Crafter's Crib Bazaar Guidelines

quite the opposite actually. The buyer is the one with the gil. If he decides someones price is to expensive then that seller can sit there selling to nobody while the buyer simply goes find a different seller.

I will follow rules since I respect your awesome site.

Lol I just have to say wow cheers to you

So it bothers you when people see through the scam and call the seller out on the HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE price? Probably because the person stands to lose profit when that one idiot becomes wise to their scheme by others telling them. I really hated dealing with any crafter because most of the nerds are completely greedy individuals as seen here.

Your example makes no sense because the same concept works in real life. If too many people think the price is ridiculous and it gets no buyers, the seller is forced to re-negotiate the price so that people are willing to buy it. If nobody complains about a price or a group of people are being lied to about the avg price of a specific item, they end up getting scammed. Also there are no "feels" here when it comes to price. It should be a certain amount above the cost of the materials and time invested in creating the item. You should make profit on the item but not a disgusting amount simply because you scammed people into believing the price was way higher than it should be.

This thread isn't about the value of an item though, it's about thread policy.

If I go to a store, found an item that I really want, I always have right to visit several different Store to compare prices until I found a price that I want to pay for. If I'm trying to get the price for a PC, I can get the price from Amazon, Walmart or ebay until I found a price that I like.

Since that's how rl economy works FFXI should be the same. In fact even auction house has transparent sell history, why cant WTS thread has the same?

Asking for thread policy that gives equal playing field between sellers and buyers isn't whining, it's asking for the right thing.

I think we should ban WTS threads. The bazaar/wanted features work fine. People who are interested in HQ cursed items usually look for listings on different servers anyways. If people want extra attention with a WTB thread that's okay I guess. The WTS threads have been mostly drama though. Although I do enjoy reading the drama, there have been obvious cases of auction shilling and other forms of nefarious horse ***going on. Worse yet is that when people point this out, their posts are deleted and they're derided by the auction shills.

[quote

With how economy works, the price of an item isn't determined by the seller, but supply and demand [/quote]

Did you even read my points in my previous post? I wasn't saying sellers can't decide how much you want to sell at all. You can sell stuff for 3 billion gil for all I care, that wasn't my point though.


And what you are saying in your own post was still supply and demand, thanks for proving my point. Even if Walmart decide to sell their PC for $50000 instead of $500, they aren't invalidating the rule of supply and demand. The market value of PC are not going to change to $50000 just because Walmart said so.

The market value of an item is what people are willing to pay, not sellers wanting to sell. Otherwise I can just go on Ebay and sell my grandma's finger nail for US $4000, refuse to sell it any lower, and claim $4000 is the market value of my grandma's finger nail.... obviously that's not gonna work because no one's gonna pay $4k for it.

The market value of an item is only established once a transaction has been made， economics 101.

Less drama in WTS threads than almost every single other thread on front page atm. Lets ban all threads and not focus on the drama creators. I made 1 WTS thread ever and it was drama free and worked out nicely.

That's a valid point. I still stand by banning all WTS threads. They are not necessary. The bazaar/wanted features of FFXIAH are a much better implementation. I never any trouble with cross server trading before WTS threads and trying to enforce rules against shilling might be impractical.

threads get more exposure then an item page. Several times iv seen wts threads that iv checked out just from finding it interesting or something i was thinking about one day and wanted to check it out. - Also you cant sell services on an item page. Or at the very best, not effectively. Those selling merc services killing various nms, or building weapons or what not.. it just doesn't work through item pages.

@ Afania, my apologies. I wrote that last night after quite a few drinks with the neighbors. I do see your point.. I only read the first line and reacted.

I don't think Snaps meant to ban merc threads. Specifically the people posting to sell a single, not particularly rare, item that can be listed on the wanted pages. Many of them use the threads to price fix, and no buyer is better off for the thread having existed because once you've decided you want a specific cursed item you're checking it's page frequently anyway. I'd also be in support of a blanket ban on WTS.

I'm not sure there is price fixing in WTS threads. I know that most people going into WTS threads and stirring drama and stating prices aren't factoring in many things, break rates, real time market value of mats especially after they are in demand, the crafters time and investment, and saying things above cost of mats are unfair to buyers is just trollish imo.

The AH history is fixable just sell to a sock account, the asking price if fixable and usually people list their wanted as 1 gil or way below cost, and I'm sure some make sock accounts only to list fake items for sale at below or at cost as well. In fact price fixing this way doesn't even require waiting a week, so why would someone price fix a WTS thread. To be honest the amount of drama and harassment crafters get on WTS threads makes me not want to even try making another sachet +1 and try to sell it. People would quote prices for mats as they were before demand spiked, I spent an entire day farming ores and burned through half my stored mats for other HQ I want to get my sachet +1, and yet if I sold that for any markup at all I'd be trolled, heck even at cost since people were valuing ore at 300k instead of what it was going for (1 mil).

There is no transparency, you can't know what the crafter got their mats for or when, the market changes daily, HQ rates aren't exactly pinned down with all bonuses they are estimated, you never know if you're going to end up anywhere near statistical average on HQ and most crafter will never make 100 of a luxary HQ item, most make zero to 1 if they even attempt it so using statistical averages is a very poor metric, or haven't you heard of people that go 0/300 on a 5% chance Dring or 1/1? How will the law of averages ever kick in without a high sample size? It cannot and no crafter I've ever known has made enough of something to have the law of averages kick in for these super expensive items. That is why statistical average cost is a guide, and demanding an item be sold to you for statistical average cost is not going to encourage crafters to make you more ***you don't need. You can't unload NQ, sometimes you get to NPC them, that's how hard they are to sell even below cost. When you end up with 16 NQ sachets and 1 HQ, you even burn through friends who want one eventually. That's not even to mention the fact no one wants to buy them and would rather roll the dice themselves and have you craft the mats for free for them. Because you know, I spent weeks and millions and all that time farming guild points so I could give free HQ chances to strangers.

The people going into WTS threads and saying it's too expensive want it at a cheaper cost to them, and all items at a cheaper cost to them. Fairness isn't something I see actually a concern very often. If it was fair, I'd get paid better than I get paid to farm the mats and sell them, I'd get more for the risk involved too because there is a lot of risk, I'd not have to put up with drama to make a sale or negotiate with angry players only caring about their bottom line, and I'd have the ability have visibility on the front page of the AH site without people calling for them to be taken down and banned while they discuss conspiracy theories and politics instead. As is, I've never and have no intention to make a WTS thread, or even make an extremely pricey HQ and sell them. Which is funny, because all you guys looking for your bottom line and harassing crafters for prices are shooting yourselves in the foot, while the farmers will farm what is in demand, you're persuading less crafters to craft because you're making it not worth it for them to do so which makes the demand stay high and the supply low, and also means there's less competition and more bargaining power for the few willing to put up with your ***which by the way doesn't prohibit them from finding buyers it could even help. SO in the end, big picture considered you're actually raising the price with your behavior but who knew being short sighted with tunnel vision, selfish and a jerk would have a negative overall impact, gee.

Afania is the only one here trying to make impartial and logical reasoning, that I can see, everyone else has some extreme bias one way or another. That doesn't mean I agree with all Afania is saying. I'm only gonna say all this once, and you guys can argue back and forth till page 9, maybe then mods will finally (mercifully) lock the topic as everyone struggles to have the last word in, this is my last word on the topic ever it's already drama and a waste of my time. I think that what goes on in WTS or Merc threads both aren't haggling, haggling isn't using peer pressure, insults, shame and bully tactics to lower prices. That's called being an ***, and that's what usually happens and why posts are and should be removed (Someone in this very thread said all crafters are gil grabbing basement dwelling nerds and not your friends in a WTS thread and is still bitching about their post being moderated, seriously?). Honestly anyone not actively buying in the thread, and stirring up drama should be topic banned from all merc threads and wts threads permanently and then we'd have some peace. At least in the threads, I'm sure the mods then get to deal with their howls of rage for being silenced, b/c you know, being an *** is their god given right and how dare someone take that from them. Honestly I feel sorry for the mods to deal with all this crap. Do you guys all go into best buy and yell at their manager and call them names because their electronics are overpriced? Do you go into tourist shops at tourists locations, ask the owner to come out and insult him and his character because his prices are high? If that isn't acceptable in real life why do you think it is online? You're being douches. You buy online if you want cheap electronics, or look for refurbished stuff etc, in game you look for other sellers, if you can't wait on the mail you pay higher shipping fees or you buy from best buy anyway. You might talk to people about how best buy is super expensive or such and such seller is in game, but you don't go to their store and say they "deserve" to be put down and verbally attacked. Most of you are being extremely juvenile, justifying picking on people you disagree with or who have different values than you or don't behave how you want, grow up. Justifying intimidation tactics is the tagline and theme song of bullies and *** everywhere and it makes me embarrassed to even associate with the site. Most forum sites have a no off topic rule, this is one great demonstration why. Going into a WTS thread, and posting anything other than price offers, or questions about the product are strictly off topic. What gets me most, is a lot of the complainers are ok stockpiling mats and selling them high on the AH when demand spikes up, but if a crafter makes a new synth that is in high demand using their own stockpiled mats to try and sell a HQ at a high price it's gouging and the highest form of sin. And they never have any self reflection at all, or even compare it to real life where that's just considered good business.

those are nice generalizations and all, but faking a 450m offer on something that's currently listed for 250m on multiple servers is pretty hard to interpret as anything but price fixing

the problem isn't people choosing to sell at a high price, it's them faking demand at that price to support it

you don't have any of those problems using the existing bazaar function, which people have yet to point out an adequate shortcoming of

significantly less exposure. Cant ask questions about it or discuss it. Cant get other ppls opinions on it.

But you can ask questions or discuss it, by simply sending a PM to the person who has it for sale. You don't need crowd input to sell a single item. Merc threads are different. Known quite a few merc, including myself, to work effectively by just putting the r/ex in ffxiah as well.

Well said verda. Personal experience: I synthed a sachet +1 and got a lucky sale for 75 mil. So at the time only one other was up, the demand was there so I dropped a ton of Gil buying all the mats to try again. I did not want to pay the sifs and sirens prices so I synthed all those my self as well, including the rainbow and gold threads. Took a while making all the base mats myself to build for 12 sachet +1 attempts. Turns out after all the work I did not have one. So I did it again, built another 12 synths. I finally hq'd again on second last (of 24 attempts). I almost did not. It cost me nearly 40 mil in attempts that was almost a complete loss. It could of went the other way for me. I levelled every single craft on 8 different mules, done guild points and stalls on all, and I have farmed so far 4/8 torques. Only one of my mules besides my main I levelled to 70 to even wear the torque. Others still stuck on different limit breaks. People don't see the big picture. The other day I spent hours making over 100 dragon cuisses then dboxing them 8 at a time to my alchemy crafter. I made a total of 10 cursed cuisses -1. Then bought 2 more off ah for 3 mil each. Dropped about 6-7 mil on just ores for them. Not a single voodoo cuisses this time. People that don't craft never see this, all they see is Disneyland pumping voodoo out like someone that farms honey. The struggle is real, any crafter knows this. Being a farmer is way more profitable then an HQ crafter.

The argument has never been what price an item is listed for. The threads are used to show false sales to try to entice buyers to pay more than an item is really going for.

Imagine you go into a car dealership and see a car with no sticker price. The dealer tells you there is a $35,000 offer on it that he has yet to accept. If you're willing to believe them, you will assume you have to spend more than $35,000 to get it and think that it is worth at least $35,000 to someone else. Meanwhile, every other dealer has the same car sitting at $25,000 ready to go. That's what the people spamming threads are doing, exploiting the visibility and faking offers to scam people.

Only idiots like foreverj would complain about someone listing an item at any price of their choice. The problem comes from those who fake sales to try to force that price to be a reality.

I wasn't targetting you, I was giving examples.

I'm not accusing you of anything, I was merely pointing out what some people may do, and some already do.

As someone that is usually a buyer, i rather like being able to see the community input. Some times they are able to point out things i was unaware of, or offer suggestions that could help. Especially when its a mix of a merc selling a single item drop.

If ppl believe false sales or dont shop around, then thats on them. In fact the idea that the thread promotes fixing also promotes the opposite. In a bazar/wanted item page you see the price and thats it. In a thread you can discuss it. While the seller could try to jack it up and make it look legit, you also have the ppl that will point out that and item simply is not worth what is being charged. Which shows its not the thread that is the issue, its the ppl. So i prefer having an open dialog on an item and dont think it should be silenced.

mods delete these posts consistantly, which is why it's been allowed to go on

Again, the posts are deleted due to the hostile way most people call sellers out. A simple "that's overpriced, it should be closer to x amount on y server" won't be removed, "OP is a price gouging dicksucker" will.

Seems like it's a whole lot of trouble on mods end, whole lot of annoyance on readers end, and very little benefit to anyone except the people spamming sell threads. Really don't get why they're allowed to continue to do so.

And there were absolutely posts deleted for calling the seller out on fake sales without personal insults.

Mistakes were made. I'll adjust to fix that in the future. On continuing sell threads, I'd prefer to move away from them when improvements are made to bazaar functions. The bazaar is usable but it has less exposure than a thread, we need to adjust this to give people incentive to use the bazaar.

I honestly don't understand the whole exposure issue, from a buyer point of view.

I want to buy Cursed Trews -1. I go on FFXIAH, I go to the Cursed Trews -1 page. I see the prices at which the item has sold and under that, I see the "Bazaar" block showing the players who are selling this in their bazaar right now, and for how much.
Beyond that, I also see people who sell it based on their FFXIAH bazaar.

If no one is selling it, Based on the AH price, I have a rough idea of the price. I can then check the materials, calculate what may be a reasonable price, compare it to the price listed and I can shout for one.

However, some items have never been sold on AH. Well, on top of that, I can't see the price of the most expensive item in the synth. I'm therefore clueless as to how much it may cost.
Well, what I can do is try asking people around me and also estimate the difficulty to obtain said item and the synth (if it's a synth) to come up with a rough price.

If I can't do that, well, if someone was able to craft it and willing to sell such items, they'd hopefully add them to their bazaar section on FFXIAH. If not, I can always shout and discuss with the crafters.

So, all in all, what is the issue with the exposure that we can see right now on FFXIAH? Sure, it can be made better, and I think people here who buy/sell often based on this information may be interested. But what is the issue with exposure? And even better, how can it be made better?

If I HQ a cursed for Adhemar body and I want to sell it for 800M or less (the famous price "1"), I'll list it on my FFXIAH bazaar and I'll shout.
I don't see how you can get more exposure than this.

Regarding the whole possible drama issue, if you make a system that has flaws from the start, well, it's gonna be rough. I don't know if this guy did price gouging by himself, but if he did, he deserves extra attention from moderators without going as far as putting a tag on him. That's a lot of work compared to "yo, this ***is working properly, are you daft?".

I mean, I understand people asking for 30 currencies for a relic as there is nothing for that and people are usually passive, you need to get in their face to get the help, but selling items? If people want to buy, they'll see the people selling. That's unneeded drama potential.

But in the previous version of forum rule, you are not allowed to point it out, so technically someone can start a thread, sell a 350m item for 999m and no one else are allowed to post "I just bought the same thing for 350m". Thus people expressed disagreement with the forum rule in this thread.

@Verda Although you are right that people can still price fix on AH sales history, with names displayed in every single transaction it's still possible to track down the character to see if it's legit. Also other competitor can still undercut on AH, unlike previous forum rule which undercut isn't allowed. Thus gives sellers more advantage than using other sales method.

As for the trolling issues, maybe make a rule that only allow people to post nothing else but prices?

Well, another perspective would be people make threads to sell new hqs or lvl 115 synthesis. Yes you can check baazars and ah if your a buyer seeking, but being such a rare synth it might not be available for a month, so the buyer stops checking. Upon crafting it, the crafter is letting the community know that one been made. A potential buyer might not of been looking.

The current situation also creates an awkward position if someone wants to advertise an item already being advertised.

Let's say seller A has an item listed in a thread, asking for 350m.

Seller B has the same item, and logs on ffxiah planning to sell it for 300m. They see a thread already exists for that item.

Does seller B make a new thread, further cluttering up the front page? Seems like it'd snowball pretty quickly, especially if the threads continue to grow at the rate they have been.

Does seller B accept that they'll have to take less exposure and hope customers are aware they are offering the item cheaper? Doesn't seem particularly fair, because they just so happened to log on or make the item a few hours later.

Is seller B allowed to post in seller A's thread to say they have the same item cheaper? That seems like asking for trouble.

Let's look at the same situation using the bazaar system.

Seller A has their item in bazaar for 350m. Seller B places the item in bazaar for 300m. Potential buyer goes to look at page, sees there are 2 sellers available. They contact the seller with the lower price, and purchase from them. If the item's value is greater than 300m, then another buyer will be along soon enough to purchase seller A's. If it is not, seller B will eventually realize the stream of lower sales is preventing theirs from moving and adjust it to a reasonable price.

The threads only 'work' to the extent they do because most sellers don't think of themselves as important enough to make a thread for every item they synth and bump them constantly. If it was the standard way to do transactions on high value items, it would become unmanagable extremely quickly.