Undercutting by 1 gil?

[Bourne_Endeavor]

It's possible B can make a sale right after a normal update but depending on the frequency of sales, this can be unlikely if A is a no-lifer sitting in front of the market board checking retainers all day - like many hardcore crafters. Now, if this behavior frustrates people as much as this thread indicates, B will also make people leave the markets either in frustration or in search of better opportunities. If B can make A quit, B can reset prices to their original value and hold a monopoly on the market.

The fallacy with this perspective is people often undercut the new price, which is what actually crashes the market. Whenever I don't have time to get into a price war or simply can't be bothered, I just make occasional adjustments and it still sells. Now this doesn't always work, especially if someone floods a market in an attempt to control it, but you can do that right back to them. In the end, no matter what you do, mass undercuts hurts everyone except the buyer. It'll only become worse once they release that stupid phone app that allows price changes without even being logged in.

[Lazaruz]

Here is some perspective from the other side with a little bit of game theory mixed in:

At any given point, the player with the cheapest item is in the most likely position to get the sale, largely due to laziness (people don't want to teleport to the right city and/or don't care about tax) or ignorance (many people don't even know there's a city tax). Suppose you have two players, A and B, undercutting each other but B is either less active or unwilling to update prices as frequently as A. Both players can replace an item immediately after it's sold (you see this in slower markets, namely gear). Because A can keep his price on top almost all the time, A is in position to get all of the sales and therefore 100% of the profits while B gets nothing. From B's perspective, he can't keep up with A in the undercut war, and since B doesn't get any of the money anyways, B has no incentive to preserve A's profits. B's best chance is to drop the price by a large enough margin that a prospective buyer might jump on it thinking it's a good deal. Queue big undercut. Repeat this until price crashes.

It's possible B can make a sale right after a normal update but depending on the frequency of sales, this can be unlikely if A is a no-lifer sitting in front of the market board checking retainers all day - like many hardcore crafters. Now, if this behavior frustrates people as much as this thread indicates, B will also make people leave the markets either in frustration or in search of better opportunities. If B can make A quit, B can reset prices to their original value and hold a monopoly on the market.

This is how we see it. The market board isn't some cooperative game; it's a winner-take-all PvP deathmatch. The one way you can avoid the scenario outlined is to price match, which truly "preserves the health of the market board" by keeping prices static instead of forever falling (even if it's just by 1). Yet, I doubt any of you claiming you're "preserving the health of the market board" really care about that. People undercut for only 1 reason and it's to get the sale. There's no other motive involved.


Note: this argument only works for slow markets, not fast moving ones like materials, leve turn-ins, or whatever, and slow moving markets are the only ones with prices in the millions that allow for huge undercuts like what people are complaining about here.

Thank you! Explained it infinetely better then I ever could with my usual rambling :P
Have a like

[Claviusnex]

At any given point, the player with the cheapest item is in the most likely position to get the sale, largely due to laziness (people don't want to teleport to the right city and/or don't care about tax) or ignorance (many people don't even know there's a city tax).

That is only the case when quantity is not a factor. Someone with 10 items at half the cost is still more expensive if you only need one or a few. It will apply somewhat to high cost single piece items but I think most people aren't going to be enticed to buy just because the is a 1-100 gill difference on a 500K gill item (at least I'm not).

[ElazulHP]

I'll undercut by 1 gil because I respect my fellow crafters and gatherers. At the end of the day we all want to see a profit so keeping the price as stable as possible is in everyone's best interests who crafts and gathers. Feel free to do it right back at me. I ain't got no problem with it. Business is business. The only person who wins when under cutting by massive amounts are the people who only buy stuff from the MB though. When you have a bunch of people doing massive undercuts you essentially kill an items worth on the MB making it worthless as well.

[Furiea]

seeing people undercutting my listings by 1 gil is like seeing this thread getting bumped by 1 reply.

[Masekase_Hurricane]

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!

I do this with craft mats as it helps other crafters out. Npcing the item just removes it from the game and helps no one. Sometimes it's not about the gil.

[KatenKyokotsu]

In other mmo, even if you don't mb pvp your stuffs will still eventually be sold in 2-3 days. Here, if you don't mb pvp hard your stuffs won't even move for a week. That's from Tonberry perspective. You undercut 1 gil, the next guy will undercut 10 gil. The ones below will be spite to undercut 50-100 gil just to be seen on the first. I don't blame others for undercutting as they wanted to get rid of their stuffs and make gil too. I can only blame se for this stupid design.

[Legewiel]

In other mmo, even if you don't mb pvp your stuffs will still eventually be sold in 2-3 days. Here, if you don't mb pvp hard your stuffs won't even move for a week. That's from Tonberry perspective. You undercut 1 gil, the next guy will undercut 10 gil. The ones below will be spite to undercut 50-100 gil just to be seen on the first. I don't blame others for undercutting as they wanted to get rid of their stuffs and make gil too. I can only blame se for this stupid design.

What is stupid exactly on the design? in Wow I had to undercut as well and in wow the prices were even worse, with ppl selling the end product a lot cheaper than the price of the materials.

[Sarevok_Thordin]

What is stupid exactly on the design? in Wow I had to undercut as well and in wow the prices were even worse, with ppl selling the end product a lot cheaper than the price of the materials.

It lends itself to people aimlessly going back and forth undercutting each other by 1gil just to stay on top, there is no cost for doing so.

By charging a tax to list it, as opposed to sell, would vastly change the Market place

[Legewiel]

It lends itself to people aimlessly going back and forth undercutting each other by 1gil just to stay on top, there is no cost for doing so.

By charging a tax to list it, as opposed to sell, would vastly change the Market place

I really hope they doesn't do that, it would be annoying to start losing money without not being sure if you're going to sell that product or not. I hated that in wow.
And plus the "pvp" on market board is fun <3