Idea against Undercutting at the Marketboard (The next.. )

mining your own minerals does not mean they are free.

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Originally Posted by Jamyl_Sarum

mining your own minerals does not mean they are free.

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Mining/Botany is a revenue generating activity and crafting said materials into something to increase the revenue potential. To me it is all revenue generation. It doesn't cost you anything to gather said materials except for the repair costs. So all in all your cost - profit ratio is significantly higher especially if you have the crafting prowess to be able to do your own repairs. If you want to debate the repair costs go for it but the revenue from said materials will be higher than your repairs even if you vendor so it is a wash. So something that doesn't cost you anything is.... free

Lots of undercutting now is by gil sellers.. On ultros you are seeing it pretty heavy on the market board and they are tanking the market.. I saw on item where NQ goods were selling for like 40,000 and all of a sudden there are lots of HQ stacks for less than 40,000. There were so many put up too it was not funny. Only bots could collect that much.. I saw this on lots of items this weekend I was watching...

Honestly, If I undercut someone its not because I'm trying to undercut someone. When I post stuff on the market, I post it for what seems fair to me, based on the time it spent for me to gather or get the stuff to make or aquire it, and What I would spend to buy something. I rarely even look to see what other people are selling them for. Could I probably make more money...sure, but I'm not greedy.

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Originally Posted by Wintersandman

So something that doesn't cost you anything is.... free

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Costs you time. time is valuable.

We people, who use the marketboard heavily, have a certain value for our time. this is because we don't have an unlimited amount, so we have to use it efficiently.

for instance, I wont even leave my fc room for under a 20k profit. if its something under that, like gathering, I can simply make more from just sitting around desynthing my brass rings.

It's a free market and should stay that way. Trying to force people to list at prices you think are fair is wrong. If you can't sell your things because you get undercut, that's really too bad. I post things for what I feel I can afford to, and I price them to sell fast.

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Originally Posted by tocsin

Costs you time. time is valuable.

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Time is relative so value is relative. You're going to be spending the time doing something and not all time spent is revenue generating.

opportunity cost.
if i need copper ore to craft something, should i go out and mine the 'free' copper ore or should i go out and mine something else, like electrum for example, then sell it and purchase the copper ore leaving me a net result of copper ore and extra gil for the same amount of time mining. this would indicate a cost to mining free copper ore. potentially a very substantial cost given enough free time is applied. well, a month subscription isn't exactly free but what the hay, i'm not going to nitpick. do whatever is the most profitable and efficient at the time. of course, this is a game so fun trumps all.

this is a 'just in time' market. buyers get what they want when they need it, not beforehand. also, nobody looks at the board and thinks 'hmm 100k. i think i will wait until someone who needs gil fast lists one for 60k'. what they do is pony up the 100k and go merrily on their way. so, just being the cheapest is pricing to sell fast. the only way it will sell faster is if you price it so ridiculously low a seller will pick it up and re list it at a reasonable price. if you want to be the cheapest, go right ahead. no need to shoot yourself in the face doing it.

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Originally Posted by Imagerror

Hello fellow Eorzeans,

after having another raging episode on my end after seeing the Marketboards this morning I ask myself why people would undercut massively.


I'm not talking the 17.000 to 16.999 or 16.500; Hell even 13.000..
No I'm talking about dropping from 17.000...

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First of all, who are you to determine the CORRECT price of any particular item?

Second, undercutting is EXTREMELY good for the consumer. So you hate your customers?

Third, why would you want to take my single biggest joy away from me?
I love undercutting. I have made obscene gil so it ain't like I'm going broke and I'm always undercutting people to the point where they give up.
And I <3 it.

Welcome to capitalism, cry baby cry cause I can do it better, cheaper, faster, harder, longer
: )

I will say, having just been one of the undercutters, there is a very good reason to do so. its predatory, yes. its mean to your fellow sellers, yes. but to me, it was worth it.

Today, I finally got tired of undercutting on my mastercraft market. people have been undercutting every 20 mins, 1 gil at a time. I had 30 of them in supply, and they were going for 340k apiece. I listed 20 of them at 275k. someone undercut me, and then I listed all 20 at 225k. they undercut again, and I reunddrcut to 180k. they then undercut to 170k, and I bought all of them up, and repriced my now 70 mastercrafts at 320k. and no one undercut.

MY market. *growls*

I'm well aware that undercutting is part of how the market works, and I'm not against the idea of it. However, it feels like it's becoming grossly over abused. Items that had a long streak of running 300-400 gold, or 860 gold, is now a fraction of those prices. This is especially trying, as a Botanist that is just hitting cap. I've found myself to be more dependent on those prices in hopes to progress myself to the next tier of equipment in order to make true progress (Farming for my "Botanist Relic" and further gear pieces).

It just feels like a number of people are failing to understand how a market works, and ultimately destroys the worth of an item in the process. I'm just sitting here, hoping these items I have become dependent on farming will recover. >>;

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Originally Posted by CheshirePuss

It just feels like a number of people are failing to understand how a market works, and ultimately destroys the worth of an item in the process. I'm just sitting here, hoping these items I have become dependent on farming will recover. >>;

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It's not that they necessarily fail to understand. Some people don't care about preserving the market. They have something that they don't need, and they'd like to get rid of it in exchange for some gil. They're willing to take however much they can get for it. In any case, it's best not to become dependent on a few items to support yourself. Diversify! If the market on one or two things tanks, look for other markets that are profitable as well.

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Originally Posted by Wintersandman

Mining/Botany is a revenue generating activity and crafting said materials into something to increase the revenue potential. To me it is all revenue generation. It doesn't cost you anything to gather said materials except for the repair costs.... So something that doesn't cost you anything is.... free

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Profit for Mining can be measured the way you calculate if you figure your time as free, I don't but sure.

Profit for Crafting should count the cost of materials as if you had bought them at the market board. This will let you know when it is better to sell your materials or craft. Spending your time crafting items that are worth less then you could of sold the materials for is just silly. It is ok to be silly, as long as it is intended.

What if undercutting just makes you happy? What if knowing someone else is going to buy it all up in their effort to control the market makes you smile? I've gotten rid of my stuff, and hopefully, a person with some market savvy got it to re-sell. I honestly don't care, as long as it's not crystals or something that I see all the filthy botters getting..and they are so, so easy to spot. I post it - if you can make more off it, buy it up! Don't hate me - hate the bots..I've not seen this many in a game I have played in a long time.

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Originally Posted by Ashkendor

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I have no inept-ability in terms of diversifying my efforts, and have consistently found different types of materials I've been able to progressively gather while leveling my class, to offer a sort of mild upkeep to my depleting funds. As often as I feel the need to self loath in regards to how trying the market can become in these particular situations, this will not change, and I will find ways around and through it.

The reason I complain about my struggles is less about my own gain (since currently I have no issue in getting money, and don't see too many issues conflicting me in the future), it's more in regards of the market's current standing. Items that had consistently run at seemingly high and fair prices, now run for virtually next to nothing. (pt 1)

Items that offers reasonable amounts for customers to buy that support the funding necessary for that class's level, is now as worthwhile to invest in as items you'd find at level 10 (in terms of gil gain). My biggest worry right now is that if this habit occurs with what's left in terms of decent funding (with early level 50 materials), the class may feel more or less like dead weight (for the people that are getting into it, and intend to progress with said class) may actually be more trying for newer botanists than it should be.


I want to stress however, I think nothing less of the class. The class itself is crucial in terms of supporting the servers we play in with the materials needed to support other classes in their endeavors as well. I apologize for the double post, but I had too much to say beyond the character limit of the forums.

I like undercutting - why? Because I buy more stuff on the market board then I sell. :)

Why would undercutting ruin the market place?
Competition is healthy for the market, maybe not for your own pockets, but if that is the case then that means you must adapt and make your self more efficient at producing goods.

Been asking for something that limits the undercutting or overpricing of items based on a percentage of the server average for soooo long now.

I think its safe to say that SE couldn't care less about undercutting or overpricing, too bad really because a few minor changes to the MB could potentially make it much better for everyone involved not just those who have no life and want to sit at the retainer bell 24/7.

I don't think that SE doesn't care about user experience.. Rather, they choose not to be a market board police and let the player input have an effect in the actual game.
I'm sure SE is capable of dictating prices on all marketboard items, there are only a couple thousand anyway.. But if they did that, none of what the players do matters. It'll be basically like selling to an NPC and buying from an NPC. MB need not exist in such a case.

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Originally Posted by Gillionaire

I don't think that SE doesn't care about user experience.. Rather, they choose not to be a market board police and let the player input have an effect in the actual game.
I'm sure SE is capable of dictating prices on all marketboard items, there are only a couple thousand anyway.. But if they did that, none of what the players do matters. It'll be basically like selling to an NPC and buying from an NPC. MB need not exist in such a case.

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TBH a completely NPC run market system would be better than what we have right now IMO, especially one based on supply and demand.

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Originally Posted by Jinko

TBH a completely NPC run market system would be better than what we have right now IMO, especially one based on supply and demand.

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I'm not entirely sure that would be a very good model.

The way I see it, there's a large divide between crafters vs. non-crafters. Do crafters gouge people on average? oh definitely, most of the crafted goods on my server have profit of 400%+
What we need is more competition in the MB throughout the ranks instead of just at the end-game.

Only way to achieve that would be to simplify crafting so it takes up less time, or entice the non-crafters to jump in thus making a larger pool on the supply end of things.

Tbh that's one of the only reasons I craft, I'm not usually a crafter in many of the games I play, but in this one, I felt like I had to make my own stuff unless I wanted to be gouged, I just hope more people see that and take initiative instead of just complain about the market. We as the players have control over it and we CAN change the system. If all the crafters just undercut like crazy and make enough of the item to meet the demands, prices will stabilize then. One problem I actually see is that some of the high end crafters work together to monopolize and make sure the prices DON'T drop due to competition.

The nature of this and most MMO markets is so childish and stupid it gives me stomach cramps. EVE is the only market to ever get it right, but even they fucked it by introducing pay to win.

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Originally Posted by Jinko

TBH a completely NPC run market system would be better than what we have right now IMO, especially one based on supply and demand.

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Amen. It'd be hard to regulate the prices of items that can only be crafted, but rare drop items should be tracked by a market matrix within the system. Then people selling on the MB would have to compete with the NPC's, and either could end up being more profitable.

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Originally Posted by Yhximott

Amen. It'd be hard to regulate the prices of items that can only be crafted, but rare drop items should be tracked by a market matrix within the system. Then people selling on the MB would have to compete with the NPC's, and either could end up being more profitable.

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What this game is lacking, but doesn't exist any any other game is an actual supply+demand that includes the NPC's

Have you noticed that people readily sell stuff on the marketboard for 1gil when they could get more from a NPC? In theory? When you look at the buy price something will be like 1000 gil, but then you sell the same item and it's 1gil.

What should be happening is that the NPC's "buy" up undervalued products that they also sell, or change their own prices. Part of the fun of crafting is being able to actually sell your stuff, but people don't buy crafted items, only materials... and every game does this. Mass produce crap that nobody actually wants. So the games introduce desynthsis to basically create a closed-loop system where you craft the item, and then turn around and desynth it, recovering some of the materials. This would change how crafting is then leveled considerably, as there would be a market demand for all items, and one couldn't simply dump things and let the NPC's buy it for gil.

Here's what I mean...

Let's say that all the NPC's have an internal "buy at X, sell at Y" system. Everytime someone buys something from a NPC, that depletes one undervalued item from the market board. (Let's be real here, the only reason anyone buys anything from a NPC at all is for a specific quantity when they don't want 99.) When there are no undervalued items on the board, then the NPC sells from it's "internal stock", when it's internal stock is depleted, then it sells for whatever is the "best price" on the market board and depletes the marketboard. So the NPC isn't contributing to gil inflation because it's not buying items nobody is buying, but players who buy from NPC's are indirectly buying from the marketboard at some markup.

In the original Version 1.0 game, The retainers actually were stationed in a heavily congested area in each starting city, and if you wanted to find something, you had to look at everyone. Other games have these kinds of markets as well. Unfortunately this doesn't work very well in practice because people will rather buy from a market/auction board at a higher price if they can get it -now- rather than spend an hour looking through all the player run shops.

Ideally we should be able to station a Retainer anywhere where there's no hostiles and have them act like a NPC shop (with an internal buy at X, sell at Y list set by the player) but past experience from other games also says this makes a mess. Perhaps there could be a way for a player to "rent" a shop space as opposed to the residential area, and have their retainer occupy it as a venture. Like there are so many ways the game's market system could be improved so that it's not "yet another trash-crafting game" to sink time into.

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Originally Posted by Gillionaire

I'm not entirely sure that would be a very good model.

The way I see it, there's a large divide between crafters vs. non-crafters. Do crafters gouge people on average? oh definitely, most of the crafted goods on my server have profit of 400%+
What we need is more competition in the MB throughout the ranks instead of just at the end-game.

Only way to achieve that would be to simplify crafting so it takes up less time, or entice the non-crafters to jump in thus making a larger pool on the supply end of things.

Tbh that's one of the only reasons I craft, I'm not usually a crafter in many of the games I play, but in this one, I felt like I had to make my own stuff unless I wanted to be gouged, I just hope more people see that and take initiative instead of just complain about the market. We as the players have control over it and we CAN change the system. If all the crafters just undercut like crazy and make enough of the item to meet the demands, prices will stabilize then. One problem I actually see is that some of the high end crafters work together to monopolize and make sure the prices DON'T drop due to competition.

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but FFXIV is really harsh for new crafters , leveling to 50 lets say alchemy wont help u at all , because u need to lvl to 50 this craft and this one at least to X and this one u better 50 too or bust.

and gear , because crafters are "rich" ,crafting gear is overpriced (materias too), getting geared in every other craft cost u millions , millions u dont have as a new crafter...so u try to go step by step only to get smashed in the face every moment

how to fix that? dunno , because butchering the crafting classes will kill all the fun for the ppl that enjoy it, but i still dont know any1 that enjoys crafting for hours or that dont use macros for crafting , to do it blindly. Is fun the first 50 times after that u want the item and be done with it.

You're right, the barrier to crafting is very.. very.. VERY tough to get over. If I didn't have an FC mate to get me over the initial 1 star hump by making me my accessories I would've had much more issues with progression. That kind of barrier is what's creating the price gouging though and well, if you read the forums and see anybody who's complaining about MB prices, you'll see many if not most of them are non-crafters. Crafters already know of the progression hump and just accept it as is.. because there IS a decent profit to be had once over the hump. If you don't craft, you'll constantly be gouged for whatever you purchase (although, if you don't craft at all you really don't "need" a lot of the things on MB.. Unless it's for glamour or furniture and even then, the necessity for those things are debatable)


But honestly, anybody who's worth their salt knows how easy it is to make a few million WITH or WITHOUT crafting.. I think we're just lacking a very good source of information on how to farm gil.
Does crafting make it easier? Most certainly yes, but is it necessary to make a couple million a week? Not at all. You can make millions a day just spiritbonding materia, You can farm stacks of leather or fleece to sell on MB for almost a hundred thousand a stack depending on the type of animal you farm.

But every gil making guide I've seen always alludes to something to the effect of doing your daily roulette to get a measley 10-20k gil or whatever and following those suggestions would take you month to make your first million and maybe that's what we need to fix.

Case in point: Think about how many level 50s you've seen complain about not having any gil to buy stuff off of the MB. There are so many level 50s running around with less than 500k gil on them. and yet, I see people in level 30s that have that much gil just by being savvy and selling stuff on MB (crafted or otherwise). Information = money in this game more than many others I've seen, simply because there's very little loot from monsters and it requires specific farming strategies.

Market boards need to be free - crafters should be able to post for whatever they like - anything less is just evil. If you can't stand the heat... well...

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Originally Posted by Warlyx

but FFXIV is really harsh for new crafters , leveling to 50 lets say alchemy wont help u at all , because u need to lvl to 50 this craft and this one at least to X and this one u better 50 too or bust.

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Oh and btw, that's also dependent on knowledge.
Leveling a crafting class can also be profitable if you know what to make. Alchemy? Make Natron and sell on MB, Horn Glue also works (little less demand but I've been able to sell all I made) . Lanolin works wonders because it's needed in such large quantities for leve turn-ins.

Leatherworking = Aldgoat Leather, Boar Leather, Peiste Leather, Raptor Leather. You can do that from level 15 all the way to level 50. Sell the nq AND hq for both above material costs..
Almost every crafting class has this, and yet people still complain about crafting being a gil drain. It really isn't, you just have to know what to make for profit and that knowledge will carry over to the end-game crafts also.

Personally, I've pretty much given up on crafting. Try to get my crafters to 50, very slowly, when I really don't have anything better to do, but that's it; even my first, best equipped DoH class is only i54.

Anyhow - maybe SE playing marketboard police wouldn't be the best thing on the whole. But when something drops 50k in price in just a few hours (happened to me, not only once)... Something needs to be done there, because that's just beyond insane. A limit on how much prices can be undercut - but then it would either have to be very strict, or the same thing would happen again. Or a limit on how often prices can be undercut, say every few hours or half a day, that might be a better solution. Perhaps a combination of these two. But yeah, something, anything, really.

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Originally Posted by BreathlessTao

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If you take crafting as a side endeavor, then you're by no means a crafter in this game..

Most crafters craft as their main thing and pve on the side. Some don't even partake in pve contents at all.

Also, when somebody undercuts you like that, they're TRYING to make you quit, so if you've given up on crafting, then they've succeeded in eliminating the competition. Simple as that.

We can remedy this situation by adopting the FF11 way of marketboarding/auctioning. You make it blind. People can see what other people are paying, but that is it. You don't know how much an item is until its sold. This ensures people have to pay fairly and people can still get a good deal if people decide to undercut and the person buying pays the amount they set. This also ensures items retain their value over a long period of time. Its a win for both sides in the long run.

Just for clarifications purposes, if you don't know what a blind auction is, here is a small explanation...

I'm selling a potion, I throw it on the board for 100gil, no one knows the price except for the past history of people who bought potions. Another person puts up a potion for 50gil, undercutting me by half. Now we have a person who wants to buy a potion, he decides what he wants to pay for the potion. He checks the price history see the last one sold for 130 gil. He decides to try to get a deal and goes to 100 gil. He doesn't buy my potion, but buys the other guys, who set his for 50gil, but he still paid 100 gil for it, so it says 100gil in the history. Now another person wants a potion, and he sees the history, last one sold for 100gil today, cool, let me try 100gil, then he buys mine for the price I set.

Of course this isn't full proof, somebody could set the bar really low, like 10 gil, just to try to move things faster, and somebody could steal your stuff if they decided to play the board against you, buying all your items for 10gil, because you wanted to try to move your item sales along, BUT I feel like it'd be the best way to try to keep the markets intact and keep undercutting to a minimum, and still retain item value longterm.

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Originally Posted by Nyghtmarerobu

. . . still retain item value longterm.

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But that's exactly the point. Why do we need policing on the undercutting issue? Why is that an issue in the first place?
People act as though undercutters are driving them down below point of profitability.. But that is not the case at all, most of the time I see profit margins of 300-400% on the MB and that is just pure bloat caused by lack of competition.

On the one hand, we have a bunch of people complaining that items are too expensive on MB and on the other, we also have people complaining about people driving prices down on the MB.. I say let us, the players sort that out and quite frankly, if you think you can't complete or you'd rather not because the competition is so fierce (i.e. annoying) then maybe the MB game is not for you, just unload at 80% regular price and be 20% poorer than the people who will bother with the tedium

I undercut almost every time I sell. Granted I don't do crafting or the like, if I get a hot item I look at the MB, see what it goes for an cut it by about 5-10%. Why? I didn't put any real effort to getting it, so me taking a 5% isn't anything big. Plus, when I look at the MB for a lot of stuff, there's a bunch of people selling the stuff at the same price. What is going to make random player-1 from picking my retainer over the other 29 who are selling?

Oh yeah, a price cut.

Even if I was doing a massive crafting/mining session I would still try to cut a small % off to make mine stand out more. It's basic economics - and it applies to in game too. If that makes me a jerk or someone who needs to be "regulated", so be it I guess.

Yep, and that's why you'll be richer than some other person who just lists an item, comes back 3 days later to find it's been undercut and comes to the forums to complain about the system not working in their favor. You put more thought and time into it, you get more gil out of the MB, simple as that.

Welcome to a real market. No, we won't put nerf padding around all the sharp edges. Deal with it.

All this debate is over semantics.

Undercutting and price(value) reduction due to abundant supply/slow turn-over are not the same thing.

True, they may not be the same thing, However, supply and demand will influence whether someone will be more likely to undercut at a more severe price if the primary reason is just to move stock. Add in other motivations and let the pricecutting begin.

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Originally Posted by Wintersandman

Mining/Botany is a revenue generating activity and crafting said materials into something to increase the revenue potential. To me it is all revenue generation. It doesn't cost you anything to gather said materials except for the repair costs. So all in all your cost - profit ratio is significantly higher especially if you have the crafting prowess to be able to do your own repairs. If you want to debate the repair costs go for it but the revenue from said materials will be higher than your repairs even if you vendor so it is a wash. So something that doesn't cost you anything is.... free

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Sigh. Look, mats you gather aren't free because you can *sell* them. So, if you use them to synth, they've cost you what you could have sold them for. Now, if what you synth out of them is worth more than the materials, yeah, you've come out ahead. Generally, that seems to be the case these days in FFXIV markets, but never lose sight of the opportunity cost of using your gathered mats instead of selling them. They're never free.