Auction House - Enhancement Booster has reached an impasse

[Diantane]

For years Enhancement Boosters were selling for about a million each. There were much more buyers than sellers keeping the price high. Today on Excel, there are about 19,000 for sale and only about 10,000 buyers. This had driven the price down to about 830,000. The reason so many are for sale is because sellers (like me with over 400 (and climbing) in inventory) are holding out for the price to come back up. There are only a few scared sellers that have sold for that low price. With over a billion in "savings" I'll never be "scared" and will hold out as long as it takes as I am still making a nice income from other wares. As soon as the buyers start realizing that the present low price is a fairy tale, the sooner this all changes again.

[Luminara]

[Glacier Peak]

15 minutes ago, Diantane said:

For years Enhancement Boosters were selling for about a million each. There were much more buyers than sellers keeping the price high

 

15 minutes ago, Diantane said:

Today on Excel, there are about 19,000 for sale and only about 10,000 buyers. 

The Auction House is linked across all shards. Saying something exists on Excelsior is the same as saying it exists on all shards as it relates to the Auction House.

 

15 minutes ago, Diantane said:

There are only a few scared sellers that have sold for that low price.

 

15 minutes ago, Diantane said:

With over a billion in "savings" I'll never be "scared" and will hold out as long as it takes as I am still making a nice income from other wares.

 

15 minutes ago, Diantane said:

As soon as the buyers start realizing that the present low price is a fairy tale, the sooner this all changes again.

Edited August 25 by Glacier Peak

[GM_GooglyMoogly]

Moved to the Market sub-forum.

 

Any player is free to set their own price for items they put up for sale and items they wished to buy.  However, you will only make that sale or purchase if another player agrees with your valuation.

 

When the price of an item goes up or down it is in direct relation to supply and demand.  My guess is that there is much greater supply. 

 

The picture in the link supplied by Luminara confirms it.  That picture shows 7,626 boosters for sale, 8,579 bidding, and last sale price between 850 and a million.  Currently, there are 18,612 for sale, 10,436 bidding, and last 5 prices  of 860,000.  That tells me that supply has gone up, demand has gone down relative to the supply, which should lead to a drop in price.  And yet, the price seems to have held at around 860K.  I would not be surprised if it fell a little more.

Edited August 25 by GM_GooglyMoogly

[Yomo Kimyata]

17 hours ago, Diantane said:

There are only a few scared sellers that have sold for that low price.

 

Scared?!?  Why I oughta...

 

 

[UltraAlt]

22 hours ago, Diantane said:

As soon as the buyers start realizing that the present low price is a fairy tale, the sooner this all changes again.

 

I'm confused as to how it is a "fairy tale".

They are selling and getting paid. You aren't. That doesn't make it a "fairy tale".

 

It makes it Market PvP!

Who is winning and who is losing in that PvP battle?

Who is generating more infl!

That may be measured by month or by week, but in the end it is total profit gained over that set period - cost for generating or obtaining the product sold.

You may sell some at a higher price. They may be selling far more with a lower price margin (that being said they may be obtaining the product at a lower cost. Drops being relatively free which makes the profit all of the return.) and actually be bringing in more infl profit.

 

I seems at this point, they are probably winning that PvP battle to me.

 

And I will say that the PvP battling has heated up since the announcement that Homecoming is legit.

I think that is a good thing.

I think that Market PvP is the best and most balanced PvP in City of Heroes.

[FDR's Think Tank]

It might be time to unload your investments in Enhancement Boosters and try speculating in different markets on the Auction House. You COULD consider delving into more volatile markets, even.

 

When people realize Enhancement Boosters are only going to keep dropping in price, they will be a mass sell off and a rapid drop.... but expect to see many other resources in City of Heroes leap up in price as people speculate on them.

[Diantane]

On 8/25/2024 at 7:31 PM, GM_GooglyMoogly said:

Moved to the Market sub-forum.

 

Any player is free to set their own price for items they put up for sale and items they wished to buy.  However, you will only make that sale or purchase if another player agrees with your valuation.

 

When the price of an item goes up or down it is in direct relation to supply and demand.  My guess is that there is much greater supply. 

 

The picture in the link supplied by Luminara confirms it.  That picture shows 7,626 boosters for sale, 8,579 bidding, and last sale price between 850 and a million.  Currently, there are 18,612 for sale, 10,436 bidding, and last 5 prices  of 860,000.  That tells me that supply has gone up, demand has gone down relative to the supply, which should lead to a drop in price.  And yet, the price seems to have held at around 860K.  I would not be surprised if it fell a little more.

 

 

It would seem in the real world it is what you say. However if the suppliers aren't selling below say a million each and will hold their ground until they get it (and will continue to gain more supplies of this), it will only show a larger and larger supply number until the buyers have to start raising their prices to get and that are for sale. The ones that are selling for less are the players that are selling one or two and trying to make anything they can.

[UltraAlt]

20 minutes ago, FDR's Think Tank said:

When people realize Enhancement Boosters are only going to keep dropping in price, they will be a mass sell off and a rapid drop.... but expect to see many other resources in City of Heroes leap up in price as people speculate on them.

 

[Bionic_Flea]

1 hour ago, Diantane said:

 

 

It would seem in the real world it is what you say. However if the suppliers aren't selling below say a million each and will hold their ground until they get it (and will continue to gain more supplies of this), it will only show a larger and larger supply number until the buyers have to start raising their prices to get and that are for sale. The ones that are selling for less are the players that are selling one or two and trying to make anything they can.

 

 

You can't corner the market in CoH.  Just by playing, people create more stuff --  more inf, more merits, more recipes, more SOs & DOs, etc.  And as you can convert merits into converters as well as inf into converters (buying Super Packs) you can create more converters.  In order to corner the market, you'd have to buy all the new ones and people will still create more and more.  As you set your price at a million, they will sit there as everyone else trades for 860k or whatever price.

Edited August 27 by Bionic_Flea

[FDR's Think Tank]

1 hour ago, Bionic_Flea said:

 

 

You can't corner the market in CoH.  Just by playing, people create more stuff --  more inf, more merits, more recipes, more SOs & DOs, etc.  And as you can convert merits into converters as well as inf into converters (buying Super Packs) you can create more converters.  In order to corner the market, you'd have to buy all the new ones and people will still create more and more.  As you set your price at a million, they will sit there as everyone else trades for 860k or whatever price.

 

This is why beauty game is never an accurate portrayal of the market. There are highly irrational sellers that will insist what they have is worth more than anyone will buy it for. People do this in the real world, even when they could really use the money... never mind in a video game where they can afford to hold out for eternity. The Price will rise and fall, but it's not gonna rise much when the supply is high enough that buyers can afford to wait.

 

You can't CORNER a market on COH, but you can absolutely manipulate it. The thing is, Enhancement Boosters is not one of the markets that can be manipulated easily. OP can say they won't sell for less, and we can say we won't buy for more... but there are countless people that don't care what any of us post here. The Items in game are more likely to go up in value are are more easily inflated by an aggressive buy up. It's been done on WOW to such an massive extent that Devs panicked... but there really isn't any reason to. It just means sellers are getting more and the in house market fees are raking it in. People eventually get what they need, because this game has many paths to do so.

 

I've seen this entire argument before, and I've heard it from the other side. Some people think if you're patient enough, you can get Enhancement Boosters off the market for 750k. There used to be people that would pipeline players on how to quickly cash in various rewards on the market for cheap because many new players are more concerned about having a pile of influence.

 

The real question is... does OP actually NEED influence for something?

Edited August 27 by FDR's Think Tank

[Ukase]

Boosters...I can get boosters a few ways. 
Direct from Merit Vendor
Hero/Winter Packs
Direct from AH
The somewhat unlikely prize/gift from contest or otherwise generous player. 

Cuz, they don't drop. 
But, what is the demand for boosters? Generally by folks who want the most out of their characters. Most casual players don't even use them. 

Of the 10% of players who do (and I just pulled that % from thin air), 95% of those folks just use them in certain powers, like Hasten, maybe end mod, or a specific category. 

Half the time, you're spending the inf on the booster to eke out a fraction of 1% more of an attribute. It adds up, I suppose, but the bang for the buck isn't anything great relative to the cost of the boosters. 

I have about 10 characters with builds that are loaded with them. The rest of my characters don't even have them in Hasten. 

So, ultimately - boosters are not in high demand for me the way converters are. And at 1M each, they're in even lower demand. 

I personally take the view that if someone wants to sell them for 850k, good. It means my stack of inf will go farther than if they sold for 1M. 

Now - if you are so sure the price is too low, and you're convinced the REAL price should be 1M, then simply buy all the boosters. All of them. 
 

18576 X 1M is only short of 19 billion. 
Let's say I thought like you - they're too cheap! I buy them all as cheaply as I can and relist at the "right" price of 1M. 

You know what happens? Someone like @yomo, or maybe Andrea, or Troo comes along and says..."hmm...Ukase is being dirty! I don't like it! And Yomo pulls out some of his 10000 stacks of 25 reward merits from one of his accounts and puts 20K of them for sale at 800k. He gets all that inf - and I'm stuck. Because it will take folks forever to get through Yomo's big stack of cheap boosters. 

The moral of the story is - they are worth only as much as someone will pay. So, right now they ain't worth 1M. And honestly - they're really only worth 100K to me. Tops. They're trash. Nothing like the enhancement converter. Those have great utility. 


If you want to get real slick - go ahead and try to trick folks by purchasing 5 at 1.1M. 
Maybe the next customer will pay the "right" price. Maybe not. 

Welcome to market pvp! 

[Hedgefund]

A booster multiplies the enhancement effect by 5%.  For  a level l50 IO, this becomes 42.4*1.05 = 44.52, or a final increase of more than 2%, which is significantly more than "a fraction of 1%".  We all have our own definition of what provides utility but I find there's far more utility from boosters than converters because a booster will actually make your character stronger.  I'm not talking about spamming them into purples because yes, in that case, with ED, you are getting "a fraction of 1%" for some (not all) attributes.

[Yomo Kimyata]

1 hour ago, Hedgefund said:

We all have our own definition of what provides utility but I find there's far more utility from boosters than converters because a booster will actually make your character stronger.

 

Utility can be subjective, but I think it's fair to say that prices in the /AH for converters and boosters are primarily driven from the supply side at this point in time.  Even though you *can* get converters from drops (but not boosters), the vast vast majority are coming from merit conversions.  Economic theory and basic math would indicate that if the price ratio of boosters to converters in the /AH differs significantly from 15:1 then one would expect merit farmers to shift their conversions to whichever salvage is more lucrative.  Right now, converters seem to be running consistently at 60k +/-, which would put "fair value" for boosters at 900k.  

[golstat2003]

I'm can't remember the last time I bought or used a booster. Converters? Nearly EVERY play session. Not suprising to see the price on boosters drop.

 

As others have said, not everyone +5s their powers. I would argue it's more rare than using converters to convert other IOs to rares and then selling those rares.

[Jacke]

On 8/25/2024 at 10:25 PM, Diantane said:

For years Enhancement Boosters were selling for about a million each. There were much more buyers than sellers keeping the price high. Today on Excel, there are about 19,000 for sale and only about 10,000 buyers. This had driven the price down to about 830,000. The reason so many are for sale is because sellers (like me with over 400 (and climbing) in inventory) are holding out for the price to come back up. There are only a few scared sellers that have sold for that low price. With over a billion in "savings" I'll never be "scared" and will hold out as long as it takes as I am still making a nice income from other wares. As soon as the buyers start realizing that the present low price is a fairy tale, the sooner this all changes again.

 

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA !!!

 

I'm sorry, I'll need a moment.

 

EDIT: Went off the rails not noting that @Diantane was talking about Enhancement Boosters, not Enhancement Converters.  @Ironblade pointed that out.  Also got my own calculation price for Enhancement Converters wrong.  I use 100,000 Inf per Converter.  Though I do usually get them for around 60,000 Inf each.   Though the rest of the post is more-or-less on the point: Gotta get a feel for how the prices vary over a week or two, as well when that bracket changes.  If it doesn't appear to be changing back, have to adapt to the changes, as I have for the selling price of rare Enhancements.

 

I never sell Enhancement Converters.  I used to do a bit of Farming, but now I intermittently craft and sell Enhancements to make Inf.  (BTW, playing a L50 is good for millions of Inf per session.)  Which means I consume Enhancement Converters, a lot of them.  So I buy them on the Auction House.

 

Although I calculate with Converters costing 1-million 100,000 Inf in my calculations to make sure I get a profit on the Enhancements I sell, I feel hard-done-by if I pay more than 60,000 Inf per Converter.  And this has been true for years.

 

There's ups-and-downs for all prices on the AH.  There's the Sell-It-Now price and the Sell-It-in-a-Week-or-Two price.  Also the Buy-It-Now price and the Buy-It-in-a-Week-or-Two price.

 

There's also longer-term changes in the price range for items on the AH.  The pricey Enhancements I sell used to go for millions of Inf more.  I resisted the change, but when I realised the short-term price variation had significantly changed, had dropped, I confirmed what I could still get a profit on and adapted the Reserve Prices I post the Enhancements at to sell them.

 

If you're going to use the AH, you have to learn about it beyond what's in that Last-5-Sale-Prices window.

 

If you want and are able to sit on Converters until the price range rises, you can.  Better still to sit on the Reward Merits or convert them into Hero Merits or Villain Merits, much more compact.

 

 

Edited August 28 by Jacke

[Ironblade]

1 hour ago, Jacke said:

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA !!!

 

I'm sorry, I'll need a moment.

 

I never sell Enhancement Converters.  I used to do a bit of Farming, but now I intermittently craft and sell Enhancements to make Inf.  (BTW, playing a L50 is good for millions of Inf per session.)  Which means I consume Enhancement Converters, a lot of them.  So I buy them on the Auction House.

 

Although I calculate with Converters costing 1-million Inf in my calculations to make sure I get a profit on the Enhancements I sell, I feel hard-done-by if I pay more than 60,000 Inf per Converter.  And this has been true for years.

 

um, slow down there.  Diantane was talking about BOOSTERS and you're talking about CONVERTERS which are way cheaper than boosters.

Try to get up to speed before you start laughing at someone.

[Ironblade]

On 8/25/2024 at 6:25 PM, Diantane said:

As soon as the buyers start realizing that the present low price is a fairy tale, the sooner this all changes again.

 

Or not.  Firstly, by definition, it's not a fairy tale price.  It's the actual market value, even if you don't approve.

Secondly, we've seen long-term and/or permanent price changes before.  This could be one of those.  Time will tell.

[Jacke]

2 hours ago, Ironblade said:

um, slow down there.  Diantane was talking about BOOSTERS and you're talking about CONVERTERS which are way cheaper than boosters.

Try to get up to speed before you start laughing at someone.

 

Oh, good point.

 

Got my own stuff wrong too.  I use 100,000 Inf as the calculation price for Enhancement Converters.

 

The rest of the post is more-or-less on the point: Gotta get a feel for how the prices vary over a week or two, as well when that bracket changes.  If it doesn't appear to be changing back, have to adapt to the changes, as I have for the selling price of rare Enhancements.

 

I really rarely see Converters going much above 70,000 Inf and they're usually around 60,000 Inf, sometimes lower.  By the 15-to-1 ratio of Reward Merit Costs for Boosters over Converters, I'd expect to see Boosters hover around 900,000 Inf.  That they appear to be around 830,000 Inf is likely due to Players getting a better feel for when they're useful in a build and not overusing them as they may have in the recent past.

 

Also likely driven by Players needing to make builds, both Converters and Boosters.  If the recent addition of Marine Affinity didn't affect the price range of Boosters, I'd say that's very odd.  Maybe due to a glut of Boosters that will eventually clear.

[Ridiculous Girl]

uhhhhh... if you are selling boosters, you will never lose inf, not unless you trying to buy low and sell high. if you are buying them with merits, you will always win, it is just a matter of by how much. 😉

[Ukase]

9 hours ago, Ridiculous Girl said:

if you are buying them with merits, you will always win

Does one always win? I suppose it depends on how you define "win", right? 
 

On the one hand, merits drop from playing (or from packs). So, you exchange them for boosters, sell, then profit. 
But the profit from the sale of boosters vs converters, used wisely - I dunno if I call that a win. It is a win, in a fashion. You didn't spend time crafting and converting. You just slap them on the AH, maybe check back in a day. To be clear - it's relatively easy to compare the sales of converters vs boosters on the AH. But it's not so clear how much you make with converters by using them to turn trash into gold. I think Yomo once said he valued 1 reward merit as 1 million inf. And maybe that's true in the long run. I think you have to go through a lot of RMs to reach that average. But, I digress. 

One of the better things about CoH is there's so many options to play and earn the loot required to kit out your character and the many alts. 

Most of you are savvy enough to know this already. I just point it out for those who may not recognize the versatile ways to playing your way to in-game wealth. 

[Andreah]

There is long-term, relatively slow, deflation in the CoH player economy. I remember when Boosters routinely sold for 1.2+ million each. Selling them over 1 mill now is uncommon, at best. If you dare to list them at 1 million or more, it may be a long wait.

[Andreah]

Here's an experiment you can do to see what the demand curve looks like. Post one booster for sale at each price point between 800k and 1,000k, say, in increments of 10k. See which sell immediately, see which sell over night, see which take a week, and see which don't sell at all.

 

You can learn a lot by bidding to buy in a price spread like that, too.

[Intrinsic]

4 hours ago, Andreah said:

There is long-term, relatively slow, deflation in the CoH player economy. I remember when Boosters routinely sold for 1.2+ million each. Selling them over 1 mill now is uncommon, at best.

 

I used to sell them regularly for around 1.7-1.8 million.  As you say, the long term has trended towards deflation.  There is some buoyancy at the current price level for boosters, as other options for merits have become more attractive.

[Andreah]

Part of the pressure for deflation, is, imo, the increasing breadth of player knowledge about how to use game's features to get what they need.