Market Ward Madness

Selling items for 1 gil is actually selling at a loss, It's just not good business.

Using Alligator pears as an example, as these are actually listed on Ragnarok as:

Alligator pear 1 gil each, in a stack of 99, totaling 99 gil.

When these sell, a 5% tax is applied and you do not not receive the full 99 gil. These items will sell to an NPC for 1 gil each, with no tax, so you will receive the full amount and immediately.

If another player buys them, gil is merely transfered from one player to another, whereas selling to an NPC will actually bring more gil into the game!

So my question is... Why?

And here I was thinking that if you go anywhere near the market wards in any town you get so much lag that crafting feels like a chore, slogging through molasses to make something, clikc on an NPC or the Bell, etc. Instead, people not realizing sell price versus consumer cost is skewed against their favor? That's just silly. Madness is forcing everyone to craft in one location in one part of the town and everyone else suffering for it. I would suggest another bell where one can craft. Maybe when housing is introduced.

have you considered its possible that they dont care about 19 gil? That they would rather just make the pears accessible to players on their server? I appreciate it as a cook when i see this. If i could find them i would give them their 19 lost gil.

I've seen Boar Leather listed as 0. :(

Maybe they want to help people level up crafting instead of selling to NPC?

Or if they are trying to clear inventory space on their retainer, they can just sell from their inn room instead of having to run to an NPC vendor. I've come across that in a few cases, where's I'm clearing space and I would probably just throw the items away, but it's actually easier to sell it from the retainer interface than to discard it (because for some reason you can't "discard item" you have to manually move it to your inventory, close the window, then discard).

One or two reasonable points raised. Selling cheap to help crafters and clearing inventory space, I think I can handle those.

People just don't know how to play the market. The only tactic they know is "undercutting". Like in this example:

http://i.imgur.com/mAM1Ldl.png


For some odd reason, the guy indicated by the orange arrow undercut the other guy below him. I guess he was in a hurry to sell, what doesn't make sense is that he then proceeds to undercut himself, and then more people follow and keep undercutting the undercutter (red box).

So what I did was simple, buy everything in the Green box and flip it for 380, making profit from other people's darksteel ore.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dorin

People just don't know how to play the market. The only tactic they know is "undercutting". Like in this example:

http://i.imgur.com/mAM1Ldl.png


For some odd reason, the guy indicated by the orange arrow undercut the other guy below him. I guess he was in a hurry to sell, what doesn't make sense is that he then proceeds to undercut himself, and then more people follow and keep undercutting the undercutter (red box).

So what I did was simple, buy everything in the Green box and flip it for 380, making profit from other people's darksteel ore.

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Ah, someone with business sense!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ghondon

have you considered its possible that they dont care about 19 gil? That they would rather just make the pears accessible to players on their server? I appreciate it as a cook when i see this. If i could find them i would give them their 19 lost gil.

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Niceness doesn't make an economy, though.. If we did this in real life, our entire social structure would quite literally collapse.
While the economy ingame can't collapse in the same way, we need to either generate gil via NPC's (which brings new money into the economy and encourages us to spend more) or sell for higher - thus circulating gil in a more sensible way - as it is a lot of people are actually just slowly losing money, going back and forth until the taxes eat up the entire cost and the gil is lost forever.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GrimWarlock

Ah, someone with business sense!

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Depending on how often someone sells there, it is risky behaviour, since the miners are likely to have a hell lot more of ore than they put on the market. (I.e. the miners are pretending to have lower supply than they actually have, to get better price for the work they've already done) So if the miner sees that he has been bought out, he should immidietely put more and more ore into the market. On faster markets, you may have time enough to sell some stuff if not all before the miner puts more of his stack there.

Whenever I try to sell something, and every item before mine has been undercut by, say, 10 gil each time, I raise the cost of my item to 10 gil above the one before me. In a futile hope that it will stop there lol.

If I had to pick between 1 gil from a vendor and 1 gil on the market board, I'd probably pick the market board. It's such an insignificant amount of gil that's lost and I'd rather somebody use those items than vanish.

Well buying and reselling under cutters is very profitable, and its not really risky if you know the market your selling in. Playing the market is mostly common sense realizing that most people want instant sales. also where did this 19 gil of 99 gil loss come from. 5% tax on either end would at max be 10 gil... where did we start suffering from a 20% tax on the market

aww i found the guy, its closer to 5 gil loss, so yes you lose 5% again its nothing big, its 5% loss but you enable products to be made, which means that the 5% you lose may have helped a crafter make that absolutely needed item when leveling your lancer. Really this economy is fine, the measly 5% loss is nothing to whine about. most items have a higher then NPC sell value on the market if there for crafting.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by FrogDog

If I had to pick between 1 gil from a vendor and 1 gil on the market board, I'd probably pick the market board. It's such an insignificant amount of gil that's lost and I'd rather somebody use those items than vanish.

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I'd go for the vendor, as 1 gil sell on the market is just annoying.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dorin

People just don't know how to play the market. The only tactic they know is "undercutting". Like in this example:

http://i.imgur.com/mAM1Ldl.png


For some odd reason, the guy indicated by the orange arrow undercut the other guy below him. I guess he was in a hurry to sell, what doesn't make sense is that he then proceeds to undercut himself, and then more people follow and keep undercutting the undercutter (red box).

So what I did was simple, buy everything in the Green box and flip it for 380, making profit from other people's darksteel ore.

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Tell me about it. Farmed some boars hide last night just to come back to a 400 gil per decrease in the span of 45 min...

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Originally Posted by Noata

Well buying and reselling under cutters is very profitable, and its not really risky if you know the market your selling in. Playing the market is mostly common sense realizing that most people want instant sales. also where did this 19 gil of 99 gil loss come from. 5% tax on either end would at max be 10 gil... where did we start suffering from a 20% tax on the market

aww i found the guy, its closer to 5 gil loss, so yes you lose 5% again its nothing big, its 5% loss but you enable products to be made, which means that the 5% you lose may have helped a crafter make that absolutely needed item when leveling your lancer. Really this economy is fine, the measly 5% loss is nothing to whine about. most items have a higher then NPC sell value on the market if there for crafting.

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ehh bad math sorry was early in morning drinking coffee. I excel at math as well dont know where that clicked in my head. It is definitely 5 gil :) Good catch

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dorin

People just don't know how to play the market. The only tactic they know is "undercutting". Like in this example:

http://i.imgur.com/mAM1Ldl.png


For some odd reason, the guy indicated by the orange arrow undercut the other guy below him. I guess he was in a hurry to sell, what doesn't make sense is that he then proceeds to undercut himself, and then more people follow and keep undercutting the undercutter (red box).

So what I did was simple, buy everything in the Green box and flip it for 380, making profit from other people's darksteel ore.

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This.

Especially when its a constantly moving item. THAT DEMAND!

Selling the same item at multiple prices can be a valid tactic, but it's not usually a good idea on commodities. Dealing in commodities is insanely annoying, I don't envy anyone making their profits off of such an item. The only way a decent profit can be made is by buying up the competition, which is a lot of work. At least on finished products you can crash the market.