Don't you just hate it when....

[Tangled Metal]

Don't you hate it when someone undercuts everyone just to make a buck?

Scenario:
Multiple vendors have an item at 10 mil. So a few people start charging 9.95 Mil. All well and good, competition is a good thing. Everyone wins and no one is more than 100k off of each other.

Then someone comes along with literally dozens of that item and puts them on their vendor for 2 mil. You confront this person who says "Oh, I just has a few left so I am selling them really cheap." So you say "O.K. No big deal." You buy all the items that person has to keep the delicate balance of the fragile economy and within minutes there are just as many right back on the vendor! You watch another fellow unhappy vendor buyout the 10 to 15 of the said item only to see it restocked within the hour with another dozen or so of said item.

There seems to be a never ending supply of these obscure items. Not saying that they are duped but I have seen 30+ of these items fly off this vendor today.

What do you do about it? In attempt to keep the market stable so that we all get a little action all we have done is made this less-than-honest vendor rich while we all continue to suffer. So, in summation, I want to say "Hey, thanks for lying to me and others and enjoy your gold. I hope karma gets ya down the road and I would love to be there to watch!"

 

[Tjalle]

What are these items you speak of?

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

Well for one I'd stop buying them.

Usually when someone undersells something I'm also selling, I ignore them, they do it for a rise, so I don't give them one. I've enough to not really care either way. I sell because I don't need the item, not because I need the money.

 

[Thav12]

Dupes bad. Needless to say. If tht is the issue, I will eat the following words.

However, is it entirely impossible that the delicate economy you talk about is mostly upset by people like you keeping prices for items artificially high? Simply put, a crimmy costs 18 mil. Is that because they are rare or because you set that price based on your automated search of Luna vendors? If there are many of something and demand is low, prices should come down. That is of course unless you buy them all up and make them rare again, a practice that I frown upon, but that is of course entirely legal in this game. Only problem with it is that that practice depends highly on scripted searches (that I use as well and do not have a problem with by the way)

 

[Stupid Miner]

If you have enough money, and if the item is such that it'll be sure to keep selling, i'd buy them out and when they run out make a huge profit.

 

[Tangled Metal]

Probably not duped items, what it more than likely is that this person saw the items for the going rate, went to a shard that has them at a lower price and X-Fered them over to said shard. The owner of the said vendor does not normally play said shard. It would not be a big deal if the going rate was 1 mil for said item and said vendor has an unlimited supply of them at 2 to 4 mil.

It is just poor sportsmanship and then to make false statements, although I am quite sure that if I were to confront said player it would go something like this:

"Hey man, I thought you were out of those."
"Heh heh, yeah I found a few more. These are the last of it!"

Said player leaves. 12 more bought. 1 hour later 12 more appear on vendor.

 

[Kimball]

The dupes really bug me because I become quite uncomfortable when buying anything for a "deal" from a vendor....The problem is I find it equally annoying that you would drop 20 - 30 mil just so you can keep your prices higher your vendor....Way to go!

 

[Tangled Metal]

If you have enough money, and if the item is such that it'll be sure to keep selling, i'd buy them out and when they run out make a huge profit.

That is hard to do when the supply is limitless and my gold is not.

 

[Tangled Metal]

The dupes really bug me because I become quite uncomfortable when buying anything for a "deal" from a vendor....The problem is I find it equally annoying that you would drop 20 - 30 mil just so you can keep your prices higher your vendor....Way to go!

I am not the only vendor that has bought all that said vendor had. Said player intentionally put multiple items at a SEVER reduced rate to undercut 10 or so other vendors. Maybe I am the A$$h0le for trying to make a little money on my not so marked up items. When I pay 7 for an item and try to sell it at 10, that is good business. When someone comes in and puts items on a vendor for less than my profit margin that is pretty rude and has some intent to screw someone else. (Profit margin of 3 mil- player selling item for 2 mil)

 

[UOKaiser]

Well for one I'd stop buying them.

Usually when someone undersells something I'm also selling, I ignore them, they do it for a rise, so I don't give them one. I've enough to not really care either way. I sell because I don't need the item, not because I need the money.

Not too easy to do when they just continue and force the market down to unprofitable levels. I usually engage in months-years of battles with there vender buying them out as soon as they place to keep the market stable till they finaly stop. Then resell it after there done. Long battles I have to have support of fellow members in my circle.

 

[GL_Seller]

wow stop crying... seriously u come off as greedy nothing else. If urs sell at 10 buy them out then when they get done resell. If they have so much of this crap im sure its not something uber rare. U guys are just hoarding to make the price go up.

I love underselling people it assures lower fees and my items sell faster. So either sell at his price or wait and stop crying.

 

[UOKaiser]

wow stop crying... seriously u come off as greedy nothing else. If urs sell at 10 buy them out then when they get done resell. If they have so much of this crap im sure its not something uber rare. U guys are just hoarding to make the price go up.

I love underselling people it assures lower fees and my items sell faster. So either sell at his price or wait and stop crying.

If your supplys are limitless and noboduy buys you out then you will push the market for the item to a new low. After that another person undercuts you to sell before you with there limitless supplies then you need to do the same to them untill someone gives.

 

[Tangled Metal]

wow stop crying... seriously u come off as greedy nothing else. If urs sell at 10 buy them out then when they get done resell. If they have so much of this crap im sure its not something uber rare. U guys are just hoarding to make the price go up.

I love underselling people it assures lower fees and my items sell faster. So either sell at his price or wait and stop crying.

Good point. However, if I start selling under his price, I loose the money I spent on getting the item in the first place. I then start to go in the hole completely. And if it is true that said player's supply is limitless for whatever reason that player will just do what he always does, cut his selling price in 1/2 again.

If you pay for all of your items off of the sell of 1, then you can sell the rest for any amount because it is all profit. This seller started out selling at market price then got greedy and made it so he is the only one who is selling at all because he made everyone look like they are way over priced!

This thread isn't about my greed- it is about his greed. Do you see my point? Also, I am not the only vendor that has been hurt because of his selling things ate 20% of what the normal market value is. It would be like working yourself to death doing BODs to get a Barbed Runic Kit and trying to sell it on your vendor for 2 mil (going rate) and someone comes along and starts selling a seemingly endless supply of Barbed Runic Kits for 400k each.

 

[RavenWinterHawk]

That is hard to do when the supply is limitless and my gold is not.

If the supply is limitless there not worth 2 million and not nearly worth 10 million.


Know what youre buying.

 

[UOKaiser]

If the supply is limitless there not worth 2 million and not nearly worth 10 million.


Know what youre buying.

Certain supplies shouldn't be limitless But they seem that way. I run into that usually with gems,ingots. Takes me a good 2-3months to usually clean out the said venders sometimes shorter sometimes much longer. But eventually I do. I have developed enough methods to keep undercutting to a minimal thanks to my experience,friends and alliances. Thats when you see real gold pass hands and i mean more than many can believe there is out there.

 

[Tangled Metal]

If the supply is limitless there not worth 2 million and not nearly worth 10 million.


Know what youre buying.

I never said they were worth 10 mil, just 10 mil was the going rate for 2 months until someone shows up with dozens of them. So, for 2 whole months they were rare enough that people paid 10 mil for them and all of the sudden they are so plentiful that they go for 2 mil? Does anyone else smell something fishy?

Lets look at another example of say a unique event items. That one UNIQUE item gets in the wrong hands and boom, 300 players are now selling that UNIQUE item! Then it becomes a [replica] hmmmmmmmmmmm.........

 

[UOKaiser]

I never said they were worth 10 mil, just 10 mil was the going rate for 2 months until someone shows up with dozens of them. So, for 2 whole months they were rare enough that people paid 10 mil for them and all of the sudden they are so plentiful that they go for 2 mil? Does anyone else smell something fishy?

Lets look at another example of say a unique event items. That one UNIQUE item gets in the wrong hands and boom, 300 players are now selling that UNIQUE item! Then it becomes a [replica] hmmmmmmmmmmm.........

Got to mention which item that drop from 10-2 maybe someone heard something about it.

 

[GL_Seller]

No ur right ur not talking about ur greed or his greed. Just come right out with it and accuse him of duping. Thats exactly what your doing limitless supply etc etc.

Items getting into the wrong hands is one persons greed. It happens. Quite frankly i love replicas and have no problem with other stuff being turned into them as well.

So sell as his price or just wait. If he 1/2s his prices again ur so called community should be happy. Id love to know what it is thats selling at 10m that he cut to 2m then if u put at 2m he would cut again to 1m.

 

[Thav12]

Rowan I sort of felt bad for your loss until you started comparing your shameless market domination and rip off tactics with obtaining items through hard work and hours of game play. You lost me there. You got to be kidding.

When I finally get my orni in doom that I have been trying for the last three months I sure as hell think it is worth a lot. If it is 10 mil, I probably lost half of that in deaths and certainly time. Unfortunately I have not been able to buy one because people like you artificially jack up prices.

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

Not too easy to do when they just continue and force the market down to unprofitable levels. I usually engage in months-years of battles with there vender buying them out as soon as they place to keep the market stable till they finaly stop. Then resell it after there done. Long battles I have to have support of fellow members in my circle.

They're not forcing anything if you don't buy from them.

 

[UOKaiser]

Rowan I sort of felt bad for your loss until you started comparing your shameless market domination and rip off tactics with obtaining items through hard work and hours of game play. You lost me there. You got to be kidding.

When I finally get my orni in doom that I have been trying for the last three months I sure as hell think it is worth a lot. If it is 10 mil, I probably lost half of that in deaths and certainly time. Unfortunately I have not been able to buy one because people like you artificially jack up prices.

I think you got his point wrong. The way the market works is the more and less useful the item out there the cheaper it is. There is a balance with the market. There is a current market price that can be kept. There are individuals that either increase the price immensly or decrease the price immensly. If it took someone like 5mil worth of deaths and 2 months worth of trying and when he comes to sell it the going price for it is 600k I have to guess this would be horrible investment so would 5 mil be or 8mil. 2mil profit is not worth 2 months of work. So a balance has to be kept.

Lately the balance has being in the lower end l items not worth enough than the work it takes to get them so we being out of balance for a while.
In your example ornys should be worth more than 10mil. 5mil worth of death a month or so of trying and wasting time in doom, inflation and usefulness. It should be at least 20-30mil. The faction arties,previous dupes and increase drop rate,increase supply destroy this price. They are actually at 5mil at the moment most likely will go down because the way the trend is.

 

[Guido_LS]

While in some ways, I appreciate the sentiment, in others, I'm of the just get over it mindset. The only reason people charge some of the outlandish prices they do is because they have property in that little walled in section of Luna, which in turn is scanned and put online by certain websites - the only place one can find items for certain.

It's my opinion Luna vendors have done as much to hurt UO as any change ever made by the devs. Back in the "bad" old days, I used to enjoy taking my chances in Fel, searching out the vendors, as the best prices were always to be found there. If I ended up in a fight, so be it - that was the chance that was taken. Now there are so few traders there as to make it pointless. I stopped looking. The Britain x-roads was another hotspot. The only thing there now are the occasional Ettin and Mongbat. Now there is Luna and maybe 15-20 good vendor shops outside of Luna.

The real scam is in knowing that the guy selling bulk regs at 9-12gp per paid 2-3 per off of the faction vendors on the Fel side. Same with iron ore and boards. 1 million for 10 of what are basically foraged items (ML mined/chopped/fished stuff is a good example). The guy selling pieces of ancient pottery frags at 5k each... please. Anyone with 40-50 magery and a store bought horse can farm those, and some other SA items, all day long. The same stuff people in Luna are charging 10k each for.

So, in the view of one of those *average* players - one that seldom has more than 2-3 million gold on hand at any point, yet still manages to get done the things they want to get done, although it may take a little more effort, this falls into the cry me a river category. You Luna vendors made your beds out of sharpened nails. You're the ones that have to lay in them.

 

[UOKaiser]

They're not forcing anything if you don't buy from them.

If you owned a pizzaria and another one started next door in order to stay in business you need to engage in price wars with the other unless both mutually colaborate on a set price. They force you if they have the same product so the wars must start and continue till a victor imerges. They get the money they want for there items you sacrifice your gold for the time being knowing later on you will make a profit from them after they can't supply anymore. The nature of business.

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

If you owned a pizzaria and another one started next door in order to stay in business you need to engage in price wars with the other unless both mutually colaborate on a set price. They force you if they have the same product so the wars must start and continue till a victor imerges. They get the money they want for there items you sacrifice your gold for the time being knowing later on you will make a profit from them after they can't supply anymore. The nature of business.

I disagree, UO is not real life, and changing product is an infinitely simpler soloution. Items have a value in their use not just their cost. In 9 years of buying/selling I've never sold at a loss, and definitely wouldn't just because of someone else.

 

[Tangled Metal]

I am not accusing said player of duping. I was using duping as an example of killing the economy and hurting honest players. And buying at 7 from a vendor outside of Luna and putting it on a Luna vendor for 10 is a common practice. When people pay 10 for an item that originally cost 7 they are paying for convenience of not having to go search for it.

When someone comes in and starts charging 2 for the same item, yes, the consumer is happy cause they got a smoking hot deal for the item, but the other 9 vendors are like WTF? It is unclear how said player can make a profit at 2 mil when the item is obviously at 10 mil on 90% of all the other shards.

Perhaps this person is a power gamer and has 15 computers running 100% attended at all times to farm said items. Yes, I am sore that I lost out on any and all profits on said item and I will have to now sit on several million gold worth of items to not take a HUGE loss on what I paid for them. That is upsetting to any player that relies on vendors for income.

 

[Thav12]

Rowan I sort of felt bad for your loss until you started comparing your shameless market domination and rip off tactics with obtaining items through hard work and hours of game play. You lost me there. You got to be kidding.

When I finally get my orni in doom that I have been trying for the last three months I sure as hell think it is worth a lot. If it is 10 mil, I probably lost half of that in deaths and certainly time. Unfortunately I have not been able to buy one because people like you artificially jack up prices.

I think you got his point wrong. The way the market works is the more and less useful the item out there the cheaper it is. There is a balance with the market. There is a current market price that can be kept. There are individuals that either increase the price immensly or decrease the price immensly. If it took someone like 5mil worth of deaths and 2 months worth of trying and when he comes to sell it the going price for it is 600k I have to guess this would be horrible investment so would 5 mil be or 8mil. 2mil profit is not worth 2 months of work. So a balance has to be kept.

Lately the balance has being in the lower end l items not worth enough than the work it takes to get them so we being out of balance for a while.
In your example ornys should be worth more than 10mil. 5mil worth of death a month or so of trying and wasting time in doom, inflation and usefulness. It should be at least 20-30mil. The faction arties,previous dupes and increase drop rate,increase supply destroy this price. They are actually at 5mil at the moment most likely will go down because the way the trend is.

I understand the basics of economics just fine. Monopolizing the market through price fixing is illegal in most societies. You are mixing true value (ie labor, time, resource rarity) with perceived value due to these kind of monopoly issues. In your example, 5 mil of deaths and 2 months worth of trying would never lead to a 600K item in a free economy because either you would have bought it for 600K and not spent that time on it, or it would be worth a lot more. The only thing that escapes this kind of reasoning is art. The price of art is in the eye of the beholder, usually corrected by a rarity factor.

Your statement that we are out of balance is correct. We always have been. The only thing is that right now the power is with the buyers and not the sellers since we can make most of the previously rediculously priced items or mostly equivalent items. In the real world this would lead to bankruptcy of some of them main luna vendors, but in this game.... probably not. When one of the other posters was stating that this is a "war" he is fighting that "lasts months to years", where he is outcompeting people that sell cheaper than he does, I was about to jump through the screen... people like that single handedly F.U. this economy more than any other game mechanic, and they are proud of it. Well, thanks...

On a side note, and this is something i have always suspected, but now have confirmed: It is these price fixers that have done more damage to the economy than scripters. The scripters would script say a heartwood runic, the price for that item however was fixed by the luna vendors. They would buy it for say 10 mil and sell it for 20. Now, they not only screw over the people that play the game and don't script, they "encourage" two catagories of players to script more heartwood runics: those that can not afford 20 milion and those that encouraged by the rediculous prices continue to make more.... again, thanks!

 

[Kallie Pigeon]

Competitive pricing is good for buyers and you're a seller so that's why you're worried.

 

[UOKaiser]

I disagree, UO is not real life, and changing product is an infinitely simpler soloution. Items have a value in their use not just their cost. In 9 years of buying/selling I've never sold at a loss, and definitely wouldn't just because of someone else.

UO economy is centered on real life though. less of the item exist + harder to aquire+Higher demand = more expensive, more of a item+easier to aquire+low demand = cheaper the item. Just like real life. You might not sell for a loss but thats because there are people like me out there that keep the ingot price from hitting 1 gold piece and the leather price hitting 1mil per 100 pieces. If we bought all the items to resell at 100k each and thats our main product and everyone else is selling the item at 130k each so that we can make a 30k profit on each of then someone comes in selling the items at 90k. You can be sure they will be bought out immediately untill they can't supply anymore so that everyone can resell that item 130k again.
Changing product is usually not a option. I have enough supplies of certain products to last me years on my venders. Im not gonna just toss them all in the trash can if another cheap vender opens up. Im gonna handle the competition.

 

[Tangled Metal]

Rowan I sort of felt bad for your loss until you started comparing your shameless market domination and rip off tactics with obtaining items through hard work and hours of game play. You lost me there. You got to be kidding.

When I finally get my orni in doom that I have been trying for the last three months I sure as hell think it is worth a lot. If it is 10 mil, I probably lost half of that in deaths and certainly time. Unfortunately I have not been able to buy one because people like you artificially jack up prices.

I do not dominate any market. I only follow others in their market pricing. I am not asking anyone to feel bad at my loss, I will recover. I obtain items through hard work all of the time. Every SA reg I have sold I gathered myself and took the risk of going into the abyss. I sometimes get lucky when I am out and about and find an item on a vendor outside of Luna that I can profit by buying and reselling.

I don't see how anything I have said could be construed as "shameless market domination" or "rip off tactics" on my part. Please show me how you interpreted what I said as that. I was talking about a stability in an item in the market for 2 months until someone comes along with more of the item than anyone else and starts to sell it at 20% of what everyone else is selling it at.

I do not set the prices, I am far too small of a fish in this ocean to be setting any prices. I just follow what the big boys set for pricing. As you could see by what I said earlier, I spent 20 mil to try and keep the current pricing so all of us could make a small profit. And that got me where? It got me broke and in possession of multiple items that I can only sell if I drop the price BELOW what I paid for them. As you can plainly see, I am not the mafia, I am the shop owner that has to pay the mafia to stay in business.

 

[Thav12]

That is upsetting to any player that relies on vendors for income.

what makes you so special? the prices and margins you are talking about are of an order of magnitude that any other person would take an increddible amout of time to obtain through game mechanics. Most people therefore rely on buying and selling to make a buck. Unfortunately, most of us that actually play the game don't have the milions and milions to create the margins and profits that you are able to create. Don't cry over your miscalculation publicly, it is silly. However, and I am with others on this one, i suspect that you are stealthily suggesting that someone is doing something very illegal like duping. Something that is indeed hard to proof, but quite likely if suddenly dozens of a previously very rare item start popping up. I will give you that.

 

[Thav12]

Rowan I sort of felt bad for your loss until you started comparing your shameless market domination and rip off tactics with obtaining items through hard work and hours of game play. You lost me there. You got to be kidding.

When I finally get my orni in doom that I have been trying for the last three months I sure as hell think it is worth a lot. If it is 10 mil, I probably lost half of that in deaths and certainly time. Unfortunately I have not been able to buy one because people like you artificially jack up prices.

I do not dominate any market. I only follow others in their market pricing. I am not asking anyone to feel bad at my loss, I will recover. I obtain items through hard work all of the time. Every SA reg I have sold I gathered myself and took the risk of going into the abyss. I sometimes get lucky when I am out and about and find an item on a vendor outside of Luna that I can profit by buying and reselling.

I don't see how anything I have said could be construed as "shameless market domination" or "rip off tactics" on my part. Please show me how you interpreted what I said as that. I was talking about a stability in an item in the market for 2 months until someone comes along with more of the item than anyone else and starts to sell it at 20% of what everyone else is selling it at.

I do not set the prices, I am far too small of a fish in this ocean to be setting any prices. I just follow what the big boys set for pricing. As you could see by what I said earlier, I spent 20 mil to try and keep the current pricing so all of us could make a small profit. And that got me where? It got me broke and in possession of multiple items that I can only sell if I drop the price BELOW what I paid for them. As you can plainly see, I am not the mafia, I am the shop owner that has to pay the mafia to stay in business.

You are doing that though... you are buying items for milions of gold to maintain a perceived "stable market price". The only reason you are doing that is so you can continue to demand the "market" price for that item (and not loose money). That is shameless market domination and you rip off others that could have bought the item for cheap. You may not see yourself as a big fish, but you are a much bigger fish than you may think you are... Now, i mean you no ill. I see your points and it is certainly not a personal issue against you. You are trying to reduce your losses and are probably on to something highly illegal that is causing this problem for you (duping). But my bigger point is I think valid, in that you rely on this broken economy to stay broken so you can reap the benefits.

I like your mafia statement though... I can certainly appreciate that as well... However, true mafia would come to your store and break your knees if you undercut them or would not give them your share. Your knees will be just fine I assume if you did not participate...

 

[UOKaiser]

I understand the basics of economics just fine. Monopolizing the market through price fixing is illegal in most societies. You are mixing true value (ie labor, time, resource rarity) with perceived value due to these kind of monopoly issues. In your example, 5 mil of deaths and 2 months worth of trying would never lead to a 600K item in a free economy because either you would have bought it for 600K and not spent that time on it, or it would be worth a lot more. The only thing that escapes this kind of reasoning is art. The price of art is in the eye of the beholder, usually corrected by a rarity factor.

Your statement that we are out of balance is correct. We always have been. The only thing is that right now the power is with the buyers and not the sellers since we can make most of the previously rediculously priced items or mostly equivalent items. In the real world this would lead to bankruptcy of some of them main luna vendors, but in this game.... probably not. When one of the other posters was stating that this is a "war" he is fighting that "lasts months to years", where he is outcompeting people that sell cheaper than he does, I was about to jump through the screen... people like that single handedly F.U. this economy more than any other game mechanic, and they are proud of it. Well, thanks...

On a side note, and this is something i have always suspected, but now have confirmed: It is these price fixers that have done more damage to the economy than scripters. The scripters would script say a heartwood runic, the price for that item however was fixed by the luna vendors. They would buy it for say 10 mil and sell it for 20. Now, they not only screw over the people that play the game and don't script, they "encourage" two catagories of players to script more heartwood runics: those that can not afford 20 milion and those that encouraged by the rediculous prices continue to make more.... again, thanks!

That poster is me. It's the nature of the market. We are merchants. We usually don't gather the products our selves we buy them from others who does the work. In order for us to make profit we need to sell at a profit. If a lone vender sells below market price he got what he wanted he sold his product at the price he wanted to sell it and we bought it. But the only reason we bought it is to make a profit from it. the only way to make a profit from it is that he don't have anymore products to sell at the cheaper value. So we buy out all his items at the price he wanted to sell it. Then after he finish selling his stock we sell the item at the current market price established by the collective of venders. Win-Win.
if a customer wants the cheaper price he or she will have to compete with the rest of the resellers and need to be fast on the draw. We compete everyday and have mutual understanding of first come first serve. This gives us unlimited stock that we don't need to farm or waste time gathering our selfs. Those who gather-farm etc we consider as suppliers and they receive pure profit for there time.We however receive the difference between buying it and selling t which is always alot less than the supplier but we buy alot of the items and our time is freed up. I myself both supply and resell as I like to have everything covered. There are however those that continue to supply at lower rates which will do for a long time. This does bring the market down and fierce war between resellers,suppliers,lone merchants,alliance of merchants,dupers,scripters is waged.
Billions exchanging hands,outpricing,underpricing,outsupplying,undersupplying,prices fluctuating up and down, extreme conflicts between merchants,guilds joining forces with other guilds for the battle of the market, large & singular merchants placing there bets with variety of different tactics,etc.The ending results end in the final price of each battle even if the price is just a few gold pieces.
All this goes on daily and behind the eye of the average player which only see the price people are selling things at and only do the usual UO things. UO has a much more imersive playstyle behind closed doors.

 

[Tjalle]

I´m still curious. What items is he selling for 2M?

A PM will do just fine...

 

[Helfgrim]

If your goal is to maintain a 10million selling price on something, buy him out he gets what he wants, you get items to keep marking up 8 million to maintain your priceline. Its your choice and you can't fault a person for getting the price he wants for something. You as the consumer have a choice not to buy.

 

[Val-Tur]

While in some ways, I appreciate the sentiment, in others, I'm of the just get over it mindset. The only reason people charge some of the outlandish prices they do is because they have property in that little walled in section of Luna, which in turn is scanned and put online by certain websites - the only place one can find items for certain.

It's my opinion Luna vendors have done as much to hurt UO as any change ever made by the devs. Back in the "bad" old days, I used to enjoy taking my chances in Fel, searching out the vendors, as the best prices were always to be found there. If I ended up in a fight, so be it - that was the chance that was taken. Now there are so few traders there as to make it pointless. I stopped looking. The Britain x-roads was another hotspot. The only thing there now are the occasional Ettin and Mongbat. Now there is Luna and maybe 15-20 good vendor shops outside of Luna.

The real scam is in knowing that the guy selling bulk regs at 9-12gp per paid 2-3 per off of the faction vendors on the Fel side. Same with iron ore and boards. 1 million for 10 of what are basically foraged items (ML mined/chopped/fished stuff is a good example). The guy selling pieces of ancient pottery frags at 5k each... please. Anyone with 40-50 magery and a store bought horse can farm those, and some other SA items, all day long. The same stuff people in Luna are charging 10k each for.

So, in the view of one of those *average* players - one that seldom has more than 2-3 million gold on hand at any point, yet still manages to get done the things they want to get done, although it may take a little more effort, this falls into the cry me a river category. You Luna vendors made your beds out of sharpened nails. You're the ones that have to lay in them.

QFT.

Once upon a time, you could find popular items outside of Luna that were not subject to Luna insanity. For almost a year now on my shard, almost all of those nice large vendors and malls are gone and have not reopened.

Ask yourself why a crimmy's going rate is now on average 18 million on high population shards when 2 facts are clear. 1) there are a lot fewer players to buy them than when ML was new and they were 10-12 million for many months. 2) there are a LOT of them in game now. These are being farmed daily by solo templates. I did not say they dropped daily but the attempts are made daily by solo farmers. Lets not forget the Melissa event where people farmed her 24/7 and every few spawns someone claimed to get one. The answer? Luna and price fixing. The same thing with 120 sword or 120 mage scrolls. They jumped to 6-8 million, and 14-20 million on my shard AFTER it was made easier to make them via scroll binders. Now you cannot find a single 115 scroll for sale in the more popular scrolls.

The massive amount of gold in game has some effect as inflation has its effect. But heres the kicker to UO, a couple of years ago when EA announced that they had removed a couple hundred billion gold from the game, on my shard a number of items almost doubled in price thereafter. WTF?

In a real world supply & demand market where people care about balance, price fixing schemes are illegal. They are illegal because they destroy the buying power of the consumer and allows price cartels to dominate.

The economic situation in many MMO's and its manipulation by people who do nothing buy play at economics makes me very sad. The buyer in UO cannot often buy at reasonable prices due to the so called "merchant" players who go and buy out the reasonable priced items just to keep their price fixing schemes in place. I also share the personal opinion that the Luna market has had an overall negative effect and made price fixing/gouging "the normal" standard. There is and has been nothing balanced about the UO economy since sometime during the flood of Doom arties into Luna.

Oh and if someone wants to complain that it cost them 5 million to obtain an item they were hoping to sell for 10 million but were undercut - that's supposted to be part of the risk you must accept for playing at economics. The last time I logged into the game, I dont remember a Eula stating price gaurantee's for "merchant" playstyles.

 

[Tangled Metal]

what makes you so special? the prices and margins you are talking about are of an order of magnitude that any other person would take an increddible amout of time to obtain through game mechanics. Most people therefore rely on buying and selling to make a buck. Unfortunately, most of us that actually play the game don't have the milions and milions to create the margins and profits that you are able to create. Don't cry over your miscalculation publicly, it is silly. However, and I am with others on this one, i suspect that you are stealthily suggesting that someone is doing something very illegal like duping. Something that is indeed hard to proof, but quite likely if suddenly dozens of a previously very rare item start popping up. I will give you that.

I am not claiming to be special. 10 Mil gold is not that much at all. If you go to an EM Event and happen to be lucky enough or skilled enough to acquire an Event item, you could turn around and sell the item for upwards of 200 mil in a matter of minutes.

Just last week I was at an EM run event where I was able to loot 2 of the event items off of the corpse of the main baddie. And before you start saying loot scripter, all I did was open the corpse and loot all the items that I had rights to. The RNG was good to me. Another player looted one of the items as well. That person sold their item for 200 mil in gold and trade. Instant millionaire from attending an event and getting looting rights.

I traded my extra item for another rare event item. Now to some I have an item that is worth 200 Mil. I could easily sell it for that, probably more. I collect rares so I am keeping it. There were only 5 of the item which makes it more valuable. At the last event the RNG was not as kind to me and I did not get any items.

Some would say I did not work very hard for the 2 items I got last week. I will happily agree with that, but I did work for them. I paid 25 Mil for a Dread Warhorse and trained it up and was able to use it to get looting rights on the bosses. Now, someone could have just as easily come along and not get looting rights and wait until the corpse was lootable to anyone and pull an event item out. That happens all of the time.

There are ways to make gold that require very little work. Then there are merchants that follow trends and work to buy items to resell at a profit. That is not underhanded it is the basis of all economy. The person who made your $120 shoes did not get $120 for them. They probably made an hourly wage that would make you sick and quite sad.

Just because I capitalize on something does not make me the bad man. Nor does it make me the one that sets the price. I am not claiming illegality on the part of said player. Sometimes if is looks like a fish, sounds like a fish, feels like a fish, smells like a fish and tastes like a fish it is actually a duck. Although, those cases are really rare. Perhaps he just knew the hot spot to get the item and the secret to getting so many of them. Or perhaps like a good businessman he found someone else that was selling them for a substantial amount less than everyone else and bought a ton of them and decided to sell them cheaper than everyone else too! Not pointing fingers here saying that guy is a duper. I am just saying he is selling dozens of the same item at a severely reduced rate from everyone else.

 

[Sindris]

This thread kinda cracks me up. It reminds of when UO first started and i would sell my GM Archer suits for 1000 gold and people (other smiths) at the brit forge would freak out because the accepted price was 1500. I also sold ingots for less than what was normal at the time and people would gripe about that. One fellow who I would take great pleasure in naming (but won't) went so far as to tell me I was hurting his RL income because he sold some of the stuff I was making/farming for real cash. While I could empathize with his situation (NOT sympathize) my take on that line of argument has always been that people shouldn't make my entertainment their primary source of income. Or secondary for that matter.

What people failed to realize is that while I was making less per item I was selling, I was making bank in tips. Back when you had to actually hand over your stuff to be repaired, a good reputation was everything for a smith. People would form lines to get repairs from me, or wait until I came on line rather than give their stuff to another smith. It was a golden age for blacksmiths. But I am getting off topic...

When vendors first came into being and people still bought GM weapons for their primary hunting/pvp needs I remained competitive with other smiths. I would sell for a standard fee and offer discounts for bulk orders. I got more flack for that. It got to the point that the person I still won't name tried and failed to organize a boycott against my guild on Chessy, claiming I/we was/were hurting their incomes. He even caused a bit of havoc by creating a character with my name and dressed like I do and talking a lot of smack at the forge. It was THAT serious to him. It was THAT big a deal. All I was doing was playing a game.

In any event, I'm still here and that person is probably still in Texas wondering why women won't talk to him. And UO is still a game. People really do forget that sometimes I think.
(Myself included at times)

 

[Tjalle]

The massive amount of gold in game has some effect as inflation has its effect. But heres the kicker to UO, a couple of years ago when EA announced that they had removed a couple hundred billion gold from the game, on my shard a number of items almost doubled in price thereafter. WTF?

Try 15 trillions(!)...

 

[Thav12]

I understand the basics of economics just fine. Monopolizing the market through price fixing is illegal in most societies. You are mixing true value (ie labor, time, resource rarity) with perceived value due to these kind of monopoly issues. In your example, 5 mil of deaths and 2 months worth of trying would never lead to a 600K item in a free economy because either you would have bought it for 600K and not spent that time on it, or it would be worth a lot more. The only thing that escapes this kind of reasoning is art. The price of art is in the eye of the beholder, usually corrected by a rarity factor.

Your statement that we are out of balance is correct. We always have been. The only thing is that right now the power is with the buyers and not the sellers since we can make most of the previously rediculously priced items or mostly equivalent items. In the real world this would lead to bankruptcy of some of them main luna vendors, but in this game.... probably not. When one of the other posters was stating that this is a "war" he is fighting that "lasts months to years", where he is outcompeting people that sell cheaper than he does, I was about to jump through the screen... people like that single handedly F.U. this economy more than any other game mechanic, and they are proud of it. Well, thanks...

On a side note, and this is something i have always suspected, but now have confirmed: It is these price fixers that have done more damage to the economy than scripters. The scripters would script say a heartwood runic, the price for that item however was fixed by the luna vendors. They would buy it for say 10 mil and sell it for 20. Now, they not only screw over the people that play the game and don't script, they "encourage" two catagories of players to script more heartwood runics: those that can not afford 20 milion and those that encouraged by the rediculous prices continue to make more.... again, thanks!

That poster is me. It's the nature of the market. We are merchants. We usually don't gather the products our selves we buy them from others who does the work. In order for us to make profit we need to sell at a profit. If a lone vender sells below market price he got what he wanted he sold his product at the price he wanted to sell it and we bought it. But the only reason we bought it is to make a profit from it. the only way to make a profit from it is that he don't have anymore products to sell at the cheaper value. So we buy out all his items at the price he wanted to sell it. Then after he finish selling his stock we sell the item at the current market price established by the collective of venders. Win-Win.
if a customer wants the cheaper price he or she will have to compete with the rest of the resellers and need to be fast on the draw. We compete everyday and have mutual understanding of first come first serve. This gives us unlimited stock that we don't need to farm or waste time gathering our selfs. Those who gather-farm etc we consider as suppliers and they receive pure profit for there time.We however receive the difference between buying it and selling t which is always alot less than the supplier but we buy alot of the items and our time is freed up. I myself both supply and resell as I like to have everything covered.

And i applaud you for being a succesful business man. In a functional economy, you would be fine. Ultimately, the price is then dictated by the buyer of your products, the end consumer. In the example that is causing so much uproar, the OP is crying wolf that suddenly the supply is going up and that he realizes that a previous price level is dropping. In stead of letting the market be the market, a fixed price is assumed and maintained artificially. In that kind of situation the consumer does not dictate the final worth of a product anymore, it is the reseller.

Say I were to buy all the milk in the supermarket and then resell it for 2000 dollars per gallon. I would make sure I buy all the milk, and i keep track of that using a piece of software that covers essentially all usable vendor venues in a 500 mile radius. Then I would sell it to everybody for 2000 dollars and be rich. Is that good tactics or nasty abuse? Now, someone starts producing a lot more milk and sells it for cheap again, so much of it that I can't afford to buy it all any more. Is that sad for me, or good for all the mothers with little children?

In the real world, the price will come down because someone will sell milk for 1900 dollars, and then another for 1800 and so on, but in this artificial ultima world, it is essentially monopolized because of people like you keeping prices at a level that is understood amongst you guys, and the accumulated wealth amongst you makes it possible to buy up anything and store it up to years (your words). All other people just suffer like hungry babies, hungry for a little milk... (i enjoy the dramatic touch here ;-) )

 

[wanderer1origin]

can we all say in a group LOL AH LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

so tried under cut got burnt and come forums wine

and didnt offer rare wine for us

so sad i am for yah

 

[UOKaiser]

Mostly i don't know which item the poster is talking about. Im just helping with a explanation on motives and how things are usually played.

 

[HD2300]

QFT.

Once upon a time, you could find popular items outside of Luna that were not subject to Luna insanity. For almost a year now on my shard, almost all of those nice large vendors and malls are gone and have not reopened.

Ask yourself why a crimmy's going rate is now on average 18 million on high population shards when 2 facts are clear. 1) there are a lot fewer players to buy them than when ML was new and they were 10-12 million for many months. 2) there are a LOT of them in game now. These are being farmed daily by solo templates. I did not say they dropped daily but the attempts are made daily by solo farmers. Lets not forget the Melissa event where people farmed her 24/7 and every few spawns someone claimed to get one. The answer? Luna and price fixing. The same thing with 120 sword or 120 mage scrolls. They jumped to 6-8 million, and 14-20 million on my shard AFTER it was made easier to make them via scroll binders. Now you cannot find a single 115 scroll for sale in the more popular scrolls.

The massive amount of gold in game has some effect as inflation has its effect. But heres the kicker to UO, a couple of years ago when EA announced that they had removed a couple hundred billion gold from the game, on my shard a number of items almost doubled in price thereafter. WTF?

In a real world supply & demand market where people care about balance, price fixing schemes are illegal. They are illegal because they destroy the buying power of the consumer and allows price cartels to dominate.

The economic situation in many MMO's and its manipulation by people who do nothing buy play at economics makes me very sad. The buyer in UO cannot often buy at reasonable prices due to the so called "merchant" players who go and buy out the reasonable priced items just to keep their price fixing schemes in place. I also share the personal opinion that the Luna market has had an overall negative effect and made price fixing/gouging "the normal" standard. There is and has been nothing balanced about the UO economy since sometime during the flood of Doom arties into Luna.

Oh and if someone wants to complain that it cost them 5 million to obtain an item they were hoping to sell for 10 million but were undercut - that's supposted to be part of the risk you must accept for playing at economics. The last time I logged into the game, I dont remember a Eula stating price gaurantee's for "merchant" playstyles.

Because there is a lot of real life $$$ profit involved. Which is why some people do not want to see EA sell gold, because when EA realise how much profit there is in it which they can keep for themselves, they will take steps to stop gold and items sales for real life $$$.

 

[UOKaiser]

And i applaud you for being a succesful business man. In a functional economy, you would be fine. Ultimately, the price is then dictated by the buyer of your products, the end consumer. In the example that is causing so much uproar, the OP is crying wolf that suddenly the supply is going up and that he realizes that a previous price level is dropping. In stead of letting the market be the market, a fixed price is assumed and maintained artificially. In that kind of situation the consumer does not dictate the final worth of a product anymore, it is the reseller.

Say I were to buy all the milk in the supermarket and then resell it for 2000 dollars per gallon. I would make sure I buy all the milk, and i keep track of that using a piece of software that covers essentially all usable vendor venues in a 500 mile radius. Then I would sell it to everybody for 2000 dollars and be rich. Is that good tactics or nasty abuse? Now, someone starts producing a lot more milk and sells it for cheap again, so much of it that I can't afford to buy it all any more. Is that sad for me, or good for all the mothers with little children?

In the real world, the price will come down because someone will sell milk for 1900 dollars, and then another for 1800 and so on, but in this artificial ultima world, it is essentially monopolized because of people like you keeping prices at a level that is understood amongst you guys, and the accumulated wealth amongst you makes it possible to buy up anything and store it up to years (your words). All other people just suffer like hungry babies, hungry for a little milk... (i enjoy the dramatic touch here ;-) )

Sadly can't do that in real life or UO. There is always someone that can gather the milk. If it's 2 high nobody will buy it if it's 2 low everyone will wipe it clean. The goal is to make profit. Sell the milk or buy the cow. There is no one person or group of people that can hold the market. Like I explained before it's a constant battle between all these groups every day that dictates the market price. In essence the suppliers control what price they sell them to us for. We sell it according to overall value in the market which has being decided between these price,supply wars. If a dup comes well the market shows what happens to the prices. Neither suppliers or resellers can compete with them we have to rely on EA for that.

 

[Lord GOD(GOD)]

UO economy is centered on real life though. less of the item exist + harder to aquire+Higher demand = more expensive, more of a item+easier to aquire+low demand = cheaper the item. Just like real life. You might not sell for a loss but thats because there are people like me out there that keep the ingot price from hitting 1 gold piece and the leather price hitting 1mil per 100 pieces. If we bought all the items to resell at 100k each and thats our main product and everyone else is selling the item at 130k each so that we can make a 30k profit on each of then someone comes in selling the items at 90k. You can be sure they will be bought out immediately untill they can't supply anymore so that everyone can resell that item 130k again.
Changing product is usually not a option. I have enough supplies of certain products to last me years on my venders. Im not gonna just toss them all in the trash can if another cheap vender opens up. Im gonna handle the competition.

I don't agree.

 

[wanderer1origin]

think is a whine over sa imbuing items that you can farm and over time will get cheaper as demand for slacks and new tricks to getting imerges

ever a fail in long term

I´m still curious. What items is he selling for 2M?

A PM will do just fine...

 

[Thav12]

Sadly can't do that in real life or UO. There is always someone that can gather the milk. If it's 2 high nobody will buy it if it's 2 low everyone will wipe it clean. The goal is to make profit. Sell the milk or buy the cow. There is no one person or group of people that can hold the market. Like I explained before it's a constant battle between all these groups every day that dictates the market price. In essence the suppliers control what price they sell them to us for. We sell it according to overall value in the market which has being decided between these price,supply wars. If a dup comes well the market shows what happens to the prices. Neither suppliers or resellers can compete with them we have to rely on EA for that.

Only partly true. The battle you are describing is only taking place between a handful of merchants (monopoly) and the price is dictated by a perceived level, not a real one. But your points are well taken, and essentially you are saying the same thing I am. The problem is that with prices going up and up and up, without increase in true value of the item, you are describing what is called inflation. Due to massive inflation, most people in this kind of an economy are going to be disenfrenchised and can no longer buy the items or milk for that matter and loose control over the economy. That is why everyone is so afraid of out of control inflation in the real world.

Why is an item 18 milion? your answer is: because that is where the market has settled it out to be. My answer is: because that is where you decided the market has settled out to be. Difference is in the nuance. Most people that need that said item do not have the large amounts of gold you clearly have accumulated to influence the marked in any sort of way. in fact, you even said that you would outlast almost anyone, even if it would take you a year... ALl most people can do is buy gold from a merchant gold seller, or be lucky enough to get an item like that through routine gameplay. There is no real middle ground there...

 

[Tangled Metal]

The item in question is no longer spawning and has not spawned in quite some time. So there is no "fresh" supply of them to be had.

 

[UOKaiser]

Only partly true. The battle you are describing is only taking place between a handful of merchants (monopoly) and the price is dictated by a perceived level, not a real one. But your points are well taken, and essentially you are saying the same thing I am. The problem is that with prices going up and up and up, without increase in true value of the item, you are describing what is called inflation. Due to massive inflation, most people in this kind of an economy are going to be disenfrenchised and can no longer buy the items or milk for that matter and loose control over the economy. That is why everyone is so afraid of out of control inflation in the real world.

Why is an item 18 milion? your answer is: because that is where the market has settled it out to be. My answer is: because that is where you decided the market has settled out to be. Difference is in the nuance. Most people that need that said item do not have the large amounts of gold you clearly have accumulated to influence the marked in any sort of way. in fact, you even said that you would outlast almost anyone, even if it would take you a year... ALl most people can do is buy gold from a merchant gold seller, or be lucky enough to get an item like that through routine gameplay. There is no real middle ground there...

I do outlast most but when I can't handle somethign i do need to call in for support usually if i spend so much in a matter of days and my funds are low. There have being times I've emptied my venders out with not more than 500k to my name buying peoples products over a course of time. Then regained all my gold back and then some after they ran out of supplies. In reality i can't very well tell every vender in all the shards to start selling orny for 30mil. the market doesn't support it. If every single major vender bought all the ornis of every shard out and they stop giving faction orny and everyone decided to sell tehm for 30 mil I have to say doom will be 24/7 full again with people getting there own or getting extra to sell. Market just don't support it.
At this point the prices on mostly every item i believe is too cheap for the amount of work it takes to get them. Which mean theres a overbudunce and lower demand for these products.

I prefer higher rates especially for newbie merchants who actually want to make gold and catch up to the rest of us. It's taking them a longer amount of time these days when the highest items could only be sold for a few million compared to a few years ago these same items were in the 10's of millions.
I feel for them. Though my fellow merchants would disagree with me as they prefer it this way. They already made there gold and now they can afford alot more these days than they were able to before. Which is why this UO economy is messed up. There is alot more gold out there and yet items are the cheapest they ever being I don't know what to call this a inflation of gold and deflation of goods?

 

[UOKaiser]

The item in question is no longer spawning and has not spawned in quite some time. So there is no "fresh" supply of them to be had.

Why you gonna make us guess lol. The redeemer?

 

[Thav12]

Only partly true. The battle you are describing is only taking place between a handful of merchants (monopoly) and the price is dictated by a perceived level, not a real one. But your points are well taken, and essentially you are saying the same thing I am. The problem is that with prices going up and up and up, without increase in true value of the item, you are describing what is called inflation. Due to massive inflation, most people in this kind of an economy are going to be disenfrenchised and can no longer buy the items or milk for that matter and loose control over the economy. That is why everyone is so afraid of out of control inflation in the real world.

Why is an item 18 milion? your answer is: because that is where the market has settled it out to be. My answer is: because that is where you decided the market has settled out to be. Difference is in the nuance. Most people that need that said item do not have the large amounts of gold you clearly have accumulated to influence the marked in any sort of way. in fact, you even said that you would outlast almost anyone, even if it would take you a year... ALl most people can do is buy gold from a merchant gold seller, or be lucky enough to get an item like that through routine gameplay. There is no real middle ground there...

I do outlast most but when I can't handle somethign i do need to call in for support usually if i spend so much in a matter of days and my funds are low. There have being times I've emptied my venders out with not more than 500k to my name buying peoples products over a course of time. Then regained all my gold back and then some after they ran out of supplies. In reality i can't very well tell every vender in all the shards to start selling orny for 30mil. the market doesn't support it. If every single major vender bought all the ornis of every shard out and they stop giving faction orny and everyone decided to sell tehm for 30 mil I have to say doom will be 24/7 full again with people getting there own or getting extra to sell. Market just don't support it.
At this point the prices on mostly every item i believe is too cheap for the amount of work it takes to get them. Which mean theres a overbudunce and lower demand for these products.

I prefer higher rates especially for newbie merchants who actually want to make gold and catch up to the rest of us. It's taking them a longer amount of time these days when the highest items could only be sold for a few million compared to a few years ago these same items were in the 10's of millions.
I feel for them. Though my fellow merchants would disagree with me as they prefer it this way. They already made there gold and now they can afford alot more these days than they were able to before. Which is why this UO economy is messed up. There is alot more gold out there and yet items are the cheapest they ever being I don't know what to call this a inflation of gold and deflation of goods?

I appreciate the thoughtful post above. You and I don't differ much in opinion actually. Just a different sized UO wallet and our points are reasoned from our own perspectives. Don't know any sort of solution for this problem, at least not off the cuff.