Price of Super pack : Lords of winter

[tidge]

The discounted Winter Packs were mostly a mechanism for the "rich to get richer", so whatever value the discounted packs provided as a sink for Influence was not great enough to matter to those who have a more complete picture of the total economy of Homecoming.

 

The following is written with no particular insight into the greater economy: I do find it strange that AFAIK the Winter ATO cannot be purchased with (some crazy large) number of Candy Canes, like the Winter's Gift recipes. I suppose this is partially because there are no Recipes for the inherently attuned pieces (Event, ATO). The means of farming Candy Canes aren't that different than simply farming merits, from my PoV.

 

Writing only for myself: I don't use enough Winter ATO pieces to bring myself to care where I get them from. I'm merit-rich, so I use the merit vendor directly. If I am not chasing some specific bonus from slotting a somewhat complete set, the only other value I generally get from them is to use (non Superior) versions while leveling, as a sort of slot-and-forget. This personal strategy is the last choice behind using attuned PVPs or Overwhelming Force.

[srmalloy]

18 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

We are back to them being able to be purchased them with merits.

If you want a purple, slot it at level 50 and catalyze it. 

 

That is if you don't want to buy them from the market.

...at a price that is significantly higher than the cost of buying the regular enhancement and a catalyst, even accounting for the fact that the seller has acquired the IO, slotted it, acquired and used a catalyst, and acquired and used an unslotter to make the Superior version available to be put in the auction house; the surcharge for the 'convenience' is often out of all proportion to the value of the enhancement.

[tidge]

20 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

...at a price that is significantly higher than the cost of buying the regular enhancement and a catalyst, even accounting for the fact that the seller has acquired the IO, slotted it, acquired and used a catalyst, and acquired and used an unslotter to make the Superior version available to be put in the auction house; the surcharge for the 'convenience' is often out of all proportion to the value of the enhancement.

 

I have to admit I'm confused why catalyzed Winters and ATOs have ever been considered worthy of being put on the market, for either sellers or buyers. I can sort of see why someone might sell such a catalyzed piece if they don't want it any longer. It strikes me as wildly inefficient, even for the newest-of-the-newly power-leveled fire farmers to buy those as catalyzed.

 

These days, it looks like the market for Superior v. non-Superior versions has roughly equalized, but I remember a time when folks were arguing for the catalyzed versions as a niche market.

[macskull]

9 hours ago, tidge said:

 

I have to admit I'm confused why catalyzed Winters and ATOs have ever been considered worthy of being put on the market

For a very brief period in 2019 the regular and superior versions were bucketed together. These days there's not much reason for the superiors to be on the market, but they are tradeable so shrug.

 

Along the lines of what the OP is asking for - I don't see any reason why the winter packs shouldn't be 10 million all the time. The other servers that share Homecoming's codebase have them for 10 million. Or we could go back to the pre-Homecoming days and make super packs into rare drops from mobs again.

[UltraAlt]

13 hours ago, srmalloy said:

...at a price that is significantly higher than the cost of buying the regular enhancement and a catalyst, even accounting for the fact that the seller has acquired the IO, slotted it, acquired and used a catalyst, and acquired and used an unslotter to make the Superior version available to be put in the auction house; the surcharge for the 'convenience' is often out of all proportion to the value of the enhancement.

 

Yes. And that is how profit on the market is gained.

People don't want to do the work to get it the cheap way so they are willing to pay what those willing to produce and/or simply put the item on the market for sale.

 

Honestly, I didn't mean to imply buying a purple Winter IO from the market for an inflated price.

My intent was to mean, just as you can purchase an Winter IO with merits, you can buy the same Winter IO from the market. And, yes, you would have to use a catalyst on either of them in order to make it purple.

 

To me, the merits is the way to go.

With card packs, it is random. You can post one you don't need for sale, wait for a sale on that item, then repost a bid on the one you want, and then wait for the bid to go through.

With merits, you pick the one you want. You have it.

 

Making it purple is the second part that could happen regardless of what method you obtained the non-purple.

If it is worth it to you, you could pop the purple out with an unslotter, put it on the market for sale, wait for the sale to go through and then repeat the process until the purple you have slotted becomes essentially free ... if you profit on the market through the transactions over time.

[Kistulot]

On 12/10/2024 at 6:12 AM, Snarky said:

the issue here is "shadow accts"  a market manipulator could just have an army of not real accts and get all that.  which is why i suggested it be linked to yearly badge acquistion.  since time online and levels gamed are too easily farmed.

The issue I have with that is, say, my badger has capped badges and I... dont really want to ever do that again.

 

The winter ATOs being more expensive than other ATOs doesnt feel like a particularly helpful feature, and you cant use candycanes until december anyway. so...

[Snarky]

1 hour ago, Kistulot said:

The issue I have with that is, say, my badger has capped badges and I... dont really want to ever do that again.

 

The winter ATOs being more expensive than other ATOs doesnt feel like a particularly helpful feature, and you cant use candycanes until december anyway. so...

And there is an answer buried in the data above (to me - it might seem winter cold to others…).  Your badger has capped badges. And has probably had a pretty solid build for the last 809 badges?  More?   You can get 500 or so badges in a full day (12 hours) doing locations.  Only (or almost only) newer characters need winter packs or any i/o.  Now , under my theory (never to be implemented) you would be able during the winter event to get discounts on 1 pack for every 100? Badges earned during that year. 

[Zect]

I often sell superior winter-O's on the AH (these generally come from respecs of old builds) and mail the inf around. Inf is easily convertible to whatever I want. Enhancements are considerably less so.

 

Obviously, if inf is a concern your calculus will differ, but for the wealthy it's the difference between going shopping with a Mastercard, as opposed to having to dig up one of my 498 treasure stashes of pirate gold.

[FrauleinMental]

On 12/14/2024 at 9:13 PM, Kistulot said:

The winter ATOs being more expensive than other ATOs doesnt feel like a particularly helpful feature, and you cant use candycanes until december anyway. so...

 

The Candy Keeper is always ready to take your candy canes in the Ski Chalet.

[Kistulot]

8 minutes ago, FrauleinMental said:

 

The Candy Keeper is always ready to take your candy canes in the Ski Chalet.

 

It's always there, but I swear I wasnt able to buy badges before december...

[lemming]

38 minutes ago, Kistulot said:

 

It's always there, but I swear I wasnt able to buy badges before december...

Checking on Beta since it is not Winter there, you can not buy badges. Here are screen shots:  offseason is on beta, inseason on live

[Kistulot]

30 minutes ago, lemming said:

Checking on Beta since it is not Winter there, you can not buy badges. Here are screen shots:  offseason is on beta, inseason on live

Thank you for proving that I have not lost my mind.

 

Felt like a tossup for a minute there.

 

...it also probably says more about me that Winter's Gift didn't occur to me but badges did.

 

...I'll show myself out.