how do you handle intrusion into your market niche?

[tellania]

noticed an intrusion on my market niche.  I'm not a mega-seller by any means, made about 6-8 billion (spent a lot on my 50's as well), unlike some monsters here who do 10's of billions every week or two ...

Anyways, I noticed a component of (not telling if recipe, IO, or salvage, ...) with a higher bids by mine (typically by 1 infl).

At first, I thought 'how dare you intrude upon my ebil marketing!', and set a bit 1 infl higher back

 

Over time, it has creeped by 1k, 10k, to 100k and occasionally 1m more!

 

At first I thought I could wait them out, or just outbid them (in my villains head "I'll crush them for competing fairly with me!"), then thought ... maybe its one of those super ebil marketers with BILLIONS to compete ...

 

Sadly, I'm more of a 1 trick pony (one market), I used to loose or make very little in the market, until I uncovered my niche.

 

I'm curious how the rest of you handle, when you see someone else making inroads into your rightfully manipulated price gouging?

 

[Lines]

I think sometimes you just gotta be the bigger person and take the high ground.

 

Hold their family for ransom.

[AureumError]

I farm to aggregate additional raw materials and invest enough to make the niche unprofitable for a few weeks. Thus asserting dominance.

Like whoever committed to the weird flex of dumping around 2k of a certain popular IO into the market a few months back.

[Ukase]

My niche (well, one of them) has been buying level 10 pvp IO recipes, crafting them, converting them to the usual ones that sold frequently for what I think is an excellent margin. I used to just bid a low-ish price on each recipe, for sale or not, hoping to snag what I could. As success ensued, I began to bid for more than 1, up to 5 of each recipe. Eventually, crafting all of these, despite my having the salvage stashed on the AH in tidy numbers of 5 each, I noticed a soft-limit that was difficult to manage - a limit of my time...crafting 100 recipes when you already have all the salvage in inventory is not time consuming. Converting them can take some time, depending on the rng. But due to the volume and the limit of what you can hold - and the number of AH slots, I would have to divide this one niche into a couple of characters at this volume - and further reduce my actual play time doing this. To what end? I have all I need, and the pile continues to grow, despite what I think are frequent sizeable philanthropic donations. While doing this, I would often notice my 3m bids would often be outmatched by 1 inf, or 10 inf. Since I know my costs of salvage and crafting, I know how much room there is on the margin, and I also am aware of opportunity cost. The margin has to be large enough or the time/inventory invested can be used elsewhere. Kind of like when they shut down CoH. Yeah, it was making money, but was it making more money than could be found in the market, given the investments of resources? So, at what level is the profit no longer profitable ENOUGH for you? 

There are some who delight in taking a niche and then leave it behind after a period of time. You don't know if it's an "ebil marketer" or some lucky soul who blundered into it after running Dr. Q multiple times on 3 different accounts and has now found themselves with 2100+ merits across three accounts and thought your niche was unreasonable and wanted to make it more reasonable. 

I see this all the time with Sudden Acceleration: KB to KD. They sell for 3-4m, then someone who I suppose hates to encounter KB unloads a good amount of them for about 1m. Soon, the market runs out, and the price goes back up to 3-4m. 

So, your choice is to wait, or increase your bid price to a point where the niche is no longer working. Doesn't matter who's on the other end. The smaller the margin, the less likely it's one of us, I would think. There may be some who aim for high  volume, low margin, but I would guess most are looking for more margin with less volume. We'll never truly know for sure. Ebil Marketers may often lie to manipulate the less ebil so they can make more inf. 

 

[Yomo Kimyata]

Ooh, a market PvP thread!

 

Fortunately, I really have not seen very much of it on Homecoming, but it is there.  It's annoying, and yet there's very little anyone can do to stop it, and that's the way it should be because at the end of the day competition is going to lead to better prices and flow.  I always think the worst though is when people 0.01 you by increasing bids by the bare minimum and you don't notice until the next time you check in.

 

Some thoughts on what you can do, in no particular order:

 

1.  Do nothing.  If someone is outbidding you, you generally don't know how deep their bids are.  That 2,000,001 bid may be one deep, or several hundred deep.  Work on something else and check back later to see if things have gone back to normal.  Maybe someone just wanted one recipe.  Maybe not.

 

2.  Compete with higher bids.  I remember on Live people would keep 0.01-ing bids on purples and such hoping to snag a buy at 138,256,278 as opposed to 138,256,277.  The problem is that there really isn't an end solution to that -- if the other side wants to keep on competing, the two of you can keep 0.01-ing until someone gets bored or frustrated or until it gets unprofitable.  Pro tip:  some people (like me) like to use "handles" or "fists" which are characteristic numbers or patterns so that they can quickly look at the history and recognize if they still have the highest outstanding bid.  If you notice that, use a similar handle but higher so that they may not notice at first.  Example:  one of you has been buying lots and lots of rare salvage with bids that end in xxx,099.  When I feel the desire to compete there, I'll bid xxx,899 and hope that it will take a while before they notice.  But eventually they always do.

 

3.  Make it unprofitable, like @AureumErrorsays.  

 

4.  Find a different path.  I'm working off the assumption that you are talking about IO recipes, because that's really the only bottleneck.  Look into buying IOs instead -- it may not be *as* profitable but it may be a lot easier to pick up those.  Or maybe look into another path.  If you want to end up with LotG 7.5%, for example, there are a lot of ways you can get there.  Red Fortune recipes are one way, but far from the only one.  

 

I'm sure I'll think of more.  Happy hunting, good luck, and it isn't me, because I don't 0.01 bids!

Edited October 6, 2020 by Yomo Kimyata

[Lines]

10 minutes ago, Ukase said:

My niche (well, one of them) has been buying level 10 pvp IO recipes, crafting them, converting them to the usual ones that sold frequently for what I think is an excellent margin.

I noticed this one recently. It's crazy how cheap the recipes are compared with the IOs.

 

I mean, recipes in general are very cheap, but the crafting cost usually offsets the value.

[Yomo Kimyata]

16 minutes ago, Ukase said:

My niche (well, one of them) has been buying level 10 pvp IO recipes...
 

I recently noticed that Panacea procs are now consistently the cheapest of the set, which tells me that someone's been doing too much in-set converting...

[Ukase]

13 minutes ago, Lines said:

I noticed this one recently. It's crazy how cheap the recipes are compared with the IOs.

 

I mean, recipes in general are very cheap, but the crafting cost usually offsets the value.

I find it...well, not amusing, but really interesting that there seem to be a LOT of people who see the value in the PvP set bonuses enough to want them...but they don't do simple math. 

Once you reach level 50, assuming a previous 50 granted you the catalysts, or you got them straight away from the AH or a merit vendor - the cats drop fairly often. At least once a day, anecdotally. My farmers certainly have a ton of them. While I understand why - I don't "get it" - they don't just buy a level 10 recipe (cheaper to craft), convert to what you want, slot it and catalyze it. Even though the cat is about 2.3m, 2.3+3M is still cheaper than 8-9M. (using average prices)

As far as just listing the uncatalyzed level 10 IO, and then having an alt buy it at that price - that has never, ever, ever worked for me. Never. I mean, I'll list it at 1:00:00, and then tab out, and try to buy the attuned version at 1:00:04, and it has never been available at that same price, or even 1 inf over. Never. So, I just bid creep and often find myself paying about 1-2 million more. Suppose that's better than losing a catalyst, but catalysts aren't my market and they drop routinely and I have more than enough for new alts, so I will use them in this fashion to avoid putting my inf into the market. Last thing I want is to fund my competition! 

 

[tellania]

There is a lot of good advice here ....

 

I prefer the 'hold the family for ransom' idea (thanks LINES!)

 

but yeah, this might be a momentary glitch to force out the market.

 

And Ukase, I found 2 things help:

1.  Craft a cheap recipe (e.g. lvl 10 pvp IO), then convert.   If there is a market for it sell it.   Bid on a attuned version of what you want, no need to be stuck trying to buy back the same one.   Also, lvl 10's are the same as attuned if they offer a unique bonus (e.g. +def, +hp, +res).   I dont bother with those.

 

2.  As far as bidding, then attempting to buy back, it depends if there is a higher bid pending (then you'll not get it).   I've bought loads of salvage, but the market didnt update the sold prices.    In general, you may have 'high bid' on a character, then post the IO in AH at a higher (but slightly less price).   You'll pay for the transaction, but not for the catalyst.

 

[Yomo Kimyata]

3 hours ago, Ukase said:

As far as just listing the uncatalyzed level 10 IO, and then having an alt buy it at that price - that has never, ever, ever worked for me. Never.

 

Short answer is that one or both of your characters (buyer and/or seller) has both bids and offers on that item at the same time.  Call it a bug, call it a feature, whatever, but it screws up the queue system.

 

If you want to sell an item to another alt, make sure the seller is not bidding on that item as well.  If you want to buy it on an alt, make sure you are not selling a copy.  

 

It's slightly more complex than that, but if you follow those rules you should be sound as a pound.  I do this all the time.

 

Also, if you know a market pretty well, it's certainly possible to sell an unattuned version into the pool and buy an attuned version from the pool and make a profit.

[VV]

Patience. Play the long game. Keep your bids solid on what you had been bidding. Place a lot of them and just wait until they complete. Eventually, your competitor will move on, I'm sure. People like that tend to play the short term. It will slow your profits for a while, but work out in the long term.

 

The other option is, of course, crush them and their puny dreams. Use your wealth to not only outbid them, but to corner the market on this component. Unless it is one of those seeded things that the devs put a bajillion of, that is not too hard. Do this for a week or three and eventually they will get out, when they see you are serious. This is way more costly, and can backfire over the first method, but is usually a quicker fix, and certainly more satisfying. 

[ZacKing]

challenge them to an arena duel!

[Troo]

On 10/5/2020 at 9:39 PM, tellania said:

noticed an intrusion on my market niche.

lol.. LOL.. Mwahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

 

seriously though:

Rarely is it actually profitable to try and duke it out with someone.

Diversification is likely the best move. Then circle back: If the niche hasn't settle back in a week, it will in a month.

 

[Sir Myshkin]

What happens when an immovable object meets an unstoppable force?

 

It surrenders.

 

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

 

Okay, in all seriousness the best thing to do is surrender (temporarily) your “claim” on that resource. Give it a few days, maybe a week or two, see what happens. Some folks are just looking for a quick nibble, a taste of INF, others are looking to muscle competition out.

 

Since it was called out by Yomo, I’ll use Red Fortunes as an example. About a year ago those recipes could be scooped up in bulk at 450k a shot without much concern, and even occasionally there’d be a competitive jump to 750k, but so long as only a few were involved and they spread their bids out across the entire set at a couple of stacks each then the market looked casual, fluctuating.
 

I used to by in on those heavily before I stopped single-character marketing and switched to “flip your drops” per toon as it was more convenient/flexible. I went back for a quick shot of instant-gratification INF to knock out a hundred mill for a build around late winter and the prices were seven digits! The recipes (yes, recipes) for Red Fortunes were selling for nearly as much as the crafted IOs (2 mill on average). I watched for months after as it was battled between several people going from 1.6, 1.8, 2, 2.2, then back down, or have a light mix. 
 

That locked-in price range has been that way pretty much ever since. Don’t get me wrong, there is still a margin of profit in there (we all know they’re converting it to LotG’s), but they’ve forced themselves to collectively loose out on 1.5 million in margin by being greedy on the recipe.

 

Could I, at even given time I want, completely wreck the status of that recipe’s market? Oh absolutely. I have hundreds of thousands of Merits I can roll into converters and just blanket those recipes in a bid that just breaks me even on cost, but the moment I turn away and stop, it’ll just go back into the same cycle when one (or all) of those folks involved see it normalize again. 
 

As such, the answer becomes “walk away, surrender.” Find a different niche, if the current player gets bored you can reclaim your place, but force driving prices doesn’t just harm them, it also harms the wee-folk trying to get by. A true marketer shouldn’t break the market, just bend it a little. Those who are willing to aggressively short change you and your operation by force are going to break that market if one of you doesn’t step back.
 

Collectively the above is essentially why I don’t focus on a particular piece of the market anymore and just try and take advantage of small points of gain/interest as they come up and use my drops as my source pile. So long as I can earn 1-2 mill per item I sell, I can flex the fact I don’t have an initial recipe investment in how I list something.

[Yomo Kimyata]

16 hours ago, Troo said:

lol.. LOL.. Mwahahaha...

 

To @Troo's point, it's pretty fair to say that there is nothing new under the sun, and I work under the assumption that if it appears I am the only player in a niche, it's simply because no one else is currently finding it sufficiently interesting in terms of return or entertainment value.

[Yomo Kimyata]

Or, you could always dump about 1,500 of the item in question onto the market and flood him or her out.

 

 

(also not me)

[Grindingsucks]

I do hate buying and selling on the market, but it's the only way to get the IO sets you'll want for your character in a timely fashion.  I don't really get into bidding wars, per-say, though I find waiting for my bid to go through incredibly boring, so I'll often throw an egregious amount of money at an enhancement I need to complete a set, so I can get it slotted and go about my business.

 

When selling, I just list each item for 1 influence, take whatever I get, and move on.  I spend as little time as possible on the market, though I still feel like I spend way too much time on it.  It is what it is, though.  🤷‍♂️

[Saikochoro]

Every so often though I will find a nice niche to sit in for a while until the profit margin erodes. Then I just go back to converter roulette until I eventually find a new niche. 

 

 I used to have a niche that I could easily make 8-10m per sale in profit. I kept it up for about 3 months, but did it in small volume to not arose too much interest. I did maybe 25-30 a week.  Eventually the profit margin eroded to the point where I lost interest and moved back to converter roulette. 
 

I’ve done converter roulette enough to know all of the IOs worth selling on my given level range. It usually doesn’t take more than a few conversions to make a profit of 1.5-2m off a recipe. Sometimes I will convert more if I land on a defense IO. 

Edited October 16, 2020 by Saikochoro

[Yomo Kimyata]

22 hours ago, Saikochoro said:

 

I’ve done converter roulette enough to know all of the IOs worth selling on my given level range. It usually doesn’t take more than a few conversions to make a profit of 1.5-2m off a recipe. Sometimes I will convert more if I land on a defense IO. 

For my cost accounting, I find that one yellow recipe counts for about 2mm+ in profit.  Doesn't matter if I get it from a drop or buy it on the AH.

[MunkiLord]

If it's something I work on a regular basis I'll either wait them out or move my bids high enough that there is little to no profit and the other person typically moves on relatively quickly.

 

If I'm moving in on another person's niche I'll be super aggressive for a few days to a week then move on and circle back around in a month or so.

[Dekordius]

My present method of acquiring income is diversified enough that I do not personally run into this issue very often; that said, I'll mirror the advice that others have issued and say that it's best just to leave it alone for a while. Engaging in a race to the bottom is an excellent way to murder your own margins, and there's plenty of money to be made in moving on to a different niche.

[Troyusrex]

I say fight. Make it unprofitable, or at least less profitable. Many ebil marketers (or maybe I'm just projecting....) will give up pretty quickly. There's a big ocean of places to make an easy buck and I don't want to fight with you on your little pond. Sure I COULD spend billions to win a market, but why bother?

[lokpyrite]

Under cut the bastard that's trying to horn in on my niche, if I can't make inf on it no one will

[Sir Myshkin]

Haven't logged into the game in month, occupied with other things, and saw something pretty amusing that made me think of this thread by happenstance:

 

 

If you really want a piece of the market, am I right?

 

And no, not a bug, it looks to be a costly mistake of one-too-many zeroes. 😄 Curious how many processed before they noticed. Stack of ten would be 200 million gone in a heartbeat, click that one too many times and a billion is gone in a flash!

[Sakai]

Fire and Brimstone is the only true way to handle interlopers. 

 

Well that or schools of marshmallow  guppies, but they can be unwieldy to handle at times being all gooey and whatnot. 

 

So yeah, go with Fire and Brimstone. You will receive more of a standardized result.