When I was 12 years old, I was climbing through the barn
when I found a cardboard display of collapsible sunglasses. The idea behind
these folding sunglasses was the ability to snap and fold the glasses small
enough to fit into your pocket. There were a few design flaws however. Many of
the places where the sunglasses were to fold were poorly made and while wearing
them your hair would always be pinched and tugged. Comfort is a strong point in
any type of body accessory. They were utterly uncomfortable. I dug the
cardboard display out from underneath a few boxes and hay. I went to my father
immediately to ask permission to set up a sales stand. He agreed and I was on
my way. I grabbed the nearest folding picnic table, a chair, and a Dukes of
Hazzard magazine. I headed outside to the road. I setup my stand, and my
business was born. In the South it is not uncommon to find many different
tradesmen on the side of the road. Some of them setup mini flea markets, and
yard sales. I was a sunglasses salesman. Of course at the time I wasn’t aware
of style. My sunglasses were 1970’s styled, it was ’97. It was definitely an oversight on my part. I sold very few.
Three days of very small amounts of sales, I decided to pack
it up. I look back on that day now and I am excited for the amount of sales
that I had. I had made over 20 dollars, and sold only 4 pairs of sunglasses. I
had no overhead, no investors, and I was able to make a 100% profit.
I was no millionaire, but deep down, I was becoming a Gold
Goblin.
When I first started in World of Warcraft it was 2006, I was
in Houston Texas working for the government. I remember running through
Stranglethorn Vale to Booty Bay, on a 100 gold bet that I couldn’t make it all
the way as a level 17 paladin. I won the bet and was 100 gold richer. I
immediately flew back to Stormwind and began scanning through the auction house
for things to buy. (This was before Auctioneer mind you, or at least before my
knowledge of it) As I scanned each page for cheap items I ran across a stack of
Mithril Ore posted for only 10 gold. I purchased it immediately. That stack of mithril
ore sat in my bag for at least 2 more levels. Since I couldn’t use it quite
yet, I posted it back on the Auction House for 20 gold. This story sticks out
in my mind of being the first time I had ever made any profit in a video game.
Sure I had posted things before and they had sold, but it was the first time I
ever used the flip technique. Not 2 hours after I posted the mithril ore, it
had sold. It brought me 10 gold in profit, and I then invested that profit into
more stock. My adventure as a Gold Goblin had begun.
Let’s backtrack. The
Flip Technique, is a common technique used by anyone who has ever played a
player market. Sometimes a player does this without even thinking about it.
They buy an item from the market, and turn around and sell that item either
because they didn’t need it or needed it and didn’t use it. This is considered
flipping an item. Even unintentional flips are considered flipping. So if we
are to buy a large investment, let’s say 250,000 gold worth of materials, and
we repost and make only 1 gold, we are still in profit, and we have still
flipped an investment.
Flipping is not a hard concept to grasp. We fall back to the
phrase, “Buy Low, Sell High.” This is the essence of flipping. Never should we
ever take a loss using this technique, if it appears we will take a loss, we do
not sell.
I would just be telling you something you already knew if I
didn’t throw in my own advice. Often times we make poor decisions. We are
human. We make poor investments and often times we lose because of these poor
investments. All is not lost, but we lose big time when we know little about
our investment.
If you do not know everything about the item you are about
to invest in, DO NOT BUY IT!!!!
Product Research
is very important, without it, we know nothing about the market in which we are
about to enter. We spend more time worried about the dollar sign instead of the
signs of the market. It takes a long time to get at the level of knowing all
about the market niches. Until then, we start small. We start small, and we
learn. We learn, and we profit. ‘Simple in Concept, Simple in Action. Always
simple.’
After we have
established a proper knowledge of an item, its value, and its use, we can then
move on to establish an Average Market
Price.
In the Elder Scrolls online, we do not have an Auction House
to reference our prices. We only have what is currently going through trade
markets and chat. We are responsible for knowing these prices. We are the
sellers. Through what I call the trade
union proposal, I have written a set of steps to prepare ourselves for
evaluating and obtaining an Average Market Price:
- · Supply and Demand – What items are in good/bad supply, what items are in Demand
- · Player Income – What is the average amount of money a player makes in one play session (4 hours)
- · Class Warfare – Some players will be better at hording items than others, some will be more frugal with their money. Find the Balance.
- · Popular Professions – At launch, we expect a large amount of people to be leveling their professions. They will pay what they can.
- · Sell Small – Remember, you are starting a new game, the first month, you focus on you. Do not focus on making money just yet.
- · Document, Document, Document – If it’s useful information write it down.
The first month is
blown, do not expect to get in a good routine in the first month of release. Do
not worry with prices, or even selling for that matter. The market will
eventually sustain itself. For now, we worry only about our own progression and
professions.
In order to calculate the Average Market Price, we will need
to take all of the above things into account.
Example:
ChillBilly makes
1000g per hour each play session. He has 4000 gold. During his play time he
accumulates 60 iron ore, 60 wood, 60 Capon Meat. He is low level, under 17.
He is attempting to build his skills in Blacksmithing. He
immediately burns through his supply of 60 iron ore, and after crafting and
extracting he is off to the market to obtain more Iron ore.
“WTB 100 Iron Ore, willing to pay 100 gold” (of course I get
trolled)
So ChillBilly has evaluated that 1 iron ore is worth 1 gold.
His potential sellers troll him for this evaluation.
So ChillBilly retorts with “WTB 100 Iron Ore” A seller comes online and offers ChillBilly 100
Iron Ore for 300 gold, an increase of 2 gold per iron ore, set at the price of 3
gold per Iron Ore
ChillBilly agrees and makes the deal.
ChillBilly
immediately writes down his transaction of 3 gold per 1 iron ore, maximum
investment of 300 gold.
Later down the road, ChillBilly needs 100 more iron ore, he
goes to the trade channel “WTB 100 iron
ore”
A seller approaches him with a 5 gold per iron ore proposal.
This puts the total value at 500 gold for the transaction. ChillBilly Agrees.
Later he needs another 100 iron
ore, and a seller proposes a 4 gold per iron ore proposal. 400 gold for the
transaction. ChillBilly Agrees.
ChillBilly Farms Iron Ore only for about an hour and comes
up with 100 iron ore.
From his previous transactions he adds together the Sum of
each transaction.
3+4+5= 12
He divides the number of transactions from the sum of the
transactions.
12 divided by 3 = 4.
He now has his Average Market Price for his
transactions. He begins to sell his items judged by this Average Market Price per item.
These numbers will change due to sources of information. A
good Gold Goblin, is a good listener. Listening to transactions across trade channels
and trade communications centers allows a Gold Goblin to calculate what he or
she should be selling their items for.
My suggestion:
In order for these values to be assumed, we must find where
players are trading. With any luck, a large amount of players will use a
teamspeak like mine to do their trading.
In other terms, players will be found in certain locations.
Either in main cities or at Wayshrines. You can fast travel to players.
However, you will not fast travel directly to a player, rather you will travel
to the closest way shrines.
It will not be uncommon for players to be found selling
items around these wayshrines. In fact, I would expect to see many player
markets spring up in local chat around these wayshrines.
We may even go so far as seeing live auctions right before
our eyes in game. Unfortunately, the chat will not be seen above our heads as
we have seen previously in games such as World of Warcraft. Instead chat will
remain in the chat box, and it will be much more difficult for players to
locate you. Venues will most definitely help this problem. Keep your eyes open
for highly traveled areas. These will be your venues of trade.
Tamriel Gold Goblin
Trade Network Teamspeak:
199.68.232.126
Looking for
responsible staff for this server. It is preferable that you are the leader of
a guild or an officer in a guild.
You can email me with
your interest
tamrielgoldgoblin@gmail.com
-CB
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