Undercutting by 1 gil?

[Snow_Princess]

i remember i was the first one on the market with a super rare item, i wanted to sell it for 4 mio gil. it took weeks and nobody wanted to buy it. i checked several times per day if someone else was putting the same itemon the market too.

so after weeks of waiting someone else put the same item for 1 gil less than me on the market, and sold it withing 1 hour. i was SO salty xD

but however, before that i was thinking i should be fair, not undercut, only set it on the same price, and so on. but since then i undercut everyone by usually 10 gil, because that's just how the market works. people will always buy the item on the top of the list. they will even pay thousands of gil for the taxes jus to save this 1 gil, because they don't understand how the market works.

and to understand that the people don't understand how the market works, is important to understand how the market REALLY works...

That is not completely why, though it can hold true in some cases. Its more lazy, FFXIV's whole ecnon is dependent on the lazy, so it makes sense to fit such a personality to have people just click the first name they see.

To the TC, people HAVE to undercut because FFXIV's econ is so slow moving, if you want to sell something, you need be on top of the list. That is why I do not understand people that do it in large amounts, it doesn't magically sell faster.

[Moonlite]

When are we getting a cross data center MB so Balmung can really scare the rest of the servers? Undercutting people get so caught up in it items will drop below vendor price. Materia has been good so far in SB but IN HWs near the end you could consistently see sub vendor prices and you can just see the tread marks of lower price, lower price.

It must be the horrible interface/coding of the MB but in other games RMT usually clean up all sub vendor price items. But you can consistently find sub vendor prices. So it must be to much hassle for them to bot the MB and vendor.

[Pixiehawk]

No, the most annoying thing is getting an item, seeing all the prices are 200k, putting yours up for 200k, and coming back 4 hours later to find the prices have dropped more than 90%.

A better question: What is going on in the heads of all these idiots who put stuff on MB for LESS THAN A VENDOR WOULD HAVE PAID THEM!

Or same price, which means less after fees. I mean really WTF!?!

[Zfz]

FFXIV's whole ecnon is dependent on the lazy

Many people don't realize this, but this is exactly how the Market Board is designed, and it was confirmed by Yoshida himself, that they wanted to reward sellers who check the board frequently, learn the market, and adjust prices accordingly. By extension, the whole market tax system and different markets are there to add a layer of obfuscation as well.

To people who complain: don't complain about 1g undercutters. You can do it as well, and you are expected to adjust your prices frequently on items that move quickly, becuase the whole system is designed to reward that behavior. If you want to list and forget, like most people who don't play the market, then you will not be rewarded as much as those whose end-game consists entirely of the market board interface.

----

As to people who do it in larget amounts, I sometimes do it, too. This is because I set my price based on the selling history, not the outrageously overpriced listings that obviously nobody is buying. In those cases, I will undercut a 130,000 item by listing at 25,000 if the price history says nobody's buying above 20,000. And I believe a lot of people who are not frequent sellers who just want the stuff sold will do the same, i.e. price according to the purchase history, not the current listing. Especially when it's something obviously only a few people are selling because not many people are buying; then they can buy my item and resell it at a profit.

Don't expect everyone to treat the market board as a venue of profiteering. Frankly speaking I don't give a fuck about profits on the market board. When I'm selling, I'm selling to get rid of stuff that has significantly more value than the vendor price, else I'd have just dumped it on NPC vendors. All I care about is that it sells above vendor price and that it sells reasonably quickly to not clog up my retainer's listing. Most times I'll be listing lots of stuff then forget them for weeks if not months before my retainer inventories have filled up too much and I need to sell again.

[NinjaTaru72]

Depending what I'm selling us going for, but I'll undercut anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand..

OH your selling this item for 10k? I'm selling it for 7k.

Your selling this for 80k? I'm selling it for 65k.



Im not a crafter, or a gatherer. I just sell what u get. I don't care much for the market.


Like on my server fat cats were going for 600k. My fisher venture brought me one for the first time do I sold it. Easy 500k. Few days later I got another. Another 500k.

Then a week later (2 days ago) suddenly cats are 2.5mil. So i sold mine for 1.4 this time. Cuz 2.5 is crazy, and it sold fast

[Mikki]

snip

I don't necessarily think this behavior is bad since you tend to be selling one at a time and it will go fast. So it doesn't have a chance to hurt the market as much, unless several people undercut you before it can sell. What IS harmful is when someone purposely gathers/crafts a bunch of one item and does this. People who actively work the markets need to also keep in mind market history and current sales volumes. If the item usually sells for much less and isn't selling as much at this new inflated price then yes. By all means, slash the price back down.

What I really hate is when an item sells so much that you can see all sales are from the past HOUR at some points and someone constantly slashes the price. They make a ton of the item and put them all up for up to 90% off....and they keep doing it, until that is the "new price", when people were perfectly fine, clearly, buying it at the old price. I can understand you people who don't work the market and just put stuff up that you end up with but these people who are clearly making the item to sell and keep coming back to do it over and over again really get under my skin....

[Alleo]

Lowering the price will often speed up sales even on high demand items. If sales are slow it's often because people do want the item they just won't pay the ridiculous price tag that sellers want for it. The second that price falls to a price more people are willing to pay sales will speed up..

I agree that its better to lower the price if its only selling slowly but there are more than enough items on the market that constantly and daily sell well and yet you will have people that sell their items for less than the price of the NPC. Thats a big case of bad. (I will always cry a bit when I look at the materia market that constantly sells lots of numbers but each item itself is barely anything worth) If I have an item and see that the last sold one was months or weeks ago and there are still others there then I will first try it with the current price and if I need space and it does not sell then I will drop. But I will never get into a market that is going good and drop the price by half or more because in the end you will just lose money too.

If someone just sells all their junk items that they got from runs on the MB for barely anything, I do kinda question why they dont just sell it to the NPC. Less need for space and more left to sell the good items and you wont crash the markets for those that are wanting to profit from it.

(And yes I am a bit salty since a lot of market that are constant are often dropping a lot when I try to sell something for the current price..its like a very bad case of bad luck x))

Like on my server fat cats were going for 600k. My fisher venture brought me one for the first time do I sold it. Easy 500k. Few days later I got another. Another 500k.

Then a week later (2 days ago) suddenly cats are 2.5mil. So i sold mine for 1.4 this time. Cuz 2.5 is crazy, and it sold fast

Well your first price drop is not even 20% so its still kinda fine since its one item and not a whole flood of them and since they sell fast the market will probably not crash from that small amount. But I am really not sure why you let 1 million Gil just go like that? If the history showed that they are still sold for 2.5 (so there are people that will pay so much) why undercut by such a huge amount that will leave you with such a big amount of cash gone? I am quite sure you would have sold it as fast as you did with 1.4, if you put it up for 2.0 or 2.1 but you would have gotten more out of it. I mean its good for the buyer and if you dont care about Gil its probably fine too but I really cant understand why such a undercut is necessary if its selling so well. (But thats just me)

What I really hate is when an item sells so much that you can see all sales are from the past HOUR at some points and someone constantly slashes the price. They make a ton of the item and put them all up for up to 90% off....and they keep doing it, until that is the "new price", when people were perfectly fine, clearly, buying it at the old price. I can understand you people who don't work the market and just put stuff up that you end up with but these people who are clearly making the item to sell and keep coming back to do it over and over again really get under my skin....

Especially since you only need to click at one button and you will see what the current lowest price is and then another button to see how it sold in the last few hours. x) Undercutting them again and again just does not make any sense at all for such items since you would probably still sell them as fast as before but you will also get more out of it and wont destroy the market too.

[Dark-Saviour]

What I really hate is when an item sells so much that you can see all sales are from the past HOUR at some points and someone constantly slashes the price. They make a ton of the item and put them all up for up to 90% off....and they keep doing it, until that is the "new price", when people were perfectly fine, clearly, buying it at the old price. I can understand you people who don't work the market and just put stuff up that you end up with but these people who are clearly making the item to sell and keep coming back to do it over and over again really get under my skin....

Can't say it's often the case, but one scenario that can lead to that is if someone is going for the crafting achievements.
Started working on the BSM one a while back and I had so many cobalt rivets... So many... I can't be arsed to try and split stacks, so I actually do just try to list them as full stacks at or just below normal price, but a number of them did sit for a while (and then undercutting happened... a lot...), so I could see people trying to unload them quickly since inventory space is at a premium...

Buyers have 2 options. They can either look through the sellers and find the cheapest deal and buy it right now. Or they can put up a buy order for the price they are willing to pay and wait for a seller to accept that price. Might take a day or 2 but will save you money.

Sellers have 2 options. They can either look through the buy orders and sell to the guy who will pay the most right now.. Or they can put a sell order up for there own price and wait for a buyer. Again might take a couple of days but you'll get more money

It's an incredibly balanced market system where the value of items is determined equally by both buyer and seller. And generally patience. If you need it right now be prepared to pay more. But if your not in a hurry you can save a load of money and get it a better price.

GW2 does something similar, but it just aggregates all of the sales, so you don't have to look through individual listings. Say 200 people post 2 of a material each for 67 silver and this is the lowest price; if you post 4 of yours for the same price, buyers will simply see 404 available at 67 silver and yours will sell after all 400 preceding your listing have been bought at that price.
Same thing with buy orders.

I'm rather fond of the individual unit sale aspect of the GW2 system, but the whole setup also makes it convenient for people who want to manipulate markets.
Not that it would necessarily be more 'complex' otherwise; just more tedious, I suppose. :-/

[GetFoesReqd]

It doesn't bother me personally, but as a sort of symbolic sign of respect, I kind of adjust the undercutting a bit based on the value of the item. I know others here have said they do the same. Like, something worth a half a million, I undercut by maybe 500 or a thousand, the price stays relatively stable, and it "feels nicer" to not see the one gil thing, even if it really doesn't mean much. It's kind of a pointless courtesy but at least it shows a little consideration I guess. In the end though, it really doesn't matter, and one gil is a lot better than some hateful price tanking crap like a 50% undercut. But then again it is also a free market, and some times the trouble with those is people will kick them in the nads like they want on Funniest Home Videos.

[Jazalin]

I undercut by one all the time. Why should I care what someone else is selling something for, i just want my item to sell first at the highest possible cost. The markets on this game are whacked anyways. The real problem is people not knowing what they are doing and posting a 25k item for 500gil. That is what kills the market. Its not competition, its just someone not knowing what they are doing.