Lets Talk About UNDERCUTTERS!!!!

[Atreides]

Currently I welcome undercutting more than anything and hope they'll keep doing it. The prices right now are beyond reason.

[Obysuca]

Currently I welcome undercutting more than anything and hope they'll keep doing it. The prices right now are beyond reason.

>_> If people didn't undercut things so much they became worthless, you'd have gil so they wouldn't be beyond reason. That item you just got/crafted? Just imagine, it could be 40k, instead of 400 gil and then you could afford that nice 500k glamour much quicker than you could with 400 gil items.

Now, I bet you're saying "Oh, but then they'll sell that 500k item for 5 mil" Well, that's an easy fix too. It's been done before in other mmos, just have a fixed price, so players can sell cheaper than that and make gil, but if they go higher than it, no one will buy it, when they can get the fixed price for cheaper. With that, we wouldn't be seeing worthless 110 gear for 2-4 mil, when you can get better 115 for 10k-20k. I'm sure a lot of people felt greedy when HW came out and 115 gear was that cheap, compared to them pricing it at 2-4 mil

[Kikoten]

I didn't know undercutting was so frowned on. I thought it was just the way marketing goes, competition and whatnot. All I know is if I see a level 5 item that doesn't look pretty, and has no good stats, being sold for 150,000 gil, I am going to undercut it to a more applicable price.

[fireslash]

whats an undercutting fair portion?does 10% of the lowest price seems fair?

[Hysterior]

will undercut people putting ridiculous price any time of the day
some people are too greedy, my retainer is the robin hood of retainers

[KaijinRhada]

Unfettered undercutting is bound to happen in a player made economy. Not every one has the same feel for getting the most out of the worth of an item (albeit some things are ridiculously priced), and some people don't care enough to be patient for a larger profit. The thing that really gets me in a rage is when people list things for vendor price or lower. Why bother?

[SakuraMidori]

Iv seen so many a holes sell stuff that npc's sell and charge like 20k more to take advantage of players who don't know any better so yea ill undercut you all night long on stuff like that. otherwise ill only do it by a small amount

[XiXiQ]

depends really. If I see someone undercutting something by a ridiculous amount, I'll just list higher or not at all. The funnier part is when people start undercutting the big undercutter by 100 gil or something piddling. Its the same with any market really, wait and see, buy low, sell high. A little patience and attention doesn't go astray.

[aerialrave]

Video games like this have a true sense of free market, with little to no interaction by the GMs.
You won't find such a free market anywhere like this in real life due to politics.
It's a real shame if you don't like the system, because really it's supposed to be an opportunity.

The truth of the matter is that you are powerless to truly control the price. Why do you say a given item is worth a certain price? That's just your opinion. There are plenty of other people in the world who are willing to craft or gather the same item and sell it cheaper than you. Don't cry because you got undercut. The real truth is that you are over-valuing your wares and it's really not worth as much as you think it is.

So why do prices go spiraling downward? It's basic Economics 101: the simple law of Supply and Demand. As Supply goes up and Demand goes down, prices plummet. This is like super basic stuff. You have virtually zero control of Demand: either someone wants it, or they don't. You also have very little control of Supply: market manipulation can only do so much, as you can't stop people from producing more of a given item, in a virtual world resources are theoretically infinite. But although you can't control these things, an engaged business person can find patterns in the Supply and Demand. If you do market research, you can find pockets of Demand where Supply is low... and that is your opportunity to make gil.

So what's going on when you get undercut? You have something you want to sell (READ: YOU WANT TO GET RID OF IT, if it was important or of real value to you, you would hold on to it). The item didn't sell at the price you set it for, even though you set it low enough and believed it to be a fair price (READ: NOBODY WANTS IT, at least not at that price, which means demand is low). Then someone comes along with the same item and attempts to sell it lower than you, aka undercut (READ: THE ITEM IS NOT RARE BECAUSE SOMEONE ELSE HAS IT, which means supply is high enough to warrant price drops). If supply was low, there wouldn't be enough people to undercut you to force price drops. On the flip side of the coin, if demand was high enough, both your item and the undercutter's will sell. There is no sense crying over this, as you really can't control any of it. That's just the way it is.

TL;DR
mad cuz poor

[ECHOxLegend]

If I can make enough money to make it worth a trip to the board and i can do it fast then I'm doing it, why should I care about anyone else.