Collapsing the Wave Pacer market

Solandri - Heavens Tear

Amy_Nailo - Lost City wrote: »

Your argument is totally flawed because of this

What if someone DECIDES to pay 100k for a wave pacer because he values the dull claw at 20k each ? 20k X 5 = 100k, plus the time he would need to buy the dull claw. 20k is too much ?

If it's so hard for him to acquire dull claws that he values them at more than 20k/ea, then buying the wave pacer for 100k is a better alternative for him than finding the dull claws to do the quest. And there is no problem.

I doubt you'll find someone who thinks dull claws are that difficult to find. But if you did, then he would think 100k is a great deal for wave pacers. The person may still be ignorant about the quest (which was why I view 100k wave paces as a scam), but it's a moot point in your hypothetical case since even if he knew about the quest he would still prefer to buy the wave pacer for 100k.

My beef with the 100k wave pacers (and 2.9k crafting materials) is that the price is predicated on ignorance. The buyer thinks he's getting a good deal, but when he later finds out about the quest or the cash shop, he realizes it wasn't a good deal. An informed buyer (and informed seller) are essential to a properly functioning and efficient free market. And I consider transactions based on keeping a buyer or seller uninformed to be scams.

You just said you have no right to judge a transaction you're not a part of.

I'm not judging any transaction I'm not a part of (outside of fraudulent scams), you are. If a buyer and seller are happy with a transaction, who am I to argue? If you don't like the high price and refuse to buy, who am I to argue. I'm not saying they shouldn't buy at those high prices, and I'm not saying that you should buy at those high prices.

You on the other hand are saying two people who voluntarily agree to a deal shouldn't be making that deal.

EDIT: Another quote from you again to prove my point

Nobody is saying you have to pay those prices. If you value your time so little, you don't have to pay those prices.

Lemme try to explain that again, since apparently it's not as self-explanatory as I thought it'd be.

Some people will put a higher price on their time. Some people will put a lower price on their time. Someone who puts a high price on their time will be willing to pay a higher price for those dull claws. You, as someone who puts a low price on your time, see that and shake your head in disbelief. You are applying your standards and values to someone else's decisions, when obviously that someone else felt it was a good decision based on his standards and values. That is *WRONG*. You have to judge his decisions using his standards and values, not yours.

If I set a high price* and you refuse to pay it, I don't judge and criticize you for refusing to pay those prices. It's your decision to make, and I respect your freedom to decide not to buy at those prices.

Yet if someone willingly pays that high price, you judge and criticize their decision to buy, and you criticize me for selling. It's our decision to make, not yours, but you don't respect our freedom to make that decision.

*I should probably point out that I don't set my prices that high. In fact my buy and sell prices are set so the person I'm buying from makes about as much money from each item as I do. Personal philosophy. I do this because it's my shop, and I'm free to set the prices as I see fit. Just as I don't want others to dictate to me how I should set my prices (buying or selling), I'm not going to dictate to others how they should set their prices (buying or selling).

The world does not revolve around you and your set of values. Each person has their own set of valuations and makes decisions based on those. Just because you view a deal to be unbalanced does not mean everyone else must obey your opinion and also find it to be unbalanced.

Solandri - Heavens Tear

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary wrote: »

Interesting! But I really can't take any credit for setting the price.

My price started at 5000, but I kept having to raise it in order to lower demand because I kept selling out almost right away.

That's been my experience as well. I'm notoriously cheap, and initially set my selling prices low to reflect what I thought was "fair" (i.e. prices I would buy at). The result was I sold out almost immediately and my shop (which advertised a variety of items) was left with only one or two items for sale. My selling price was so low that I was having trouble buying enough items to keep it stocked even if I cut my margin to a razor-thin amount.

So basically to keep inventory in stock so a customer has my full selection to choose from, I was forced to raise prices to keep things from selling out faster than I could replace them. That was an eye-opening experience for me. When I started, I (naively) thought that since it was my shop, I'd be able to set the prices however I wanted. But the market dictated that I set my prices closer to true market value if I wanted to keep the shop open. The market ultimately controls the price, not me.

I have the buy and sell prices tweaked now so that I gain new items to sell at approximately the same rate I sell them. I'll still make minor adjustments to counteract slight fluctuations in my inventory, but those are usually adjustments of 250 or less. It's been quite an educational lesson on how free market prices assert themselves on the participants.

Purra_Pearl - Sanctuary

FoxRunning - Heavens Tear wrote: »

i've never understood why anyone would buy the beginner manta from any shop, since it can be gotten down the road at BB for $10k....

The replacement wavepacer costs 20k coins. You can sell it back to an NPC for 10k.

Purra_Pearl - Sanctuary

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary wrote: »

Heck, my "no life" skillz are so 1337 that my girlfriend wanted a -*ahem*- different kind of roleplaying last night, and you know what it was? Yup: big bad Barbarian and naughty naughty Venomancer.

People say that we Venomancers like to flirt with every handsome man we meet, but they don't understand that it's the guy who always talks to us first. b:chuckle

You're the naughty one. b:dirty

Bobncut - Sanctuary

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary wrote: »

My price started at 5000, but I kept having to raise it in order to lower demand because I kept selling out almost right away. At 10000 there's a big psychological barrier that slows sales down, so 9750 seemed to be about the limit.

After I got a large supply and didn't need to worry about selling out I even tried lowering prices to increase volume, but what I found was that volume did not increase enough to offset the reduced profit per Claw sold.

So, like economic theory would predict for any seller with a bit of market power, you explored the demand curve and found the point that maximized profits. The part I find most interesting about this is that the in-game demand curve appears to also be quite rational since the price point you reached seems to be just about the break-even point for a rational customer. I guess I can rest easy now knowing that most people playing this game are rational despite a vocal minority on the forums.

Starchief - Sanctuary

Omfg this guy cant be serious...

MissEbil - Heavens Tear

Man, this shizzle is still going?
BWAHAHAHAHA get over it and save up people!

Solandri - Heavens Tear

Bobncut - Sanctuary wrote: »

So, like economic theory would predict for any seller with a bit of market power, you explored the demand curve and found the point that maximized profits. The part I find most interesting about this is that the in-game demand curve appears to also be quite rational since the price point you reached seems to be just about the break-even point for a rational customer. I guess I can rest easy now knowing that most people playing this game are rational despite a vocal minority on the forums.

It's not so much that people are rational, but that the system is stable. I'd go into more detail but then this would digress into a lecture on the Laplace domain and how it allows you to distinguish between a stable and unstable dynamic systems. The simple version is that if the demand curve and the supply curve are continuous, if you plot them, they must intersect at one point. Prices will naturally gravitate towards that point.