so a part of the value is to the crafter who makes them, and so they are willing to sell for a loss in order to obtain the experience. This would be something like an investment, or something like research. Where you expend resources at a cost, with the expectation of getting gains in the future.

A research facility might spend millions of dollars developing a new drug. The byproduct of their experiments are not simply the waste materials that they might sell or dispose of, but also the technical skill and information gained as a result of the experiments themselves. Crafters in FFXIV operate under the same asumption, that they take losses for now, in order to make gains in the future. So, I would contest the point that such things do not happen in real life.

Another point about video game economics being different... I'm not entirely sure on this one. Economics is really just humans interacting with one another. Because humans are still the ones operating the video game, the very fundamentals would not change a bit. That's just my hunch though.

Also, when you say:

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I just want to sell my item for what its worth.

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In a free market, worth and value change. Stable prices usually mean there is a stable demand and stable supply. Especially for FFXIV, there is rarely stable demand or stable supply. So fluctuating prices should not be surprising. And if prices were not able to change when needed, either higher or lower, we would have shortages and wasteful production.

You are right I didn't think about R&D costs.

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Originally Posted by Roaran

In a free market, worth and value change. Stable prices usually mean there is a stable demand and stable supply. Especially for FFXIV, there is rarely stable demand or stable supply. So fluctuating prices should not be surprising. And if prices were not able to change when needed, either higher or lower, we would have shortages and wasteful production.

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This is true, although up until recently we haven't had the ability to see sales history on items, it was a totally free market where everyone sold an item for what they thought it was worth.

With the introduction of Price History there has been a trend towards stability because even if an item is not currently for sale someone can check the last sold item for some kind of starting point.

This is why I think its more important to have that information on the retainer side than the search counter.

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Originally Posted by Jinko

This is why I think its more important to have that information on the retainer side than the search counter.

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I personally find it annoying when I have to move from my retainer to the search area to see prices, so I'd totally be in favor of having price history displayed both when you buy and sell.

But I think it's vital to be able to see the actual prices when you buy and sell at the same time.

Price history is simply just a reflection of the market prior to the current moment. It can't account for short term or sudden changes, which usually accounts for differences between the historical and the actual price. This is why I think it is more important to first make current actual prices being visible a priority, then secondly a detailed price history.

I agree with you, in an ideal world the selling and buying or items would be done through one interface much like WoW's AH, Its unlikely we will ever see this as retainers have taken their stand and it seems like they aren't going anywhere.

Saying that I can't see why we can search and buy from the retainer menu.