Undercutting people by 1 copper

ladyvengeance · 09-17-2007, 10:12 PM

I'm a level 38 tailor, and as such I craft a lot. It's how I make most of my money. When selling items, I deal with people trying to undercut me and that's fine - it's all part of the game and I really don't mind it too much. The thing that annoys the hell out of me are the people who undercut me by 1 copper. These miserly idiots think by undercutting me by such a miniscule amount that they'll maximize their profit. Whenever I buy stuff off the broker, if I see someone undercut another person by 1 measly copper, I buy from the other guy out of principle. I urge all of you to do the same in order to counter this childish behavior.

Calthine · 09-17-2007, 10:17 PM

I think you'll find there's a large population of players who won't buy from the 1c undercutters, lol.

Guy De Alsace · 09-17-2007, 10:22 PM

I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp.

Makes my teeth grind.

ladyvengeance · 09-17-2007, 10:34 PM

Guy De Alsace wrote:

I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp.
Makes my teeth grind.

Yeah that annoys me as well, although if it's a good rare master I'll just buy it off them and sell them both for 3pp. I've made loads of money that way. People who put fabled items up and undercut me by as much as 10pp. Just buy them and sell them at a higher cost.

greenmantle · 09-17-2007, 10:35 PM

Its rude childish and hmm i think ive grouped with a few of them SMILEY

Like calth i buy from the even priced person not the 1c undercutter

Jrral · 09-17-2007, 11:12 PM

Guy De Alsace wrote:

I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp.

My attitude on it is "If you're going to undercut, then by the gods undercut!". If I don't think something's worth 3p, I'm not going to waste time pulling the price down 1g, or even 10g, at a time.

Cadori Seraphim · 09-17-2007, 11:32 PM

Yeah I wont buy from those who undercut 1copper lol thats just rude.

Vatec · 09-17-2007, 11:39 PM

Depends on the item. Harvestables, every penny counts as a seller or a buyer. Big ticket items, I generally price to match the lowest and then drop the price by 10% (rounded as needed) every couple of days until it sells. I never, ever match someone who undercuts me, though I'll occasionally buy one of them out. If I kept trying to match or beat other players' prices, I'd be doing nothing but standing at the broker all day....And yes, I am sometimes mystified by other players' pricing "strategies." Carbonite clusters are selling for 20sp. All of a sudden, someone will dump 300 on the market for 10sp. What on earth are they thinking? 19sp, sure. 15sp, maybe. But 10sp? Are they operating out of some misguided desire to help out the "little guy" or something? *shrug*

Josgar · 09-17-2007, 11:49 PM

Whats wrong with undercutting? Especially if you are selling only one of them. I dont want the item and want to get rid of it, I sell it. The end. If I wanted to I could bloody sell it for a copper. I dont see what the big deal is. Its supply, demand, and somewhat marketing rolled into one that makes the economy flow. I however am more likely to buy from people who have more than one of them. More convenient for a stack.

Soefoe · 09-18-2007, 12:58 AM

Josgar wrote:

Whats wrong with undercutting? Especially if you are selling only one of them. I dont want the item and want to get rid of it, I sell it. The end. If I wanted to I could bloody sell it for a copper. I dont see what the big deal is. Its supply, demand, and somewhat marketing rolled into one that makes the economy flow. I however am more likely to buy from people who have more than one of them. More convenient for a stack.

Its just plain "RUDE"....I am now getting into the Adept III spells and some of them require very rare components to make...I spend ALL weekend farming components for these spells and put them in the broker at a price to compensate for my TIME/EFFORT and Lost XP and when I make a rare spell that I feel is worth 15 gold in the broker I don't want to see some idiot listing it for 20 silver. (which is exactly what happened to me last week)

Menji · 09-18-2007, 01:31 AM

Soefoe wrote:

Josgar wrote:
Whats wrong with undercutting? Especially if you are selling only one of them. I dont want the item and want to get rid of it, I sell it. The end. If I wanted to I could bloody sell it for a copper. I dont see what the big deal is. Its supply, demand, and somewhat marketing rolled into one that makes the economy flow. I however am more likely to buy from people who have more than one of them. More convenient for a stack.
Its just plain "RUDE"....I am now getting into the Adept III spells and some of them require very rare components to make...I spend ALL weekend farming components for these spells and put them in the broker at a price to compensate for my TIME/EFFORT and Lost XP and when I make a rare spell that I feel is worth 15 gold in the broker I don't want to see some idiot listing it for 20 silver. (which is exactly what happened to me last week)

Well look at it this way, they did you a favor, you buy them out and list it for 15 gold and go xp'ing.

Thuriel · 09-18-2007, 01:40 AM

There's nothing wrong with undercutting by 1cp. It's done in the real world. Echoes of Faydwer sells fo $39.99 instead of $40.

The problem is that those who undercut by 1cp don't know how to do it properly. The undercut is done more for psychological impact than offering actual savings. For example $9.99 has a big impact versus $10 since people tend to just see $9 and consider it a lower pricing tier. $11.99 versus $12 has very little impact since people think they're in the same pricing tier.

In the game, unless you take broker fees into account, the 1cp undercutting strategy falls flat and just looks rude and stupid.

Hamervelder · 09-18-2007, 01:53 AM

ladyvengeance wrote:

Guy De Alsace wrote:
I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp.
Makes my teeth grind.
Yeah that annoys me as well, although if it's a good rare master I'll just buy it off them and sell them both for 3pp. I've made loads of money that way. People who put fabled items up and undercut me by as much as 10pp. Just buy them and sell them at a higher cost.

I don't mean to insult you in any way, but I really hate it when you folks sell fabled items for an arm and a leg. Most fabled stuff that is tradeable is the lower-end stuff, and takes relatively little effort to get. I despise seeing things like the Sword of Pain, Shadowfire stuff, and Blacklotus BP on sale for 30-50 plat or more. I buy from people selling it cheaper just so the price gougers can't have the sale.

KKidrakSG · 09-18-2007, 06:12 AM

If you are competing with me for an item on the broker PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE UNDERCUT ME BY ONE COPPER!

Nothing makes me madder than when I am selling an item on the broker for a perfectly fair price and some jack you-know-what (JA for short) comes along and slashes my price by 90%. Talk about rude. The ruins my business and is akin to greifing in my opinion. Does he really get anything from selling an item on the broker for the same price he could get from a vendor for the item? NO! Does he ruin my ability to make money on the same item by doing this? YES!

On the other hand, if I have a mature competitor on the broker who makes gives a modest (and by "modest" I mean the smallest of increments 1c to 1s depending on the total price) price break to beat my price, I applaud him. Granted, when I reprice my items I will repay the favor and leapfrog his price by a similarly small amount. In so doing, we are both still earning fair profit for the work we have done. It is when the aforementioned JA enters the scene and slashes our prices by a huge amount that we lose out. Now you have two honest crafters trying to make a living who can either drop their prices so low that their profit margins become razor thin, or they can just stop selling the item. I for one am not going to spend hours at the crafting table to make a few silver pieces per combine just because that JA is selling his product for 10 coppers more than the vendor gives. I did not level my crafters to level 70 to work for pennies.

Now, I know that someone is going to come back and claim that my argument above has nothing to do with undercutting by one copper. Well...let me elaborate for anyone in the audience with a double-digit IQ.

1. Let's take for example a popular crafted item that sells for a fair price of 10G. If I have a competitor or two who politely undercut my prices by just 1 silver, then I can come back and undercut them by the same 1 silver, and we all still make fair money for our work.

2. Now let's take the same situation and throw a TURBO JA (TJA for short) into the mix. We are all happily selling our crafted items for 10G, 9g 99s, 9g 98s, 9g97s, and so on. Then the TJA throws a truckload of the same item on the broker for 8G. Hmm. That was a little annoying, but no big deal so far. Myself and my mature competitors all comply with the newcomer into the market and price our items for 7g99s-ish. That cuts into our profits a little, but it is not devastating. Then the TJA discovers that we have adjusted to his entrance into the market and again slashes our prices, but only drops to 7g this time. Mature sellers again adjust, more grumbling ensues. TJA logs on again and slashes price to 5g. Ok, this is really starting to blow now...but since we still need to eat, we all take the A-pounding and make our prices 4g99s. The TJA will NOT be having this on HIS broker, so he finishes us off with a nice round price of 1g29s...the same price a vendor will give. Thanks buddy, you just invalidated all the work us honest businessmen put into getting to 70 at all.

The moral of the story is, "Don't be a Turbo JA."

Undercutting by a copper (or a very small amount) is NOT childish or rude. It is the exact polar opposite! It preserves the integrity of the market. Do do otherwise ruins the economy and invalidates the hard work of other gamers just like yourself. Please undercut me by a copper! If you do, I will be polite enough to do the same for you.

Miss_Jackie · 09-18-2007, 06:27 AM

Are you people all on illegal substances or something? I thought we had the freedom to price items any way we wanted. Not some arbitrary crap that the rest of the schmucks set it to. If I wanna make it 1 copper less than yours, then by fcks sake, I will. So there. *sticks out tongue*

Thunderthyze · 09-18-2007, 06:38 AM

ladyvengeance wrote:

I'm a level 38 tailor, and as such I craft a lot. It's how I make most of my money. When selling items, I deal with people trying to undercut me and that's fine - it's all part of the game and I really don't mind it too much. The thing that annoys the hell out of me are the people who undercut me by 1 copper. These miserly idiots think by undercutting me by such a miniscule amount that they'll maximize their profit. Whenever I buy stuff off the broker, if I see someone undercut another person by 1 measly copper, I buy from the other guy out of principle. I urge all of you to do the same in order to counter this childish behavior.

Don't get too worked up...the people that undercut by 1c are not long in the game. It would take SO long to run through a stack of salesman's crates making sure you are best price.....by 1c. I would imagine they would soon lose the will to live and stop playing.

Now what REALLY annoys me is when it is MY guildmates that are undercutting ME by 1c!

SugarGirl · 09-18-2007, 06:42 AM

I am an undercutter. I admit it openly and with pride. I farm fo rares and solo any named mobs that I can for loot. I sell the treasured stuff to the merchant and I stick any fabled/legendary and collection loot on the broker. Then I search each item on the broker and list it for under what the cheapest item is. If it is not on the broker I list it for some insane price. This insures I get the most I can for the rare stuff and then the rest of the stuff stays on the top of the list so that it will be bought first.

Every few days I go back to the broker and check the stuff I have listed. If I have been undercut by someone else, then I re-undercut them. Sooner or later, the prices on my stuff work theri way down to where someone looks up the item and finds that the price is actually reasonable. They buy it and I make coin. This is how a free market works.

I find it far ruder to to price all of your items at some insane price and then get mad when someone marks their for a lower price (whether it's 1 cp or 1 pp). Not a single one of us has been elected the governor of the EQ2 market and I don't think it's up to anyone to think that because they feel thier item is worth xx plat that EVERYONE should sell their item for the same price.

I also LOVE other undercutters. Even though they may undercut my stuff, they are also undercutting everyone else's stuf. That means if I need a rare for something and the current lowest price is 2pp, it's up to the undercutters to bring the price down to an affordable range.

This is how a free market works.. period. It's just silly to complain because someone is will to sell your item for less.

Vonotar · 09-18-2007, 07:13 AM

If the crafting community had any sense it would form a 'tradeskill coalition' on each respective servers and persuade as many regular crafters as possible to adopt a pricing structure.That way they can focus on seeing where the demand is, checking the broker to see which items are currently under-represented and using their rares to make them, safe in the knowledge that most other regular crafters won't undercut you.In the real world this is known as price fixing, and is something that the supermarkets, airlines and other industries are constantly rapped on the knuckles for doing. Considering the amount of money these industries make it's obviously a technique that works.Sure it's not a healthy market, but when 'wild undercutter' sells his AdeptIII or Mastercrafted item at half the price of the 'coalition' they can be comfortable in the fact that once the underpriced item is sold the market will return to their pricing... or they can just buy the item ;o)

katalmach · 09-18-2007, 07:33 AM

Holymoly@Runnyeye wrote:

ladyvengeance wrote:
I'm a level 38 tailor, and as such I craft a lot. It's how I make most of my money. When selling items, I deal with people trying to undercut me and that's fine - it's all part of the game and I really don't mind it too much. The thing that annoys the hell out of me are the people who undercut me by 1 copper. These miserly idiots think by undercutting me by such a miniscule amount that they'll maximize their profit. Whenever I buy stuff off the broker, if I see someone undercut another person by 1 measly copper, I buy from the other guy out of principle. I urge all of you to do the same in order to counter this childish behavior.
Don't get too worked up...the people that undercut by 1c are not long in the game. It would take SO long to run through a stack of salesman's crates making sure you are best price.....by 1c. I would imagine they would soon lose the will to live and stop playing.
Now what REALLY annoys me is when it is MY guildmates that are undercutting ME by 1c!

I wouldn't bet on it. I've played since release and I check and go through all my items for sale at least once a day. I've got three characters selling, two from mansions, and it takes hardly any time or effort at all to go through all my wares and undercut everybody else. I'm a seller, I want a quick turnaround and constant refreshment of wares, or my bags will be overflowing with stuff. I'm not going to match the price of the lowest on the broker if I think that slashing the price is going to help me sell quicker. I usually undercut by more than a copper, but I don't mind the people that do undercut by that little. It's really rather childish to consider it "rude" to undercut - this is a marketplace, not a playground. In real life, businesses not only undercut each other constantly, they also make adverts pointing out how much they are undercutting other people. Do you think that businesses like Sainsbury's start moping and whining about how ruuuude Tesco's are when the Tesco's adverts ("We have lower prices than Sainsbury's on over 3000 items!".) come on? Of course not.

Undercutting is just something you have to learn to deal with. It is a perfectly fair practice. You just have to learn when to undercut, when to leave your price as it is (you've got 500 coffees on the broker, someone undercuts you by 1 copper with a stack of 10 - no worries for you, your coffee will go soon enough), and when to hike the price right up. My carpenter has items up on the broker for several plat, that other people are selling for silver. Yet my items sell more often than you'd think, and I make lots more on ONE sell than the other carpenters made on 50!

cradeg · 09-18-2007, 07:36 AM

when i look for an item , i list the broker by price and buy the cheapest .... i do not care about undercutters or not , i just buy the cheapest and when i put something on my broker i make it the cheapest also , sometimes for 1c sometimes for more .... i just make sure to be cheaper SMILEY

Wilde_Night · 09-18-2007, 07:42 AM

Vonotar@Butcherblock wrote:

If the crafting community had any sense it would form a 'tradeskill coalition' on each respective servers and persuade as many regular crafters as possible to adopt a pricing structure.That way they can focus on seeing where the demand is, checking the broker to see which items are currently under-represented and using their rares to make them, safe in the knowledge that most other regular crafters won't undercut you.In the real world this is known as price fixing, and is something that the supermarkets, airlines and other industries are constantly rapped on the knuckles for doing. Considering the amount of money these industries make it's obviously a technique that works.Sure it's not a healthy market, but when 'wild undercutter' sells his AdeptIII or Mastercrafted item at half the price of the 'coalition' they can be comfortable in the fact that once the underpriced item is sold the market will return to their pricing... or they can just buy the item ;o)

Ha! I've had people try that with me through mail. You know what? That gets my hackles up. Please don't try to tell me how to price my items. Don't tell me how to play. If I see their name, I automatically undercut them. Is it spiteful? Yeah, but I'm Teir'Dal. What can I say?

sorinev · 09-18-2007, 07:59 AM

Vonotar@Butcherblock wrote:

If the crafting community had any sense it would form a 'tradeskill coalition' on each respective servers

If I remember right, we had one of these on our server during the first several months of release on my server (Lavastorm, late 04, early 05). They weren't doing any of the evil and malicious stuff that happens in real life, I don't think, but it was a coalition. I think it was something like a lot of the dedicated and popular crafters made a crafters-only guild and had standard prices that they set for various items in each tier and for their personal services. I wasn't into crafting all that much at that time, but I remember finding the prices acceptable and fair. I don't know how well something like this would work today though, since crafting has gotten so easy (not a complaint!) that everyone's got their own crafters now.

Ponos · 09-18-2007, 08:21 AM

I undercut by one copper piece because it is the most intelligent thing to do.

As a seller, I want to be the first name the buyer looks at, and I want to do that by losing as little capital as possible (in the case of a purchase).

If SOE designed it so that in order to appear before the next seller, you had to undercut by a margin of no less than 10%, then I would list all my items at prices 10% lower than the next seller in line.

It essentially is costing me 1 cp. per item to advertise, and that's great marketing!

There is nothing rude about maximizing profit and the chances of making a sale. Don't want to hurt your feelings, but I don't know you. We are not friends.

Free Market Enterprise is your friend, however, if you know how to treat it right.

Tremelle · 09-18-2007, 09:02 AM

Sorry, but undercutting is not only normal economics, its natural condition of having 10-15 people selling the same item. If I place an item on the broker I have crafted, I know that someone else is probably making that same item and someone new will list that same item everyday, meaning if you are not the lowest price to start with, it maybe a long time before you sell that item. Waiting around for weeks to sell 1-3 items is not going to cut it. If there isn't a fast turn around, my stores and bags are going to get full fast . Now have much I decide to under cut, if I undercut, is my own business, it maybe 1c or it maybe 20plat. The point is I am selling mi items close to a price I think is reasonable.

melaine_dvarvensplitter · 09-18-2007, 09:48 AM

LOL! Unfortunately this topic is a dead horse and I price to sell... 1cp is irritating but it happens.. biggest ones to do it are the known plat sellers on your server, well at least on AB. Do a search on here about price cutting, price gouging and you will see page after page of topics SMILEY

Kenazeer · 09-18-2007, 09:55 AM

Some of you all would hate me then. I put 88 different tier 3 mage and cleric App4s on the broker the other day for whatever the broker minimum was, think it was like 2.5 silver or so. I was levelling up on new recipes after having worked on a bunch of writs and would have just sold them to the vendor anyway. Buy them up and resell them if you have room, vendor them or destroy them if you don't. My thinking was that maybe a real newbie could use them, it would have taken too much time to price them individually anyway, and I will be needing the crate room so I don't want them to sit.

Undercutters by one copper though, poor form.

Spyderbite · 09-18-2007, 10:21 AM

Miss_Jackie wrote:

Are you people all on illegal substances or something? I thought we had the freedom to price items any way we wanted.

/snickersI was thinking the same thing.I see some resources sold for 15+ silver.. harvests that took me about 20 mins to gather about 50 of each of them. I have no shame in slashing the price in half when I stock my sales crates in that case. Rares are same story. I've sold enough rares to know what the average price is on my server. So when I see an ebon cluster sitting there for 1 plat.. I don't even blink when I price the 3 I've got for sale at 1/3 the price.As for the 1 cp issue.. that's all just a matter of getting to the top of the list. Listing stuff on the broker is going to do no good if your items are buried on the third page at 5cp with 30 other people selling the same thing for 4cp.. only makes sense to drop it to 3cp and go straight to the top of the list where it will move quickly.just my 2 cp worth.. *chuckles at the pun*

Ookami-san · 09-18-2007, 10:26 AM

I constantly and consistantly undercut by 1cp. If you don't want to buy from me... don't. There are plenty of intelligent and thrifty people who will. But getting into a bidding war on price is insane. You drive the price to a point where its no longer really worth it craft the item - certain totems now fall into this category on my server as some idiots think that spending 3 minutes on a combine is worth 1sp. I suspect they are using some type of automated progam and just churn out large quantities - or... they have some sort of psychological disorder.... or... they trained their dog to do tradeskilling....

Dropping prices to much low rates by making large undercuts devalues us as tradeskillers by saying that our time, effort and investment isn't worth much. Personally... mine is. I'll undercut the person by 1cp, because he can in return do the same to me without lowering his price to a point where the whole process becomes unprofitable.

Spyderbite · 09-18-2007, 10:34 AM

Ookami-san wrote:

I'll undercut the person by 1cp, because he can in return do the same to me without lowering his price to a point where the whole process becomes unprofitable.

As soon as people bid the price down to below the reasonable market price, I pull my items, wait for every one to sell off their stuff at a loss and relist my items at the market value. Regardless of the price.. there will always be people in tradeskill instances lined up to buy resources. ^^

Lightfoot · 09-18-2007, 10:40 AM

The reason why people will undercut by 1cp is to move their item to the top of the list. It's logical that if someone wants to buy an item they will buy from the top of the list because it is the cheapest.

I undercut according to the price range. If the item is only selling for copper or low silver I will undercut by 1cp.

If someone is cutting your price by 50% or more, simply buy them out and throw it in to your stack.

I was having a price war with someone a while ago with shinies. We both kept undercutting each other and it was a matter of who could hold out the longest before buying the other one out then repricing. If he bought me out then priced them really high, I would go out hunting for the same item so I could undecut him again.

What I can't understand is when people price things lower than the merchant price.

09-17-2007, 10:17 PM	#2
Calthine ZAM EQII Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 7,439	I think you'll find there's a large population of players who won't buy from the 1c undercutters, lol. __________________ Please visit my non-gaming Blog! or follow me on Twitter!

09-17-2007, 10:34 PM	#4
ladyvengeance Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 177	Guy De Alsace wrote: I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp. Makes my teeth grind. Yeah that annoys me as well, although if it's a good rare master I'll just buy it off them and sell them both for 3pp. I've made loads of money that way. People who put fabled items up and undercut me by as much as 10pp. Just buy them and sell them at a higher cost.

09-17-2007, 10:35 PM	#5
greenmantle Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 769	Its rude childish and hmm i think ive grouped with a few of them Like calth i buy from the even priced person not the 1c undercutter

09-17-2007, 11:12 PM	#6
Jrral Loremaster Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: San Diego, CA Posts: 2,610	Guy De Alsace wrote: I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp. My attitude on it is "If you're going to undercut, then by the gods undercut!". If I don't think something's worth 3p, I'm not going to waste time pulling the price down 1g, or even 10g, at a time.

09-17-2007, 11:39 PM	#8
Vatec Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 473	Depends on the item. Harvestables, every penny counts as a seller or a buyer. Big ticket items, I generally price to match the lowest and then drop the price by 10% (rounded as needed) every couple of days until it sells. I never, ever match someone who undercuts me, though I'll occasionally buy one of them out. If I kept trying to match or beat other players' prices, I'd be doing nothing but standing at the broker all day....And yes, I am sometimes mystified by other players' pricing "strategies." Carbonite clusters are selling for 20sp. All of a sudden, someone will dump 300 on the market for 10sp. What on earth are they thinking? 19sp, sure. 15sp, maybe. But 10sp? Are they operating out of some misguided desire to help out the "little guy" or something? shrug __________________ 54+ Ranger 28+ Berserker, 28+ Troubador, 26+ Fury, 25+ Templar, 25+ Bruiser, 22+ Inquisitor 21+ Dirge, 20+ Paladin, 15+ Conjuror, 14+ Assassin, 14+ Defiler, 13+ Shadowknight and a few others 90 Provisioner, 41+ Woodworker, 34+ Carpenter 41+ Tailor, 30+ Armorer, 29+ Weaponsmith 70+ Jeweler, 51+ Alchemist, 29+ Sage Living and dying on OASIS since 11/09/04

09-17-2007, 10:12 PM	#1
ladyvengeance Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 177	I'm a level 38 tailor, and as such I craft a lot. It's how I make most of my money. When selling items, I deal with people trying to undercut me and that's fine - it's all part of the game and I really don't mind it too much. The thing that annoys the hell out of me are the people who undercut me by 1 copper. These miserly idiots think by undercutting me by such a miniscule amount that they'll maximize their profit. Whenever I buy stuff off the broker, if I see someone undercut another person by 1 measly copper, I buy from the other guy out of principle. I urge all of you to do the same in order to counter this childish behavior.

09-17-2007, 10:22 PM	#3
Guy De Alsace Loremaster Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: England Posts: 1,902	I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp. Makes my teeth grind.

09-17-2007, 11:32 PM	#7
Cadori Seraphim Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Dallas, TX Posts: 965	Yeah I wont buy from those who undercut 1copper lol thats just rude.

09-17-2007, 11:49 PM	#9
Josgar Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 2,606	Whats wrong with undercutting? Especially if you are selling only one of them. I dont want the item and want to get rid of it, I sell it. The end. If I wanted to I could bloody sell it for a copper. I dont see what the big deal is. Its supply, demand, and somewhat marketing rolled into one that makes the economy flow. I however am more likely to buy from people who have more than one of them. More convenient for a stack.

09-18-2007, 12:58 AM	#10
Soefoe Loremaster Join Date: Sep 2007 Posts: 164	Josgar wrote: Whats wrong with undercutting? Especially if you are selling only one of them. I dont want the item and want to get rid of it, I sell it. The end. If I wanted to I could bloody sell it for a copper. I dont see what the big deal is. Its supply, demand, and somewhat marketing rolled into one that makes the economy flow. I however am more likely to buy from people who have more than one of them. More convenient for a stack. Its just plain "RUDE"....I am now getting into the Adept III spells and some of them require very rare components to make...I spend ALL weekend farming components for these spells and put them in the broker at a price to compensate for my TIME/EFFORT and Lost XP and when I make a rare spell that I feel is worth 15 gold in the broker I don't want to see some idiot listing it for 20 silver. (which is exactly what happened to me last week) __________________ The Light in the Window is a crack in the sky A stairway to darkness in the blink of an eye A levy of tears cuz you'll never be comming back; The man in the dark will bring another attack.... Your mama told you not to talk to strangers Look in the mirror and tell me ---do you think your life is in danger here ????

09-18-2007, 01:31 AM	#11
Menji Loremaster Join Date: Aug 2007 Posts: 75	Soefoe wrote: Josgar wrote: Whats wrong with undercutting? Especially if you are selling only one of them. I dont want the item and want to get rid of it, I sell it. The end. If I wanted to I could bloody sell it for a copper. I dont see what the big deal is. Its supply, demand, and somewhat marketing rolled into one that makes the economy flow. I however am more likely to buy from people who have more than one of them. More convenient for a stack. Its just plain "RUDE"....I am now getting into the Adept III spells and some of them require very rare components to make...I spend ALL weekend farming components for these spells and put them in the broker at a price to compensate for my TIME/EFFORT and Lost XP and when I make a rare spell that I feel is worth 15 gold in the broker I don't want to see some idiot listing it for 20 silver. (which is exactly what happened to me last week) Well look at it this way, they did you a favor, you buy them out and list it for 15 gold and go xp'ing.

09-18-2007, 01:40 AM	#12
Thuriel Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 25	There's nothing wrong with undercutting by 1cp. It's done in the real world. Echoes of Faydwer sells fo $39.99 instead of $40. The problem is that those who undercut by 1cp don't know how to do it properly. The undercut is done more for psychological impact than offering actual savings. For example $9.99 has a big impact versus $10 since people tend to just see $9 and consider it a lower pricing tier. $11.99 versus $12 has very little impact since people think they're in the same pricing tier. In the game, unless you take broker fees into account, the 1cp undercutting strategy falls flat and just looks rude and stupid. __________________ -- Thuriel Elimgarde

09-18-2007, 01:53 AM	#13
Hamervelder Loremaster Join Date: Mar 2005 Posts: 1,585	ladyvengeance wrote: Guy De Alsace wrote: I dont mind undercutting by 1cp but undercutting by 50% of the price is the thing that annoys me most. Put a master up for 3 plat (maybe a few gold under the previous seller) and someone puts one up at 1pp, undercutting by 2pp. Makes my teeth grind. Yeah that annoys me as well, although if it's a good rare master I'll just buy it off them and sell them both for 3pp. I've made loads of money that way. People who put fabled items up and undercut me by as much as 10pp. Just buy them and sell them at a higher cost. I don't mean to insult you in any way, but I really hate it when you folks sell fabled items for an arm and a leg. Most fabled stuff that is tradeable is the lower-end stuff, and takes relatively little effort to get. I despise seeing things like the Sword of Pain, Shadowfire stuff, and Blacklotus BP on sale for 30-50 plat or more. I buy from people selling it cheaper just so the price gougers can't have the sale. __________________ Elhonas Warden of Mayhem, Antonia Bayle

09-18-2007, 06:12 AM	#14
KKidrakSG Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 10	If you are competing with me for an item on the broker PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE UNDERCUT ME BY ONE COPPER! Nothing makes me madder than when I am selling an item on the broker for a perfectly fair price and some jack you-know-what (JA for short) comes along and slashes my price by 90%. Talk about rude. The ruins my business and is akin to greifing in my opinion. Does he really get anything from selling an item on the broker for the same price he could get from a vendor for the item? NO! Does he ruin my ability to make money on the same item by doing this? YES! On the other hand, if I have a mature competitor on the broker who makes gives a modest (and by "modest" I mean the smallest of increments 1c to 1s depending on the total price) price break to beat my price, I applaud him. Granted, when I reprice my items I will repay the favor and leapfrog his price by a similarly small amount. In so doing, we are both still earning fair profit for the work we have done. It is when the aforementioned JA enters the scene and slashes our prices by a huge amount that we lose out. Now you have two honest crafters trying to make a living who can either drop their prices so low that their profit margins become razor thin, or they can just stop selling the item. I for one am not going to spend hours at the crafting table to make a few silver pieces per combine just because that JA is selling his product for 10 coppers more than the vendor gives. I did not level my crafters to level 70 to work for pennies. Now, I know that someone is going to come back and claim that my argument above has nothing to do with undercutting by one copper. Well...let me elaborate for anyone in the audience with a double-digit IQ. 1. Let's take for example a popular crafted item that sells for a fair price of 10G. If I have a competitor or two who politely undercut my prices by just 1 silver, then I can come back and undercut them by the same 1 silver, and we all still make fair money for our work. 2. Now let's take the same situation and throw a TURBO JA (TJA for short) into the mix. We are all happily selling our crafted items for 10G, 9g 99s, 9g 98s, 9g97s, and so on. Then the TJA throws a truckload of the same item on the broker for 8G. Hmm. That was a little annoying, but no big deal so far. Myself and my mature competitors all comply with the newcomer into the market and price our items for 7g99s-ish. That cuts into our profits a little, but it is not devastating. Then the TJA discovers that we have adjusted to his entrance into the market and again slashes our prices, but only drops to 7g this time. Mature sellers again adjust, more grumbling ensues. TJA logs on again and slashes price to 5g. Ok, this is really starting to blow now...but since we still need to eat, we all take the A-pounding and make our prices 4g99s. The TJA will NOT be having this on HIS broker, so he finishes us off with a nice round price of 1g29s...the same price a vendor will give. Thanks buddy, you just invalidated all the work us honest businessmen put into getting to 70 at all. The moral of the story is, "Don't be a Turbo JA." Undercutting by a copper (or a very small amount) is NOT childish or rude. It is the exact polar opposite! It preserves the integrity of the market. Do do otherwise ruins the economy and invalidates the hard work of other gamers just like yourself. Please undercut me by a copper! If you do, I will be polite enough to do the same for you. __________________

09-18-2007, 06:27 AM	#15
Miss_Jackie Loremaster Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Philadelphia, PA Posts: 354	Are you people all on illegal substances or something? I thought we had the freedom to price items any way we wanted. Not some arbitrary crap that the rest of the schmucks set it to. If I wanna make it 1 copper less than yours, then by fcks sake, I will. So there. sticks out tongue

09-18-2007, 06:38 AM	#16
Thunderthyze Loremaster Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Old South Wales Posts: 2,050	ladyvengeance wrote: I'm a level 38 tailor, and as such I craft a lot. It's how I make most of my money. When selling items, I deal with people trying to undercut me and that's fine - it's all part of the game and I really don't mind it too much. The thing that annoys the hell out of me are the people who undercut me by 1 copper. These miserly idiots think by undercutting me by such a miniscule amount that they'll maximize their profit. Whenever I buy stuff off the broker, if I see someone undercut another person by 1 measly copper, I buy from the other guy out of principle. I urge all of you to do the same in order to counter this childish behavior. Don't get too worked up...the people that undercut by 1c are not long in the game. It would take SO long to run through a stack of salesman's crates making sure you are best price.....by 1c. I would imagine they would soon lose the will to live and stop playing. Now what REALLY annoys me is when it is MY guildmates that are undercutting ME by 1c! __________________

09-18-2007, 06:42 AM	#17
SugarGirl Loremaster Join Date: Oct 2005 Posts: 379	I am an undercutter. I admit it openly and with pride. I farm fo rares and solo any named mobs that I can for loot. I sell the treasured stuff to the merchant and I stick any fabled/legendary and collection loot on the broker. Then I search each item on the broker and list it for under what the cheapest item is. If it is not on the broker I list it for some insane price. This insures I get the most I can for the rare stuff and then the rest of the stuff stays on the top of the list so that it will be bought first. Every few days I go back to the broker and check the stuff I have listed. If I have been undercut by someone else, then I re-undercut them. Sooner or later, the prices on my stuff work theri way down to where someone looks up the item and finds that the price is actually reasonable. They buy it and I make coin. This is how a free market works. I find it far ruder to to price all of your items at some insane price and then get mad when someone marks their for a lower price (whether it's 1 cp or 1 pp). Not a single one of us has been elected the governor of the EQ2 market and I don't think it's up to anyone to think that because they feel thier item is worth xx plat that EVERYONE should sell their item for the same price. I also LOVE other undercutters. Even though they may undercut my stuff, they are also undercutting everyone else's stuf. That means if I need a rare for something and the current lowest price is 2pp, it's up to the undercutters to bring the price down to an affordable range. This is how a free market works.. period. It's just silly to complain because someone is will to sell your item for less. __________________ It's a wonderful day to chase a tornadoes. Rubble Rabble Rouser Leetjamzyo 80 Dirge/80 Jeweller/400 Tinker of Befallen

09-18-2007, 07:13 AM	#18
Vonotar Server: Butcherblock Loremaster Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 1,697	If the crafting community had any sense it would form a 'tradeskill coalition' on each respective servers and persuade as many regular crafters as possible to adopt a pricing structure.That way they can focus on seeing where the demand is, checking the broker to see which items are currently under-represented and using their rares to make them, safe in the knowledge that most other regular crafters won't undercut you.In the real world this is known as price fixing, and is something that the supermarkets, airlines and other industries are constantly rapped on the knuckles for doing. Considering the amount of money these industries make it's obviously a technique that works.Sure it's not a healthy market, but when 'wild undercutter' sells his AdeptIII or Mastercrafted item at half the price of the 'coalition' they can be comfortable in the fact that once the underpriced item is sold the market will return to their pricing... or they can just buy the item ;o)

09-18-2007, 07:33 AM	#19
katalmach Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 275	Holymoly@Runnyeye wrote: ladyvengeance wrote: I'm a level 38 tailor, and as such I craft a lot. It's how I make most of my money. When selling items, I deal with people trying to undercut me and that's fine - it's all part of the game and I really don't mind it too much. The thing that annoys the hell out of me are the people who undercut me by 1 copper. These miserly idiots think by undercutting me by such a miniscule amount that they'll maximize their profit. Whenever I buy stuff off the broker, if I see someone undercut another person by 1 measly copper, I buy from the other guy out of principle. I urge all of you to do the same in order to counter this childish behavior. Don't get too worked up...the people that undercut by 1c are not long in the game. It would take SO long to run through a stack of salesman's crates making sure you are best price.....by 1c. I would imagine they would soon lose the will to live and stop playing. Now what REALLY annoys me is when it is MY guildmates that are undercutting ME by 1c! I wouldn't bet on it. I've played since release and I check and go through all my items for sale at least once a day. I've got three characters selling, two from mansions, and it takes hardly any time or effort at all to go through all my wares and undercut everybody else. I'm a seller, I want a quick turnaround and constant refreshment of wares, or my bags will be overflowing with stuff. I'm not going to match the price of the lowest on the broker if I think that slashing the price is going to help me sell quicker. I usually undercut by more than a copper, but I don't mind the people that do undercut by that little. It's really rather childish to consider it "rude" to undercut - this is a marketplace, not a playground. In real life, businesses not only undercut each other constantly, they also make adverts pointing out how much they are undercutting other people. Do you think that businesses like Sainsbury's start moping and whining about how ruuuude Tesco's are when the Tesco's adverts ("We have lower prices than Sainsbury's on over 3000 items!".) come on? Of course not. Undercutting is just something you have to learn to deal with. It is a perfectly fair practice. You just have to learn when to undercut, when to leave your price as it is (you've got 500 coffees on the broker, someone undercuts you by 1 copper with a stack of 10 - no worries for you, your coffee will go soon enough), and when to hike the price right up. My carpenter has items up on the broker for several plat, that other people are selling for silver. Yet my items sell more often than you'd think, and I make lots more on ONE sell than the other carpenters made on 50!

09-18-2007, 07:36 AM	#20
cradeg Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 33	when i look for an item , i list the broker by price and buy the cheapest .... i do not care about undercutters or not , i just buy the cheapest and when i put something on my broker i make it the cheapest also , sometimes for 1c sometimes for more .... i just make sure to be cheaper

09-18-2007, 07:42 AM	#21
Wilde_Night Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Kenosha, Wisconsin Posts: 1,127	Vonotar@Butcherblock wrote: If the crafting community had any sense it would form a 'tradeskill coalition' on each respective servers and persuade as many regular crafters as possible to adopt a pricing structure.That way they can focus on seeing where the demand is, checking the broker to see which items are currently under-represented and using their rares to make them, safe in the knowledge that most other regular crafters won't undercut you.In the real world this is known as price fixing, and is something that the supermarkets, airlines and other industries are constantly rapped on the knuckles for doing. Considering the amount of money these industries make it's obviously a technique that works.Sure it's not a healthy market, but when 'wild undercutter' sells his AdeptIII or Mastercrafted item at half the price of the 'coalition' they can be comfortable in the fact that once the underpriced item is sold the market will return to their pricing... or they can just buy the item ;o) Ha! I've had people try that with me through mail. You know what? That gets my hackles up. Please don't try to tell me how to price my items. Don't tell me how to play. If I see their name, I automatically undercut them. Is it spiteful? Yeah, but I'm Teir'Dal. What can I say? __________________

09-18-2007, 07:59 AM	#22
sorinev Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 258	Vonotar@Butcherblock wrote: If the crafting community had any sense it would form a 'tradeskill coalition' on each respective servers If I remember right, we had one of these on our server during the first several months of release on my server (Lavastorm, late 04, early 05). They weren't doing any of the evil and malicious stuff that happens in real life, I don't think, but it was a coalition. I think it was something like a lot of the dedicated and popular crafters made a crafters-only guild and had standard prices that they set for various items in each tier and for their personal services. I wasn't into crafting all that much at that time, but I remember finding the prices acceptable and fair. I don't know how well something like this would work today though, since crafting has gotten so easy (not a complaint!) that everyone's got their own crafters now. __________________ _______________________________________ Lavastorm Server. R.I.P. 70 Fury, 70 Jeweler. old school Fury, rolled 12/10/04 90 Brigand, 90 Armorer LU13 Fury bandwagon FTL.

09-18-2007, 08:21 AM	#23
Ponos Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Athens, GA. Posts: 274	I undercut by one copper piece because it is the most intelligent thing to do. As a seller, I want to be the first name the buyer looks at, and I want to do that by losing as little capital as possible (in the case of a purchase). If SOE designed it so that in order to appear before the next seller, you had to undercut by a margin of no less than 10%, then I would list all my items at prices 10% lower than the next seller in line. It essentially is costing me 1 cp. per item to advertise, and that's great marketing! There is nothing rude about maximizing profit and the chances of making a sale. Don't want to hurt your feelings, but I don't know you. We are not friends. Free Market Enterprise is your friend, however, if you know how to treat it right. __________________

09-18-2007, 09:02 AM	#24
Tremelle Hero Join Date: Feb 2007 Posts: 174	Sorry, but undercutting is not only normal economics, its natural condition of having 10-15 people selling the same item. If I place an item on the broker I have crafted, I know that someone else is probably making that same item and someone new will list that same item everyday, meaning if you are not the lowest price to start with, it maybe a long time before you sell that item. Waiting around for weeks to sell 1-3 items is not going to cut it. If there isn't a fast turn around, my stores and bags are going to get full fast . Now have much I decide to under cut, if I undercut, is my own business, it maybe 1c or it maybe 20plat. The point is I am selling mi items close to a price I think is reasonable.

09-18-2007, 09:48 AM	#25
melaine_dvarvensplitter Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 671	LOL! Unfortunately this topic is a dead horse and I price to sell... 1cp is irritating but it happens.. biggest ones to do it are the known plat sellers on your server, well at least on AB. Do a search on here about price cutting, price gouging and you will see page after page of topics

09-18-2007, 09:55 AM	#26
Kenazeer Loremaster Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 1,178	Some of you all would hate me then. I put 88 different tier 3 mage and cleric App4s on the broker the other day for whatever the broker minimum was, think it was like 2.5 silver or so. I was levelling up on new recipes after having worked on a bunch of writs and would have just sold them to the vendor anyway. Buy them up and resell them if you have room, vendor them or destroy them if you don't. My thinking was that maybe a real newbie could use them, it would have taken too much time to price them individually anyway, and I will be needing the crate room so I don't want them to sit. Undercutters by one copper though, poor form. __________________ Come play EQ2...we have SOEmote, Dungeon Finder, and Dungeon Maker.

09-18-2007, 10:21 AM	#27
Spyderbite Server: Venekor Guild: Dark Vengeance Rank: Member Loremaster Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Connecticut Posts: 4,262	Miss_Jackie wrote: Are you people all on illegal substances or something? I thought we had the freedom to price items any way we wanted. /snickersI was thinking the same thing.I see some resources sold for 15+ silver.. harvests that took me about 20 mins to gather about 50 of each of them. I have no shame in slashing the price in half when I stock my sales crates in that case. Rares are same story. I've sold enough rares to know what the average price is on my server. So when I see an ebon cluster sitting there for 1 plat.. I don't even blink when I price the 3 I've got for sale at 1/3 the price.As for the 1 cp issue.. that's all just a matter of getting to the top of the list. Listing stuff on the broker is going to do no good if your items are buried on the third page at 5cp with 30 other people selling the same thing for 4cp.. only makes sense to drop it to 3cp and go straight to the top of the list where it will move quickly.just my 2 cp worth.. chuckles at the pun

09-18-2007, 10:26 AM	#28
Ookami-san Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Allentown, PA Posts: 336	I constantly and consistantly undercut by 1cp. If you don't want to buy from me... don't. There are plenty of intelligent and thrifty people who will. But getting into a bidding war on price is insane. You drive the price to a point where its no longer really worth it craft the item - certain totems now fall into this category on my server as some idiots think that spending 3 minutes on a combine is worth 1sp. I suspect they are using some type of automated progam and just churn out large quantities - or... they have some sort of psychological disorder.... or... they trained their dog to do tradeskilling.... Dropping prices to much low rates by making large undercuts devalues us as tradeskillers by saying that our time, effort and investment isn't worth much. Personally... mine is. I'll undercut the person by 1cp, because he can in return do the same to me without lowering his price to a point where the whole process becomes unprofitable. __________________ _____________________________________ Life is pain Princess! Anyone who tells you differently, is selling something!

09-18-2007, 10:34 AM	#29
Spyderbite Server: Venekor Guild: Dark Vengeance Rank: Member Loremaster Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Connecticut Posts: 4,262	Ookami-san wrote: I'll undercut the person by 1cp, because he can in return do the same to me without lowering his price to a point where the whole process becomes unprofitable. As soon as people bid the price down to below the reasonable market price, I pull my items, wait for every one to sell off their stuff at a loss and relist my items at the market value. Regardless of the price.. there will always be people in tradeskill instances lined up to buy resources. ^^

09-18-2007, 10:40 AM	#30
Lightfoot General Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: UK Posts: 494	The reason why people will undercut by 1cp is to move their item to the top of the list. It's logical that if someone wants to buy an item they will buy from the top of the list because it is the cheapest. I undercut according to the price range. If the item is only selling for copper or low silver I will undercut by 1cp. If someone is cutting your price by 50% or more, simply buy them out and throw it in to your stack. I was having a price war with someone a while ago with shinies. We both kept undercutting each other and it was a matter of who could hold out the longest before buying the other one out then repricing. If he bought me out then priced them really high, I would go out hunting for the same item so I could undecut him again. What I can't understand is when people price things lower than the merchant price.