Market Satisficing, a long term strategy

[Glacier Peak]

No, this is not a guide or market theory post. Simple question instead:

 

On the market specifically, what takes the least effort and produces the most consistent dividends over time in this game? Emphasis on over a long period of time, perhaps a year or more to start seeing income. 

 

I find the recipe to rare conversion is tedious, even if it's consistent enough. Brainstorm to rare salvage perhaps? I suppose if I could determine the most demanded item on the market over time and then build a strategy to supply that item, I'd answer my own question, but I'm not that wise. 

 

Not asking for short term big inf baller strategies, just a simple thing to do that makes its value over a long period of time and has really low work effort. 

Edited September 19, 2021 by Glacier Peak

[Yomo Kimyata]

So many ways.  So.  Many!

 

I'd ask:  how much inf do you want, and over what time period?  Do you want to maximize return per click, or overall return, or what?

 

Standard rare roulette is extremely diversified by its nature -- you end up producing all kinds of output that cost you almost nothing to make, and you can generally sell everything in short order.  I also find it entertaining, but opinions may vary.

 

If you are looking for a specific niche, I'd ask yourself what do people buy the most of.  There are plenty of things that "every" character should have.  Start with that analysis.

 

At this point in time, I at least dabble in everything.  Literally everything.  There are some areas where I can produce 10x more supply than there is demand, so I try to keep things slow there.  There are a few places where I generally cannot keep up with demand, unless I spend an hour every day on them (which I don't) but those are few.

[Glacier Peak]

41 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

So many ways.  So.  Many!

 

I'd ask:  how much inf do you want, and over what time period?  Do you want to maximize return per click, or overall return, or what?

 

Standard rare roulette is extremely diversified by its nature -- you end up producing all kinds of output that cost you almost nothing to make, and you can generally sell everything in short order.  I also find it entertaining, but opinions may vary.

 

If you are looking for a specific niche, I'd ask yourself what do people buy the most of.  There are plenty of things that "every" character should have.  Start with that analysis.

 

At this point in time, I at least dabble in everything.  Literally everything.  There are some areas where I can produce 10x more supply than there is demand, so I try to keep things slow there.  There are a few places where I generally cannot keep up with demand, unless I spend an hour every day on them (which I don't) but those are few.

I am aiming for a steady flow of income of around 1 million influence a week, with the strategy being applicable for at least a year or more. I find the rare roulette antics boring, so I am trying to find an alternative that doesn't require that sort of stuff. 

 

I actually asked a lot of the questions you asked me in my post, and I don't know the answers so I am soliciting input. Here is what I have found the least effort and the most consistent market strategy:

1. Play story arcs or TF/SF, incarnate, raid content

2. Turn merits in to something (I most always do boosters)

3. Sell that item on the market.

 

I'm finding that the supply is pretty saturated in that niche, but it supports my playstyle. I also dabbled in super packs, but the only thing I felt was worth the least amount of effort was turning brainstorms in to rares then selling on the market. 

 

Edit: I wanted to reiterate the point about this being over a period of time. If I posted a booster for 3 million influence, one person in a hurry might buy it over a period of 12 months. I don't mind that kind of long term strategy, and I have my auction house slots maxed out. So if it's just a matter of waiting, I am all ears. I did the winter packs strategy, but it was such a saturated market that I did not find it working as well over time.

Edited September 18, 2021 by Glacier Peak

[Yomo Kimyata]

1mm a week is a really low bar to set!

 

Are you willing to have a dedicated alt for this purpose, or do you want it to be an easy side gig for your main?

[Glacier Peak]

41 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

1mm a week is a really low bar to set!

 

Are you willing to have a dedicated alt for this purpose, or do you want it to be an easy side gig for your main?

Yeah, easy side gig for my main. I am not looking to make a ton of influence at once, just a little bit a week or so, but the strategy should allow for replication over a period of a year or more. I don't want the method to dry up (I mentioned winter packs).

 

I think I even went as far as buying uncommon salvage and selling it to vendors, but that was too much work over time to be worth it to me.

[Yomo Kimyata]

I was going to recommend buying common salvage and vendoring it, to be honest.  That's how I start most characters.  If you can spare 100 market slots, that's 1000 inanimate carbon rods that you buy every day and vendor for a 1,000 to 249,000 profit.  (I'd probably bid somewhere around 50, which gets you 200k profit).  Open up the AH when next to a vendor.  Collect items and when you are full on salvage, click on the vendor and right click to sell the stack.  Takes seconds, you have no selling risk.  Your only uncertainty is whether or not someone else is going to buy all the salvage offered at a higher price.

[Glacier Peak]

26 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I was going to recommend buying common salvage and vendoring it, to be honest.  That's how I start most characters.  If you can spare 100 market slots, that's 1000 inanimate carbon rods that you buy every day and vendor for a 1,000 to 249,000 profit.  (I'd probably bid somewhere around 50, which gets you 200k profit).  Open up the AH when next to a vendor.  Collect items and when you are full on salvage, click on the vendor and right click to sell the stack.  Takes seconds, you have no selling risk.  Your only uncertainty is whether or not someone else is going to buy all the salvage offered at a higher price.

Common salvage, okay that's a little bit like my uncommon salvage strategy. Worth a shot, I'll report back in a year or so on this effort. 

 

Edit: Sorry, meant to add thank you! And thanks for the sell stack shortcut, I had no idea!

Edited September 18, 2021 by Glacier Peak

[nihilii]

Yomo probably has better advice than I could ever give.

 

But as a lover of absolute lowest effort for reward strategies, here's something that has worked for me for the past two years:

- buy ATO, either through Super Packs or for 5-7M on the market

- convert it to an ATO that currently has less than 10 for sale, even better if less than 5, ideally 0

- list it for 10M. Can push it to 15M if 0 for sale

I find it's almost a guarantee you will find buyers, even at those price points. It might take weeks, but they will move eventually.

I've even had success cranking my prices to >15M at <10 for sale and >20M at 0. Blaster and Brute are almost always in high demand.

[Luminara]

I think you mis-titled the thread.  Prevarication is speaking dishonestly in an evasive manner, and you're clearly not asking about that.

 

Sorry, completely unrelated, please continue.  Without prevarication.

[Glacier Peak]

28 minutes ago, Luminara said:

I think you mis-titled the thread.  Prevarication is speaking dishonestly in an evasive manner, and you're clearly not asking about that.

 

Sorry, completely unrelated, please continue.  Without prevarication.

Oh huh good looking out

[Yomo Kimyata]

1 hour ago, Luminara said:

I think you mis-titled the thread.  Prevarication is speaking dishonestly in an evasive manner, and you're clearly not asking about that.

 

Sorry, completely unrelated, please continue.  Without prevarication.

 

You know, I was expecting the thread to be about painting the tape, but it's all good!

[Yomo Kimyata]

On 9/18/2021 at 1:37 PM, Glacier Peak said:

I am aiming for a steady flow of income of around 1 million influence a week, with the strategy being applicable for at least a year or more. 

 

I'll be honest, I could probably come up with a strategy that fits these criteria for *almost* every item in the /AH.

[Ukase]

To me, if all you seek is a lowly 1M per week, I think it is quite easily done in a number of different ways. If it were me, the most mindless thing I can come up with that actually involves playing the game would be a toss up between the Cavern of Transcendence trial for 8 merits - very easily solo'd if you have stealth and can handle two igneous by yourself. 

8 reward merits =24 converters - list them at 1 inf each and I'd bet they sell for 70k each, clearing your goal easily. If you have mission tp, even taking your time a bit, shouldn't take you more than 5 minutes. 3 minutes if you rush it. (consider it takes 40 seconds just to click the 8 glowing Obelisks.) Fast & super easy with stealth. 

Or the first Signature Story Arc out of Skyway - Theoden is the contact. That's 20 reward merits the first time you've done it, another 20 the second time, and from there after you have to wait a week. This one takes about 10 minutes, maybe 15 if you've never done it before. The Reveal temp from p2w for 10K inf is a bargain at 1000x the price. 

Those are my playing strategies for quick merits while solo, aside from explorations which are repeatable if you feel like making an alt. 

Yomo has already discussed a very viable simple marketing method. 



 

[Siouxsie]

The lowest effort that I can think of that will easily net you that amount is put in 4 million bids on the purple snipe set.  Convert those to another PvP set (Health, Defense or Armor are guaranteed sellers).  Sell for 7 million if you want near instant profit.  Sell for 8 million if you can wait a day.  Do two of those a week and done.

 

There are a ton of ways, but this requires nothing but the initial investment in the IO, a few converters, and the inf to post it on the market.

 

You could bid lower if you don't mind waiting, or even pick some of the other PvP sets for diversity.  And sell higher for the same.  But I do this on pretty much all characters so when I log into them I have a guaranteed profit waiting my return.  It's not my primary money maker, but it certainly adds up, and takes just a few minutes when I do log into the neglected characters.

[Wobegone]

I'll often put in lowball bids on popular IOs, say Luck of the Gambler Def/Recharge.  Put in a few bids for just over 3 million(today for example I bought 4 of them for 3,000,100) and just relist them for something between 4.6-5 million.  They're almost guaranteed to sell overnight.  Quick easy profit, no converting needed.  There are always folks who drop stuff on the market for peanuts, and even more folks too impatient for a lower bid to fill.

[tidge]

! MInf a week? That should be doable with just running a a Dark Astoria arc. Common IO drops at level 50 vendor for ~100 KInf on average.

[Glacier Peak]

2 hours ago, tidge said:

! MInf a week? That should be doable with just running a a Dark Astoria arc. Common IO drops at level 50 vendor for ~100 KInf on average.

Absolutely doable using your suggested method, but my aim is to do as little as possible to make that amount per week. The above suggestion from Yomo has proven sufficient in that regard. Place orders on common salvage at set price on the market at the beginning of week, sell purchased stack to vendor at the end of week. Repeat once a week. 

Edited September 30, 2021 by Glacier Peak

[tidge]

33 minutes ago, Glacier Peak said:

Absolutely doable using your suggested method, but my aim is to do as little as possible to make that amount per week. The above suggestion from Yomo has proven sufficient in that regard. Place orders on common salvage at set price on the market at the beginning of week, sell purchased stack to vendor at the end of week. Repeat once a week. 

 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯  What else are you doing with your time? (Costume designs? SG Base building? Revealing maps via travel?) (this is written in jest)

 

The SSA1 (blue/Skyway or red/Cap Au Diable) takes my lowest DPS characters (at that level, MMs) about 10 minutes to run, high DPS characters (including well-kitted Controllers) take about 6 minutes. Even counting glowies and doors, I think there is less clicking (including necessary combat) in that first arc then there would be to play market with common salvage. There is a cut scene of course.

 

The Heather Townshend DA arc can take about 10 minutes to finish with minimal enemy engagement, and 30-40 minutes to clear all maps at 0x8. Either way you end up with convertable/marketable/saleable items at the end of the arc, and if you run at 0x8 it's the near equivalent of farm in terms of things you can sell (e.g. common IOs for ~100Kinf each)

 

[Glacier Peak]

All fair suggestions - however, the entire purpose of the thread was because I created an alt that I wanted to log in to once a week and do the least amount of work while slowly increasing their inf.