Are the out of control mat prices affecting your crafting???

erliesc

Nestor wrote: »

Every Crafting Related event spikes prices on in demand materials. They always float down after the event is over.

This only affects the unprepared or newer player who has not built up a stock.

To insulate your self, just buy a couple of stacks of the mats you will use before the next event, which should be the Anniversery event. And, even then, you should only need cloth, other mats are self sustaining or a net gain.

Disagree. IF the more or less *ncompetant people who run this game would use a standard deviation limit on prices...the extremes would be avoided. There would be much less chance of any player affecting prices and profiting from "price fixing games" Prices would and could still move but would only reflect the general demand....not somebodies get rich quick scheme.

I think the price issues are now affecting guild trader prices as those who profited are starting to hog the guild trader spots?

It's real wonderful that some can anticipate price moves due to "events" and all...very clever...but not if it trashes the overall pricing system....and the game.

The issue is just a PITA for me...since I have enough game gold to get thru it. But it just ruins the game for newer players who now learn that they can't trust the pricing system...and can't get ahead because of it.

katanagirl1

The other thing that really stinks is you use 12 hardwood, or 12 hardwood and 12 bast I think for the military stretcher (and maybe even regulus), and only get 1 writ voucher. That is a terrible return on your investment. Furnishing mats are the hardest ones to obtain in the game.

Tatanko

erliesc wrote: »

But it just ruins the game for newer players who now learn that they can't trust the pricing system...and can't get ahead because of it.

I'm really not sure what you're trying to say here. There is no "pricing system" -- it's a free market, and new players have the same exact opportunities I did when I began playing two years ago, perhaps more.

Nestor

Spend all the time harvesting Bugloss rather than shopping for it and this issue goes away.

It is one of the easiest reagents to see from a distance too

Nestor

katanagirl1 wrote: »

The other thing that really stinks is you use 12 hardwood, or 12 hardwood and 12 bast I think for the military stretcher (and maybe even regulus), and only get 1 writ voucher. That is a terrible return on your investment. Furnishing mats are the hardest ones to obtain in the game.

Which is exactly why Furniture Writs are not offered outside of a certain event each year. All other crafting writs are either a net gain on mats or a near break even (cloth for the most part)

Your doing these furniture writs for an Achievement. Would it be better if furniture writs paid an Event Ticket of some kind? Probably.

LadySinflower

Only to a very small extent. I usually farm what I need but occasionally I run out of something. One of my favorite potions uses powdered mother of pearl which is a royal pain to farm. Would be nice if it wasn't so expensive. Another favorite potion uses blue entomola. Not quite as bad to harvest but I would still rather not pay so much for the convenience of buying a few.

bmnoble

erliesc wrote: »

Nestor wrote: »

Every Crafting Related event spikes prices on in demand materials. They always float down after the event is over.

This only affects the unprepared or newer player who has not built up a stock.

To insulate your self, just buy a couple of stacks of the mats you will use before the next event, which should be the Anniversery event. And, even then, you should only need cloth, other mats are self sustaining or a net gain.

Disagree. IF the more or less *ncompetant people who run this game would use a standard deviation limit on prices...the extremes would be avoided. There would be much less chance of any player affecting prices and profiting from "price fixing games" Prices would and could still move but would only reflect the general demand....not somebodies get rich quick scheme.

I think the price issues are now affecting guild trader prices as those who profited are starting to hog the guild trader spots?

It's real wonderful that some can anticipate price moves due to "events" and all...very clever...but not if it trashes the overall pricing system....and the game.

The issue is just a PITA for me...since I have enough game gold to get thru it. But it just ruins the game for newer players who now learn that they can't trust the pricing system...and can't get ahead because of it.

New players start broke like everyone else who started playing the game, they have to learn how to make gold and save it like everyone else had to, you can't expect to start the game being able to afford everything on the guild traders in a few days.

Quite a few players get sucked into the housing side of the game before they have any gold to spend then complain about the prices of stuff, housing is intended to be a gold sink, for when you reach the point of having more gold than you know what to do with, if you try to do it before you learn to make gold your always going to be broke.


As for Trade guilds most of the big ones can hold onto their spots just fine with or without the extra sales tax from events, a lot of sellers may have made extra gold supplying the furniture mats at high prices, that does not mean they all upped their donations to their trade guilds, only half the sales tax generated goes into the guild banks.


Its a free market, players set their prices based on what their competition puts the same items up for, its no good putting an item up for a million gold and expecting someone to come along and buy it when 100 other people are selling the same thing for 100K for example, people either match that 100K or undercut it hoping to sell their items first.

Your not forced to buy anything on guild traders, people put up an item at X price its take it or leave it. You don't like it visit another store or farm what you need yourself.

If they added fixed values you could put items up for in the guild traders, all that would happen is people would either sell directly in zone at what they feel the item is worth or stop farming the mats at all as they feel the fixed value is not worth the time they spent farming to sell the mats to someone else.

And a fixed value does not stop a rich player buying out the entire stock and selling in zone at the higher rate, if anything it makes it even easier for them to buy out everything that people have listed at the fixed price.

mague

Anotherone773 wrote: »

In capitalism, which is what the game economy runs on

Are you sure ?

Capitalism preaches a selfregulating market. The best product for the best price wins. All others vanish. This has nothing to do with price rigging and fraud. Price rigging is actually anti-capitalistic.

It is really sad to put capitalism into the illegal corner. It is just an economic system like some others.

Dusk_Coven

erliesc wrote: »

In case you haven't noticed mat and other prices are being manipulated way out of a reasonable range.

Player 1 sells something at a real high price to player 2...while player 2 sells something at an equally high price to player 1. They come out even...price of a mat goes way up.

Not sure I understand here. Are you talking about manipulating the prices people pull up on Master Merchant? By doing this they tweak the last sale price, thereby suggesting it to be a viable price to post? Seems like a rather tricky thing to do since TTC would show the price is outside the range of what's currently posted.

erliesc

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

erliesc wrote: »

In case you haven't noticed mat and other prices are being manipulated way out of a reasonable range.

Player 1 sells something at a real high price to player 2...while player 2 sells something at an equally high price to player 1. They come out even...price of a mat goes way up.

Not sure I understand here. Are you talking about manipulating the prices people pull up on Master Merchant? By doing this they tweak the last sale price, thereby suggesting it to be a viable price to post? Seems like a rather tricky thing to do since TTC would show the price is outside the range of what's currently posted.

For price fixers:

* buy all of a couple of mats for the least cost you can...try to corner the market...
* collude with another player to hike the price of this mat and one other buy selling a good bit of each to the other player at high prices...they both come out even
* the price of both go up
* when the prices are up enough...you unload at much higher prices...you've cornered the market.
* helps if you time this to some "demand event"...

The avg price in MM will only go up slowly and if it's not the right mat you might not affect the avg price that much.

You can easily see this on some price charts...some have very steady prices over say 2 months...others have people now asking 2-3xs the avg price before manipulation starts. Some probably do this just to see the interesting charts and just to see if they can do it.

For me it just ruins the pretty charts...LOL.

Here's how the pros (?) do it....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornering_the_market

Maybe the "govt" will step in and stop this evil...then we get our nice charts back....

Royaji

erliesc wrote: »

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

erliesc wrote: »

In case you haven't noticed mat and other prices are being manipulated way out of a reasonable range.

Player 1 sells something at a real high price to player 2...while player 2 sells something at an equally high price to player 1. They come out even...price of a mat goes way up.

Not sure I understand here. Are you talking about manipulating the prices people pull up on Master Merchant? By doing this they tweak the last sale price, thereby suggesting it to be a viable price to post? Seems like a rather tricky thing to do since TTC would show the price is outside the range of what's currently posted.

For price fixers:

* buy all of a couple of mats for the least cost you can...try to corner the market...
* collude with another player to hike the price of this mat and one other buy selling a good bit of each to the other player at high prices...they both come out even
* the price of both go up
* when the prices are up enough...you unload at much higher prices...you've cornered the market.
* helps if you time this to some "demand event"...

The avg price in MM will only go up slowly and if it's not the right mat you might not affect the avg price that much.

You can easily see this on some price charts...some have very steady prices over say 2 months...others have people now asking 2-3xs the avg price before manipulation starts. Some probably do this just to see the interesting charts and just to see if they can do it.

For me it just ruins the pretty charts...LOL.

Here's how the pros (?) do it....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornering_the_market

Maybe the "govt" will step in and stop this evil...then we get our nice charts back....

Or you can... not use MM. It's just a 3rd party addon.

Asardes

In a fragmented market, like ESO Guilds Stores, cornering is something that's hard to do in practice. You can drain a few guilds at most, but it's next to impossible to visit every kiosk individually and purchase all available materials and then unload at much higher prices later, without racing to the bottom again, due to competition from newly farmed materials. You can maybe do it for items that are available only on specific dates, like seasonal motif pages, but crafting materials are available all year round. And even for the former I've seen plenty of failures, where for example people bought dozens of Worm Cult gold books or even motif pages, thinking they will be able to sell much higher at a later date, but ended up not even being able to match the purchase price months later, when they did try to sell. So there's a high risk trying to "pump and dump" even rare items, let alone common crafting materials you can find a dozen in half an hour just casually collecting nodes as you go.

erliesc

Thought I'd look at the price history for most of the mats that have risen in price lately....while the history is still there.

Facts: Most are Furnishing Mats...

There one where there is at least an attempt is Hemming (Clothing mat) which has gone from ~18 to 22 recently. On a chart you can see a series of BUYs at 60 ~ 3xs the original avg. Continuing.

Bast...orig avg = 14-15 current avg = 77 5.5xs the price

Regulus...orig avg = 12 current avg = 50 4.15xs the price

Dec wax...orig avg = 280 current avg = 313 1.1xs the price

Heartwood...orig avg = 30 current avg = 271 9xs the price

So WHEN are these prices going to magically drop back to their original prices as some predict??? When those who've cornered the market run out of stock???

In the meantime many are paying out way too much for mats....

Makes no difference if someone is using MM or other addon...prices are prices you know.....;-)

tmbrinks

erliesc wrote: »

Thought I'd look at the price history for most of the mats that have risen in price lately....while the history is still there.

Facts: Most are Furnishing Mats...

There one where there is at least an attempt is Hemming (Clothing mat) which has gone from ~18 to 22 recently. On a chart you can see a series of BUYs at 60 ~ 3xs the original avg. Continuing.

Bast...orig avg = 14-15 current avg = 77 5.5xs the price

Regulus...orig avg = 12 current avg = 50 4.15xs the price

Dec wax...orig avg = 280 current avg = 313 1.1xs the price

Heartwood...orig avg = 30 current avg = 271 9xs the price

So WHEN are these prices going to magically drop back to their original prices as some predict??? When those who've cornered the market run out of stock???

In the meantime many are paying out way too much for mats....

Makes no difference if someone is using MM or other addon...prices are prices you know.....;-)

Didn't like the responses you got in general... so you post it here.

There is no conspiracy, there is no "secret cartel", none of that.

They are simply high because of demand from New Life festival writs, and the prices are slowing coming down.

Banana

No. I have plenty from years of collecting myself

Kombinator

Anotherone773 wrote: »

In capitalism, which is what the game economy runs on, something is only worth whatever someone else is willing to pay for it. So while things may be priced higher than you find acceptable, there may be others who will pay that price.

Wrong. There ARE others who will pay that price. If there aren't, then no point selling for that price.

From SWTOR i can tell, that the auction house is the big money maker. Since gona come back serious for a time i think i'm going to apply to a trading guild. If you sell a bunch pile of materials as well, then the high price will not matter. Unlike in real life you can't get bullied for going below the competition.

So if you get a bunch of materials from gathering, and then sell below slightly the cheapest, then they can't do anything about it. And if you sell stuff for big money, then it won't matter, if others do as well. Inflation also a factor. Whenever you finish a quest, or sell something to vendor, then money is generated into the game. Because of this more, and more money is present in the game, and that means each gold worth less on the player market.

Asardes

The prices have jumped up a bit lately because of the free ESO+ trial. People who don't sub have raced to fill their craft bag before it ends, since once you lose the subscription you can't put more materials in, but you can get them out of there. Sold some surplus rubedo leather at MM +30% last week

Inaya

All this talk of collusion, price fixing makes me laugh sooooo hard. I enjoy farming mats, it's very relaxing after a long day at work and a hellish commute. I will sell my things for what the market will bear and IF you don't like the prices things are being sold for there is an entire WORLD full of mats that are free!

You can't have it both ways. You are in complete control over what you pay for mats - store cost or free.

Austacker

xWarbrain wrote: »

The cost of Bugloss is killing me on XboxNA server.

People go around to all the guild traders for weeks, buy up a certain reagent, horde it, then list a ton of it at a high price when its harder to come by. The people that do this play the economy side of the game. They log in, travel from guild trader to guild trader buying it all up while getting an idea of the market Tamriel-wide for specific items. They buy low and sell high.

Bugloss might be the rarest reagent in guild traders in the past 4-5 months. Its hard to find at any price, let alone a reasonable price. The tri-pot struggle is real.

You see an issue there, I see an opportunity.

'Quality' doesn't differ on materials. So you farming the stuff yourself and selling to undercut them creates a pretty straight forward opportunity.

Don't get locked into making gold by doing X and X only.

You need to be fluid and assess the market conditions, plan appropriately and sense your opportunities as they come.

In this situation, I'd be getting out there and farming the mats myself - not to create the pots, but to sell the mats raw!

Asardes

I compared the prices for materials with prices for potions and glyphs. The profit margin is very low to begin with, maybe ~5%, but the latter take way longer to sell, and also they will sell less often above MM price, so I just sell the reagents and runes separately. Reagents as stacks of 50 since you make a stack of potions out of it and also the price of any given stack is not very high, so it's convenient for the buyer, Kuta in stacks of 5 since, other ones in full stacks of 200 since they're cheap.

thadjarvis

Arbitrage of the spatial prices in ESO can cause some odd pricing but supply and demand should still be the primary drivers.

Eg alchemy mat prices is strongly driven by change in players guzzling potions / players farming mats. During events farmers probably turn their attention to farming event stuff while at the same there are more players active guzzling potions.

erliesc

2/11/20 Price Gouging Report:


Bast...orig avg = 14-15 current avg = 77... 5.5xs the price...74...5.1xs the price

Regulus...orig avg = 12 current avg = 50 ...4.15xs the price...48...4xs the price

Dec wax...orig avg = 280 current avg = 313 ...1.1xs the price...no real issue...

Heartwood...orig avg = 30 current avg = 271 ...9xs the price...267...8.9xs the price

Hemming...orig avg = 18 current avg = 22.5 ...1.25xs the price...22.5...1.25xs the price...no real issue...

Pitch...orig avg = 90 current avg = ?? ...??xs the price...124...1.4xs the price

Honing Stone...orig avg = 20 current avg = ?? ...??xs the price...27...1.35xs the price


Of the things I try to sell...I cannot find much of anything to make and sell where the craft cost is below 2000...seems that with most furniture etc.the craft cost has increased by 2-3xs or so.

The people running this game have allowed or caused the game economy to be severely stressed if not destroyed.

Trying to discourage crafting and move the game over to run and slash? Want to sell more furniture?

At any rate...LOOK OUT BELOW...THEM PRICES ARE FALLING FAST!!!

tmbrinks

Dude... please stop. If you don't like the prices, go farm yourself. But stop with the conspiracy theories.

erliesc

tmbrinks wrote: »

Dude... please stop. If you don't like the prices, go farm yourself. But stop with the conspiracy theories.

Reality is not conspiracy.

Taleof2Cities

erliesc wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

Dude... please stop. If you don't like the prices, go farm yourself. But stop with the conspiracy theories.

Reality is not conspiracy.

As in the reality that you’re just not interested in being self-sustaining for farming mats?

wolfie1.0.

erliesc wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

Dude... please stop. If you don't like the prices, go farm yourself. But stop with the conspiracy theories.

Reality is not conspiracy.

Tmbanks is one of the authors of one of the best mat farming and crafting projects in eso imo. And he shows his work. I recommend you check it out. As far as your pricing examples you dont even show where you are getting you data from. No sever info is present. Also if you are using MM and dont like what you see in your history or prices then talk to you guilds or change guilds. MM only pulls from those sources...

Also the best way to lower prices in ESO is simply for more people to go out and farm. It's time or gold in eso. If you dont want th shell out the gold for another persons time then make the time yourself.

tmbrinks

Hmm... other than heartwood (which I NEVER saw for anywhere close to 30g a piece before the event)... my prices are like 20-30% lower than yours. (and... I'm actually sharing screenshots )

You also realize that items like Pitch, Honing Stones, Dreugh Wax, Potent Nirn, etc... are all going up because people are actually crafting a new set... New Moon's Acolyte, so they're using more of those sets as well... right?

Or... you can continue to believe that there's this big conspiracy going around... or it's just supply and demand, and people are realizing that they were selling Bast/Regulus/Heartwood for stupid cheap, since they are not really that easy to farm (they don't drop from surveys)

Tatanko

erliesc wrote: »

The people running this game have allowed or caused the game economy to be severely stressed if not destroyed.

Just quoting this for posterity. You're too funny.

Imryll

No, but then I do my own farming (and rarely sell "extras"). New players can do this as well. If you have a high need for mats, but consider your time too valuable to spend it farming, then you're stuck paying for someone else's time, someone else who probably views their time as being as valuable as yours.

erliesc

My charts go back at least 90 days (2xs 45) and they are now set to 120 days....though the data hasn't caught up yet.

45 days catches only the more recent data.

A different set of guilds would show different prices.

Too many are up de Nile...please get in your boats...come back to reality!

I do a lot of farming and usually don't buy that much unless needed for some project...do depend on good charts for price data. I rarely if ever pay over the avg price for anything...EXCEPT that the avg price for the above mats is not actually what I'd consider a true average. Which is the value of having longer term charts...I can see what the avg really is...not what denialists think it is...or should be.

I have no real issue with people overpaying for mats if that's what they want to do...denialists SHOULD pay more?

I will wait to see if prices come back to reality....meantime with my SUPERDUPER charts I will pay a fair value. LOL.