Item duping is killing Crafters

there is a rumor that some people are using item dupe script, making them able to craft without materials by sending packet to SE server

Many have noticed and complained people selling i70 item way below the current price

one example : potash sells for 35-40k, you need 27 to craft vanya legs so its 945k-1080k
they selling it at 500k, same price as they sell vanya hat which takes only 9 potash to make

they overflooding the market, and price of every potash/peacock ore/etc.. is droping like hell

Many people on my server are farming philo to make their liviing

People will say its the demand&supply rule, but clearly there is something strange going on

It would be nice if SE could communicate on this issue...

They already fixed the matless craft exploit. Problem is the dupers got ****loads of item in the retainers. It will only get worse

yeah that was whats i was thinking...

cause 10 days ago people poped selling low, then last weekend it was back to normal, so i crafted ton even with 40k potash/animal fat/Etc..

but then monday some showed again, i lost so much money...

fixing exploit is nice, but banning fraudulent account should go along it...

I dont think its difficult to see who used the hack...

This was a huge discussion on my world as well and ill explain the situation to you best I can.

First, a recent patch has made Tomes much less rare, which was a very important change. Youve probably noticed this, of course, but how does this relate to a DROP in most star 2s?

What is now VERY obvious, was something only a select few FCs did. Work as a team. If you noticed, the tome item drop started right around the FC housing announcement.

Now FCs are opening their stockpiles, to make money grabs. Your biggest problem and everyone's biggest problem, is that you still are caught up on the "Worth 40k per, requires 9!".

9 times 0 is a much much lower number. If people had duped endless supplies, they would of sold TONS AND TONS. As is, ive bought from several 'dupers', who are always the same thing.. Quiet player, I never really heard from, but saw often. Most crafts at 50, same FC since forever.

Also, lastly, the price hasnt enough dropped below standard 'cost' on most star 2, it sits right around it, and thats factoring in costly mats. Just like other markets, all the items for anything can be farmed yourself and 'cost' isnt a rule of thumb.

i knew someone would come with this argument

they didnt overflood the market of potash/etc.. cause they cannot dupe that , only crafting the item but the 9 potash stay always on the account, cause thats the trick

so its not really a "dupe", but more a creation from nothing

Now tell me one thing

why selling all final item at same price around 500k ? since some use 9 , some 18 , some 27

anyone with a normal brain would scale the price along the number of philo mat

the only one that do that are people who have access to free philo mat

The value of an item is based on its worth, not what its component cost. This is why things like lumber sells for below their shard costs because there's relatively little use out of it, so once you converted your logs to lumber, except to take a huge loss if you're trying to sell the finished product that very few people have any need for. The worth of a piece of equipment is measured by how many philsophy stones it'd take to acquire the equivalent Darklight part. People don't care if Vanya Hat needs 9 or 99 potash to make. You seem to think if Vanya Hats needs 99 Potash then you should put it for 5 million gil just to cover the material cost, except nobody would ever buy your Vanya Hat at that price because its value is significantly below that.

u dont have logic...

If the item you trying to make will cost you 4M to make , of course u gonna sell it at 5M

People buy vanya legs at 1.7M cause thats the price

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Originally Posted by OptimalZedd

i knew someone would come with this argument

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One would think you would be more prepared for it then.

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they didnt overflood the market of potash/etc.. cause they cannot dupe that , only crafting the item but the 9 potash stay always on the account, cause thats the trick

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That obviously varies from server to server. Certain Tome items took dives, seemed like they came from nowhere... After a fix to get more from more places. Seems pretty straight forward to me. I cant buy into some dupe mastermind going NOW, SELL A SLIGHT BUMP IN OUR ENDLESS SUPPLIES NOW, BUT REMEMBER ONLY A LITTLE BIT CAUSE WE DONT WANT TO MAKE TOO MUCH MONEY!

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why selling all final item at same price around 500k ? since some use 9 , some 18 , some 27

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That doesnt happen on my server, please provide a link of a picture of it happening on yours.

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the only one that do that are people who have access to free philo mat

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Thats literally exactly what I explained is happening.

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Originally Posted by OptimalZedd

u dont have logic...

If the item you trying to make will cost you 4M to make , of course u gonna sell it at 5M

People buy vanya legs at 1.7M cause thats the price

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I dont think you understand logic.

If something costs me 0, then I have no ceiling or floor on my profits from it. Ive been explaining this to the unique snowflake crafters for a month.. MANY new crafters are made weekly, free transfers too. You are no longer competing against a tiny group of crafters, never really were really unless you were a server first crafter.

Adapt, but dont just scream cheats because you cant lower your price anymore.

There are some post on reddit too, i can take picture etc... because you just answering with your bland logic and knowledge of real life economics

but you cannot answer that :

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why selling all final item at same price around 500k ? since some use 9 , some 18 , some 27
That doesnt happen on my server, please provide a link of a picture of it happening on yours.

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Of course i can farm all day philo and sell low to be the savior of Eorzea, i will still earn money

but to make money in the game you need to optimize your profit or u just stupid, why farm for hour an item which sells for 50g when you can farm one for 1K ?

Maybe i dont give enough proof, so a white knight like you just gonna kill subject, if there is indeed a cheat (which many of big crafter on my server think), then you didnt help at all

Look what said Arkh :

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They already fixed the matless craft exploit. Problem is the dupers got ****loads of item in the retainers. It will only get worse

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Thats exactly the kind of knowledge im looking for

Your logic, attitude, and english are all terrible. You try to insult me because you fail to provide any evidence of what you are saying, only belly aching because you are getting undercut. It is not sticking, so maybe make less of an effort to make childish insults and more of an effort to back up your lame story of dupers.

I m not insulting u

try to answer that with your logic :

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why selling all final item at same price around 500k ? since some use 9 , some 18 , some 27

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its not simple undercutting, you re the one stating that blindly

u want i link the exploit site to weight my saying and getting banned ?

like the shard exploit, many people knows there was a exploit to produce shard infinitely

so the price started to drop on the market, but by your logic, its normal cause its just people putting lower price , thats the game... supply&demand blabla

how can you prove the exploit ? by using it ?

you re just playing the devil's advocate, u just wanted to show your superior intellect of understanding economy

Maybe SE find a way to not exploit the "crafting without mat" exploit , but the people havent been banned, and i find its a serious problem

but well if nobody cares... np , let the game like this

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Originally Posted by OptimalZedd

u dont have logic...

If the item you trying to make will cost you 4M to make , of course u gonna sell it at 5M

People buy vanya legs at 1.7M cause thats the price

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You are the one lacking logic here, I'm afraid. No crafter in their right mind is going to buy ALL of the 2* materials to make something as the margin would be incredibly small for something that you can't move very quickly. We farm most, if not all, of our materials to maintain higher margins and returns on items like that.

you re not speaking of logic , you re speaking of other way to get your mats. i have 120M and i dont farm all my mats , its taking way too much time if you selling 5~ piece a day

you too you are blind, truly

look ok i farm the Potash, 27 to make a vanya legs ( an example), 27 x 125 = 3375 philo, 12h~

a vanya hat 9 x 125 = 1125 philo, 4h~

so now , you gonna sell item from 12h farm same price as 4h farm

you cannot see there s something strange ? and its not because of people going for lower price as a strat but people really stupid because they dont even know the recipe, they just craft blindy

I cant even understand his posts anymore, the only part that is even legible is where he keeps saying noone but him has logic.

I tried to explain it to him, for tome items the price drop is coming from entire FCs farming and funneling into a crafter. He is still confused, stamping odd math into everything as if it makes sense. Everyone but him is stupid, without logic, and blah blah blah.

I guess he really cant understand that while HE alone farms for 12h, a group working together only takes 4h to do the same. Hence the 4h prices.

Also the title of the thread is how duping items is killing crafters, yet he claims to have 120 mil. Like I said, this is an open and shut case of a greedy crafter getting undercut by organized groups.

Lastly I keep answering his question of "Why same price", but he refuses it because it doesnt make sense to him. For instance on my server DST tassets should go for 800-1m, they require 2 tome items. However they go for 500-700k, because there isnt much demand for them and nobody wants to sit on them forever.

Considering the 2 tome items are FREE for organized FC crafters, thats 500-700k in profits. They of course sell in tandem with other pieces, which stay steady at around 400-600! This means, GASP, the item that costs 2 mats is selling around the same as the item that takes 1!

*gasp, feints, mind blown, no way jose!*

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Originally Posted by MentalPoison

*snip*

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I seriously think you're missing the point.

This happened recently on Diabolos. A player transferred from Coeurl (could tell based on the names on his crafting gear) with a 50 Weaver, 50 Leatherworker, 18 Glad, 23 Miner and not even a mount registered on his account. Suddenly, every 2-star weaver/leatherworker item had him posting 2 copies of NQ and HQ versions at seemingly arbitrary prices. HQ Vanya leggings for 444,444, NQ Vanya Leggings for 222,222. Gryphonskin ringsfor 555,555, with NQ ones for 333,333. This one a server where crafting mats were regularly selling for 35-40k on the AH.

Now, this crafter had no materia socketed in his gear, and had no other crafting classes leveled, yet flooded the markets with these items (all with his signature). If you're going to stand by the idea that it was a quiet FC pooling their resources, how foolish would they have to be? Why not just sell the mats and make more gil? Why craft so many worthless NQ 2-star items? Why not have the crafting mule actually socket materia/level his other classes to 15? Why no logic in what they priced at?

It just makes no sense. Of course, about 5 days later, all the items disappeared off the AH, never to be seen again. I'm left to assume that SE banned the account, but I guess we'll never know.

To respond to your edit, I don't understand how you think that people selling tome items for less than the cost to make consistently makes any sense. It's like me drilling for oil that I can sell for $20 a barrel but, instead, converting it to petrol and then selling it for $15 a barrel. When the price to sell raw materials is higher than the price of the finished products, why would you ever sell the finished product and not the raw materials?

thank you , someone with logic...

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Originally Posted by Rainsford

This happened recently on Diabolos. A player transferred from Coeurl (could tell based on the names on his crafting gear) with a 50 Weaver, 50 Leatherworker, 18 Glad, 23 Miner and not even a mount registered on his account. Suddenly, every 2-star weaver/leatherworker item had him posting 2 copies of NQ and HQ versions at seemingly arbitrary prices. HQ Vanya leggings for 444,444, NQ Vanya Leggings for 222,222. Gryphonskin ringsfor 555,555, with NQ ones for 333,333. This one a server where crafting mats were regularly selling for 35-40k on the AH.

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So, to start, we have a character new to your server with items carried over from his previous server. Possibly even with items ripped from his previous FC's bank, because there's no reason to believe a crafter like this should be a good person. And his level 18 GLA isn't high enough to unlock a mount. And this is related to the context of an item-duper, and we're still on track with that, right?

Then that person is flooding the market with Leatherworker/Weaver items that only a level 50 Leatherworker/Weaver, like himself, could make. Or possibly could have made on his previous server, or simply bought there if the prices were low enough and he had the supernatural abilities of 8 newly made level 1 characters per day to search for a server that had higher prices for re-sale.

He is also posting items for gil seller-style prices, or maybe just to show off what he's got, or possibly just to see what he can get away with. Was he undercutting the market, over-charging, or just putting things at arbitrary prices near the same cost so that his stuff stands out from the rest of the field?

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Originally Posted by Rainsford

Now, this crafter had no materia socketed in his gear, and had no other crafting classes leveled, yet flooded the markets with these items (all with his signature). If you're going to stand by the idea that it was a quiet FC pooling their resources, how foolish would they have to be? Why not just sell the mats and make more gil? Why craft so many worthless NQ 2-star items? Why not have the crafting mule actually socket materia/level his other classes to 15? Why no logic in what they priced at?

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Oh, so, all of this stuff has signature on it, indicating that he was indeed the one to make it. Possibly with items from his previous server. That he could have just stolen out of an FC bank or had an FC give to him because the market for the mats was low enough not to care on his previous server?

And you expect that, without materia or other classes at 15, he should not be able to make so many NQ items because it should be simple for anyone at that level without cross-class abilities or materia to be able to make HQ items reliably? I mean, any crafter that can craft should have all level 15 cross-class abilities and socketed materia before they even make an attempt, right? That's what I get from your comment there.

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Originally Posted by Rainsford

It just makes no sense. Of course, about 5 days later, all the items disappeared off the AH, never to be seen again. I'm left to assume that SE banned the account, but I guess we'll never know.

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Banned because he was an item-duper, right? And not because he was a gil seller/buyer, right?

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Originally Posted by Rainsford

To respond to your edit, I don't understand how you think that people selling tome items for less than the cost to make consistently makes any sense. It's like me drilling for oil that I can sell for $20 a barrel but, instead, converting it to petrol and then selling it for $15 a barrel. When the price to sell raw materials is higher than the price of the finished products, why would you ever sell the finished product and not the raw materials?

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You know, there's another thread out there in GD that points the finger at gil sellers pushing down the prices of common materials. Like they're trying to buy up a huge amount of cheap supply or something before jacking the prices through the roof and buying out anyone that dares sell cheaper (for the record, I have a friend who was doing this with Steel Ingots on his server as of a two weeks ago, don't know if he's still able to manage it or not).

If no one's making petrol, after all, the supply of cheap petrol will eventually run dry. Then once that supply of $15 a barrel petrol runs out, new barrels are going to go up for a premium on the price of the $20 barrels of oil.

So, is item-duping the only plausible explanation for what happened on your server? Not a chance. Sorry, it's not even close to the most likely explanations.

And then there's OptimalZedd's accusations. Based on "a rumor that some people are using item dupe script". With every example being that a person would have to buy the items off the market board, and could not possibly farm the items themselves or in a group to get free items to make other items that they can then sell for a profit while simultaneously undercutting and dropping the market out from under the people that do buy off the market board because that just wouldn't make any sense.

Well, get this. We do not play in a game of boring robo-people who do everything as expected. A person's reasons for undercutting, price-fixing, and attempting to earn arbitrary sums of money do not need to make sense to you or me. It doesn't even necessarily need to make sense to themselves.

Also, please understand that weird situations do not make a rumor true. They do not make your pre-conceived ideas of what is actually happening true. They do not give you a moral high ground to whine from.

All you can do in these cases is report to SE and move on. And, as SE's policy pop-up states when you submit these reports, they will not respond to you, no matter politely you ask, but they do receive the reports and investigate them.

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Originally Posted by OptimalZedd

they overflooding the market, and price of every potash/peacock ore/etc.. is droping like hell

Many people on my server are farming philo to make their liviing

People will say its the demand&supply rule, but clearly there is something strange going on

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Wait, wait, wait. Sorry, I missed this part earlier. PEOPLE ON YOUR SERVER ARE FARMING PHILOSOPHY TOMES TO MAKE THEIR LIVING AND YOU THINK THERE'S AN ITEM-DUPING SCHEME GOING ON TO JUSTIFY WHY THE PRICES ARE DROPPING ON ITEMS THAT SUDDENLY NO ONE IS PAYING FULL PRICE FOR EXCEPT YOU!?!?!?

I like you! XD

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Originally Posted by Rainsford

I seriously think you're missing the point.

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Its pretty easy to miss when its drowning in unsupported tears.

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This happened recently on Diabolos. A player transferred from Coeurl (could tell based on the names on his crafting gear)

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Well the Hardy Boys crack the case and with enough evidence to put the criminal away forever!!! This has nothing to do with my 'not on my server', comment either!

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with a 50 Weaver, 50 Leatherworker, 18 Glad, 23 Miner and not even a mount registered on his account. Suddenly, every 2-star weaver/leatherworker item had him posting 2 copies of NQ and HQ versions at seemingly arbitrary prices. HQ Vanya leggings for 444,444, NQ Vanya Leggings for 222,222. Gryphonskin ringsfor 555,555, with NQ ones for 333,333. This one a server where crafting mats were regularly selling for 35-40k on the AH

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So officer, let me just get this straight. First your rookie hunch about the person being from Coeurl, is completely proven. Then you figured out his retainers only by gut instinct!

Congratulations you got the promotion Detective!

All jokes aside, ill just drop the bomb shell for yahs, Coeurl had a period of people selling tome mats for 100k per. You scream dupe, I realize that I just dropped 2 mil on this FC's crafter, so their plan to sell right before housing worked well!

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Now, this crafter had no materia socketed in his gear, and had no other crafting classes leveled, yet flooded the markets with these items (all with his signature). If you're going to stand by the idea that it was a quiet FC pooling their resources, how foolish would they have to be? Why not just sell the mats and make more gil? Why craft so many worthless NQ 2-star items? Why not have the crafting mule actually socket materia/level his other classes to 15? Why no logic in what they priced at?

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Gumshoe! No I mean you stepped in some gum my man. Now what were we talking about? Oh how this person couldnt possibly have done this.. Yet, you explain in painful detail, exactly how they did.

To address each question,
1) Objection your honor, leading the witness. Sustained.
2) How is selling the mats making more money? Regardless of how he got them, my FC theory, or buying them for cheap.. You're saying why didnt he break down the items into the appropriate materials and simply sell those on the market? I could only answer this with a question, im truly sorry.
3) NQ happens to poorly experienced crafters, it goes somewhere, in many FCs that place is the clan bank. Would you vendor a 2star for 428 gil?
4) This reminds me of a popular line of memes. 'Im not saying aliens, but the answer is simply aliens.'. Who knows why this person didnt add materia or if "Snuggles Unicorn" is telling the whole truth and isnt at all trollish in nature. Aliens?
5) I take offense to this question, as someone who was infamous for 333k, 555k, and weird denominations. The logic was quite simple and your friend Optimal doesnt get it either: Beat your price!

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It just makes no sense. Of course, about 5 days later, all the items disappeared off the AH, never to be seen again. I'm left to assume that SE banned the account, but I guess we'll never know.

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Makes a lot of sense and for the very reasons you listed. If I botched tons of crafts, maybe failed my FC and/or ditched them.. I would try to liquidate everything, as quickly as I could and leave crafting to the professional artists like you and 600 trillion billion gil Optimal. Disappeared, bought more then likely. Got a good offer, mentioned other auctions, wham bam thank you maam. Guess what.. You will seefff those items again and a still cheaper then your price!

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To respond to your edit, I don't understand how you think that people selling tome items for less than the cost

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Whoops, gotta stop yah there, this is where me and OptimalProfit started to lose eye contact. Cost. Lets say you sell Cornmeal for 100 per. I spent 65 gillion gil though for my mats. Damn you are such a duper, you've beaten my 'cost' without even that crazy "I get them myself, so there is no cost" gimmick! Well played, foiled again, dratttttssss.

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to make consistently makes any sense. It's like me drilling for oil that I can sell for $20 a barrel but, instead, converting it to petrol and then selling it for $15 a barrel. When the price to sell raw materials is higher than the price of the finished products, why would you ever sell the finished product and not the raw materials?

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Right! Its like said petrol coming here to America and me selling it for a penny less then the guy across the street. The more of us on the street.. The more the pennies add up.

As someone who has used and abused this game's market and can honestly tell you its not a magic trick or a dupe. Its just simple common sense. If the materials sell more rarely then the finished product at a very enticing price, I can make much more in a shorter span of time then I can by shelling out my "Super costly free mats", to someone else to make a quick buck off of.

You cannot wrap your head around this because the market board confuses you. When you go and see the history of Potash at 42k, then potash is only forever worth 42k. While for me, i take a step back and dont see a 378k cost, but a 333k profit. Good luck seeing it, its like the sailboat in the picture of dots.

The 2 star crafting stuff simply doesn't move in volumes. It doesn't do any good if you see potash sells for 50K if only 3 of them has been sold in the last week. Even if someone just handed you 100 potash free of charge, you do NOT have 5 million gil worth of materials on you. If you tried to sell that you'll likely just sell 3 more of them for the next week if history is of any indication. Therefore, it makes more sense to take your 9 potash and turn it into a finished product and sell for 250K, if you're reasonably sure someone will buy it at that price. The 9 potash isn't worth 450K because you can't actually sell it at that price (not enough buyers). Note that the reverse can also be true. There are finished product that simply do not sell well and you'd be better off just selling the raw materials instead.

you are too clever for me, and spend too much time arguing lol

go farm 27 potash and sells Vanya legs for 500k... you will get so much profit from it, cause u are all from harvard and know superior mechanics of life lol

Or u know, be totally crazy and sells potash at 40k x 27 straight ( well lets say 35k average) , without crafting ?

u guys are just fighting just to beeing fun , internet-winner, but cannot answer one most simple question of my thread

but at least , you making live the thread, thx :)

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they overflooding the market, and price of every potash/peacock ore/etc.. is droping like hell

Many people on my server are farming philo to make their liviing

People will say its the demand&supply rule, but clearly there is something strange going on

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Wait, wait, wait. Sorry, I missed this part earlier. PEOPLE ON YOUR SERVER ARE FARMING PHILOSOPHY TOMES TO MAKE THEIR LIVING AND YOU THINK THERE'S AN ITEM-DUPING SCHEME GOING ON TO JUSTIFY WHY THE PRICES ARE DROPPING ON ITEMS THAT SUDDENLY NO ONE IS PAYING FULL PRICE FOR EXCEPT YOU!?!?!?

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you took things out of context, its just consequences. The main problem is not here. So why making lenghty post just to show at the end that you didnt understand anything ?

So now Mister Genius, try to answer that question ( the same question i keep asking AGAIN and AGAIN no counter-attacker of the thread is trying to explain) :

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why selling all final item at same price around 500k ? since some use 9 , some 18 , some 27

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Im not whining cause i dont make as much profit as before, of course some part of market gonna die etc..., thats the game

I just made that post so people can know there are such activities, SE has taken some actions and correcting the problem, but didnt ban the people that used this and are emptying their stock, which i find is a half-measure, they really need to be more efficient

After, if u think im just crying wolf. Fine, long life to the cheat !

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Originally Posted by OptimalZedd

you took things out of context, its just consequences. The main problem is not here. So why making lenghty post just to show at the end that you didnt understand anything ?

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You made the context, and that is the only context you provided.

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Originally Posted by OptimalZedd

So now Mister Genius, try to answer that question ( the same question i keep asking AGAIN and AGAIN no counter-attacker of the thread is trying to explain) :



Im not whining cause i dont make as much profit as before, of course some part of market gonna die etc..., thats the game

I just made that post so people can know there are such activities, SE has taken some actions and correcting the problem, but didnt ban the people that used this and are emptying their stock, which i find is a half-measure, they really need to be more efficient

After, if u think im just crying wolf. Fine, long life to the cheat !

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Right, sorry to mistake your attention span for something that exists. Here it is again in tl;dr format:

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A person's reasons .... do not need to make sense to you or me.

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weird situations do not make a rumor true.

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report to SE and move on.

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There is no counter-attack because your feeble attempt at an attack hardly counts as a slap-fight. Your entire idea is that someone has to be item-duping in order to be pushing down prices on materials and putting multiple different items with variable resource requirements up for the same price. What I am telling you is that neither of these things is a sign of item-duping! Nothing you have ever said, not even the most robust evidence you could find has shown any hint of a whiff of item-duping. You're passing on a rumor as if it was real and then blaming your market woes on the rumor without entertaining any idea whatsoever for other causes!

You outright dismiss the notions of tome over-farming that you yourself said was happening. You don't seem to consider gil sellers in your equations, or gil buyers for that matter. And straight up player insanity, the likes of which you're showing off quite well, also doesn't figure into your idea of market forces.

Making a post about item-duping that you can't even prove is happening does not let other people know about a problem. It just tells us that you're paranoid, and the more you fail to defend your point the more you look like you have no idea what's going on or what's happening.

You want to know why everything is going for 500k no matter how many tome mats are used? Fine. Here's some math for you. First, the variables:
C = Cost to obtain mats: 0.
T = Time required to obtain mats: Variable. Each mat requires the same amount of tomes, however, regardless of which one is bought.
Mp = Amount that buyers have shown they're willing to pay for mats: 35-40k, or 0 if they farm it themselves.
Ms = Amount of mats that are available for sale at any given time.
Mb = Amount that are being bought at that price: Unknown. Go look it up. There's a History button you can use to see how many are sold per day.
Mu = Amount that impatient people undercut the price for because they're not willing to wait 3 days: Enough to drive the prices down noticeably.
Ma = Amount of items needed to craft the item: 9-27.
Mc = Amount that buyers care about how many mats were involved in the creation of their gear: 0.
Gp = Price of gear as it is currently being sold for: 500k.

Now that all of that is out of the way. First, the Cost to create an item from mats (Cm):
Cm = Mp * Ma
This can go anywhere from 0 (all mats farmed) to 1080k. In 9 item increments, that is: 0k, 360k, 720k, 1080k.

In order to find the Premium on the cost (P) that buyers are willing to pay on items that require more mats:
P = (Cm - Gp) * Mc

Finally, the amount that sellers have decided is the final tally for what they think people will buy for (Sp):
Sp = P * (Mb/24 + (Mp - Mu)/Ms) + Gp

And there's your answer in math.

So what we learned is that ppl suck at economics in FFXIV and dump items on the wards super cheap

buyers market go

There is a thing known as a sunk cost. If you already made something that uses 27 potash, you can't convert it back to 27 potash. Maybe the raw materials set you back 1 million gil but nobody cares about that and you can't get the raw material back, so you might have to sell it for 500K to get some of your money back as opposed to none of it back. This is why you really shouldn't try to craft 2 star stuff unless you're pretty sure there's a buyer out there.

Proof that item dupers exist:
I saw someone selling a stack of Allagan Silver Pieces on the Market for 400 gil apiece.
They sell to vendor for 500 gil apiece, so this is obviously the work of a duper!
<3


(in case someone misses it, this was sarcasm)
Prices for Potash and other Philosophy mats vary quite wildly from one server to another.
Is it not possible that someone transferred servers and forgot to check prices before posting several items?
Or just as likely, that they didn't buy the potash but instead farmed them very quickly in a WP speedrun group and then undercut Vanya's prices that are based around potash prices in order to sell quickly?

We came across almost the same exact circumstances as rainsford description, a guy server transferred to our server without a DoW / DoM class reaching 20 but has several crafting classes to 50, the thing is he has shit load of crafted philo items ( vanya silk, darksteel ingot etc etc) I'm not automatically saying he is a duper or a bug exploiter but to have an almost replica as the one rainsford describe is pretty disturbing. Here's the guy lodestone details. http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...racter/5336643

we had some kind of weird issue on Famfrit with items selling at an extremely ridiculous price.

E.g : HQ items normally selling at 50-60k , sold by the same 2 guys ( not the retainers, I'm talking about the 2 guys having these retainers ) at 10-12k . ( Since this could mean nothing and that maybe those 2 guys just dont know anything about making money , i'll not give any lodestone links or names, still selling thing at 20-25% of the average price is either suspicious or ridiculous. ( And dont even think about buying them to sell them back at a higher price, they put a new set of items back at a ridiculously low price so you almost never sell lol )

People in this thread are throwing out terms that they really don't know much about such as sunk cost etc. It doesn't seem like anyone understands the concept of opportunity cost either, which is fundamental in terms of economics and accounting.

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Definition of 'Opportunity Cost'
1. The cost of an alternative that must be forgone in order to pursue a certain action. Put another way, the benefits you could have received by taking an alternative action.

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If you buy potash for 125 Philo stones, your cost for the potash is not 0, it is the cost that you could have sold them for, depending on server, roughly 35-40k. You forego selling your potash at 35k by turning into a finished product. People who plug in a cost of 0 on their potash and equivalent items are hurting everyone including themselves. You learn this stuff in accounting 101 people...

People really don't seem to get that valuation of an item changes in a world with often drastic changes. One would expect the value of 2 star items to go way down when Crystal Tower comes out (presumably ilvl 80 gear that's easier to access than Coil). Therefore, while you're making this stuff, you always have patch 2.1 looming heavily over your shoulders. It is obvious that 2 star stuff do not move in great quantities. Suppose you know that between now and 2.1 there are 10 more possible sales of some 2 star item at 1 million gil. Are you really confident you'd be the one to snag one of those sales when there are many crafters around? Of course, you don't even know if there are still 10 buyers out there until the next patch, so there's nothing wrong with simply selling at a significant discount if you think you stand a good chance of hitting all the remaining 2 star sales prior to the next patch.

Seems to me that you don't understand what happens to prices once certain materials (or in this case the special currency used to purchase them) are being farmed by an increasing number of players. Short answer: They plummet like a lead weight.

The prices you are used to seeing on the Market were due to the relatively small number of players that were in a position to farm the tomestones and spend them on mats rather than gear. Ever since they altered Wanderer's Palace to 'payout' the same number of Philosophy and Mythology stones as Amdapor Keep, it's become much much easier for every level 50 DoW player to farm them. The reason for the 'delay' was due to those new 50s needing time to gear up. Now that their main class is geared in Darklight and they have their Relic, they can farm the stones and buy the mats to sell.

In fact, I'm absolutely positive that even small FCs are starting to farm them in preparation of the FC Housing coming in 2.1. 100 philosophy tomes per run, average run for Wanderer's Palace with DL geared group is about 20 minutes (30 if they feel lazy). That's 300 an hour for just one group. Large FCs will probably have two or three groups in WP at a time. Just three groups, running WP over and over, can be clearing 900 tomes an hour (roughly). In three hours, every single one of the players in those three groups would have 900 tomes each. That's 3600 tomes per group, or 10800 total. That's 86 potash, in just three hours. From just three groups farming WP. Possibly from just one Free Company. I'm sure you can continue to follow the math as more and more FCs do this. And since most large FCs will have a level 50 crafter of each DoH class...

They've flooded the market. Supply is now outstripping Demand. That leads to lower prices. Don't believe me? Hop out to Mor Dhona and take a look at how many players there on your server are in at least partial Darklight. I'd bet it's most of them by far. There's probably /shouts from players seeking to sell their tome mats.

tl;dr The large number of players now at end game combined with a fast-running dungeon to farm has led to a glut of tome-bought crafting materials. THAT is the reason for the price drops. NOT duping.

But you are blind.

It is KNOWN there was a crafting without material ( packet injection) exploit. It has been corrected.

the problem is they didnt punish users, people who flooded market with cheap stuff are still here.

one guy is not even crafting anymore , just selling vanya silk etc... he still has ton

Please stop with the "i know economics" mentality

Oh, then please link to the dev post about the duping correction. The only emergency maintenance I've seen recently concerning something like that was about the retainer hack.

Otherwise I suspect you still have no idea what happens when players start farming valuable mats in an organized fashion.

I'll also point something else out. Not everyone who crafts or sells mats are looking to be gilionaires. When I'm setting my prices, I ask myself 3 questions: 'How useful is this to other players?'; 'How rare is it?'; and 'How desirable by other players is it?' Take note that how long it took, or how much effort, is not a factor. This is because this is a video game played in leisure time, thus the amount of time is pretty irrelevant to me. I might look at current prices.

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one guy is not even crafting anymore , just selling vanya silk etc... he still has ton

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And is he a member of a Free Company? If yes, then he's probably been appointed the one to sell them on the Market on behalf of the entire FC. Again, FC housing won't be cheap and many are looking to be prepared ahead of time. It could also be a Market mule for the FC Master.

If no, then it still proves nothing. He could have stolen the mats from a former FC and transferred.

I just explained how a single FC, using three groups, can put up 86 potash for sale in just three hours. No exploit. Just 12 players willing to do it. Now imagine 20 such Free Companies, knowing that those mats (or the finished products) are going for, deciding to do the same. That's 1720 in just three hours' time. Everyone at 50 knows how valuable the tome mats are, they also know that the finished product might or might not be more valuable. That's a lot of competition for a small market. Especially since they are just selling to each other. No one else can use or is interested in those mats except for those with lvl 50 characters. The same people capable of getting those mats for themselves.

Please, show me a screenshot of the 'tons' of items being sold by one person.

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Originally Posted by Uldi

Please, show me a screenshot of the 'tons' of items being sold by one person.

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I can't respond to most of your post, but the server injection trick was an actual thing, several threads were here but SE took them down on the forums. I remember the night I found out about it. I was mid-reading threads and they just poofed. There won't be any evidence on these forums, but there should be some of the external links that were posted on other websites.

People seem to think there's this cheater's cartel that sets price for illicitly obtained goods, so despite the fact that you can dupe items according to some guys, this said cartel is keeping price from dropping immediately. If I can craft stuff without mats, I'll put some Vanya Silks for 10K just because I can. The usual method of buying up cheap supplies is ineffective, because I can craft an infinite number of those items if I can dupe my mats, so I'll happily keep on crank out more Vanya Silk at 10K and see how long the said cartel is going to keep buying those up in an effort to control the price against my infinite supply.

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Originally Posted by Arale

I can't respond to most of your post, but the server injection trick was an actual thing, several threads were here but SE took them down on the forums. I remember the night I found out about it. I was mid-reading threads and they just poofed. There won't be any evidence on these forums, but there should be some of the external links that were posted on other websites.

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Frankly, that's apples and oranges. That was a hack that concerned leves, not Allagan tomestones. So they aren't applicable because the way the game and servers process leve turn-ins and tomestone turn-ins is different. Leves are treated as Quests, while tomestones/seals/gil are treated as Currency. The materials the OP is referring to can only be purchased by Allagan Tomestones of Philosophy.

Again, I need to see something that shows that this happened with tomestones. I'm not saying it can't be happening, but I'd need to see it work specifically on tomestones.