Greedy Goblin

Friday, February 13, 2009

281 tailoring

The alliance-only pets sell like candy in the common AH, I've elevated their prices to 20G since there is no competition.

I would be over 1000G by now if I wouldn't spend so much on leveling tailoring to be able to produce bags. I'm almost there, 19 levels to go for 300. I have the runecloth, missing some other materials.

About the server: the low amount of alliance has a very devastating effect on the economy. Much worse than I expected and I'm very happy that I started this experiment. Ideally, the size of the market would not matter as long as every tradeskills are covered. So a server with 1 BS, 1 miner ... 1 inscribe should work just as well as a server with many. After all everyone are sellers and buyers, if we increase their numbers we get no change in quality, just quantity.

Well, wrong: most people do not participate in the market as "professional" seller. They just sell what surplus they find during questing and buy stuff they need from the money they make from questing.

In order to make the economy running you need professional sellers. People who produce items for profit. I cannot buy silver rod to level my enchanting since no one is selling. I'm sure that there are BS-es in this server. I'm sure that they could make good money by listing rods. But out of these hundreds of BS-es, there is not a single businessmen who wanted to make profit from selling these rods.

Same for rugged leather for example. I'm sure that grinding lvl40-50 monsters for their skins would provide higher gold/hour than grinding anything in Northrend on a horde-dominated PvP server. Yet no one sells these leathers, although I'd pay 1G for each (not for a stack).

I'm starting to understand what's happening in "developing" countries, and what UN officials mean when they say that the country lacks the infrastructure to even distribute aid packages. There are not enough smart people who could follow their own interests and provide service for others.

My income comes outside of the ally-side market. I'm buying alliance-only pets from the vendors and sell them to horde players. My challenge was to strive in this server/side, and I'm doing it well. However if we set up the challenge to strive in a server with no other side and only a market like this and no distant NPC-s to play postman, I'd be in trouble.

PS: no matter how lost and starving and hopless this server is, buying eternal fire and selling it back as crystallized for double price still works. The civilization may collapse but as long as one idiot is alive, a "good" goblin will find a way to get resources without hard working. :-)

13 comments:

Carl said...

The gap between eternal and crystallized fires on both servers I play have dropped to about 20-30%. Not enough trade volume to make it worthwhile either.

Arbitrage on Relics of Ulduar still works though!

Anonymous said...

"I'm starting to understand what's happening in "developing" countries, and what UN officials mean when they say that the country lacks the infrastructure to even distribute aid packages. There are not enough smart people who could follow their own interests and provide service for others."

You really do not have a clue, do you?
1) There is plenty of goblins in developing countries that make more money than you can imagine. They just do what you would: charge the UN astronomical ammounts of $ to deliver the packages, then divert some trucks from their destinations so that they can sell it somewhere else. "Let the needy starve, it is their own fault they procreate", The goblin would say. This is to use your example. I can give you many other ones as they are readily available. Actually you would love it in some of these countries, regulations full of loopholes and if your business kills somebody, you can always pay government officials to look the other way.
2) People there have other priorities. They need to look for food first while avoiding mobs 20 levels higher than them (with machine guns).

One of the main issues of developing countries is actually that capitalism and darwinism is at its best. Most goblins are not taking advantage of others hunger of course...

And just to give context, I was born in one of these countries and changed areas to lower "level" ones (USA and EU) before you flame me by quoting some half assed idiot who wrote a book while waiting that his buttler brings him the brandy and cigar.
--Grorg

Anonymous said...

I cannot believe you are leveling tailoring, i was thinking of dropping it.

Havent really found a use for it maybe should start sticking bags on AH actually.

I think they need to give tailoring something more in coming patches as its a very weeek profession now i think, but what do i know lol.

Gevlon said...

@Grorg: your success of leaving that country is a great achievement, congratulation. I will write later about brute force an pillaging. I'm absolutely against it, for selfish reasons.

@Esdras: bags sell like candy! Tailoring is a real money-maker, especially after the lvl70 cloths are off CD. The botanical and the soul bags are really good sellers.

Anonymous said...

But out of these hundreds of BS-es, there is not a single businessmen who wanted to make profit from selling these rods.
Have to disagree here a bit, if I was a BS on that server/side I'd first have to check like every week which of my 100 craftable items are in dire need. Then how much profit could I make on 1 rod? 5g? 10g? Then how many would I sell per week? 3-4 maybe? We're talking about a server with very low alliance population, it's not like there's someone levelling enchanting every week.

Anonymous said...

@ Armagon

I myself am a blacksmith, on a server qith quite a few BS's the rod market is pitiful though, not so much for higher level rods but lower level ones, especially arcanite rods, can sell for alot, in fact due to lack of competition I usually sell the Arcanite rods for 4 times the price of the most expensive upper market rod.

And i sell usually about 1-4 a day.

Anonymous said...

@Grorg

You can't attribute that kind of system specifically to capitalism. The flaw in your argument arises from the fact that you could have a socialist or communist system with a dictatorial government and you would have the exact same kind of behavior.

In addition, only an idiot would charge astronomical prices in a capitalism. The actions of a true goblin would lead the prices to go to the market clearing equilibrium price and maximize consumer expenditure.

Mister K said...

I think to many people have listened to your advice on the eternal and crystallized fire on my server the market is in huge flux everyday, although if I time it right I still make a hefty profit. I actually had a question, I leveled jewelcrafting up and have just been doing the daily to get my token and selling the dragons eye on the auction house. This has given me all my gold back in just a few days of this process Is this the best bang for my busk or should I be using the dragons eyes for something more profitable

Gevlon said...

@Mister K: Dragons eye will always be profitable since it has CD, therefore its supply is limited. You MAY make more profit if you sell epic rings, you may not. That depends on your servers market. However Dragons eyes will always sell.

Unknown said...

It's good to see you're back on topic. Thank you.

Anonymous said...

I am leveling enchanting on my DK. I couldn't find the next rod I needed on the AH so asked in guild chat if we had a BS I could send mats to have one made. I'm kind of new to the whole guild social process. The BS who I sent the mats to not only sent me back the rod I needed, but the next THREE rods as well w/ his own mats.

That makes me think that selling rods on AH is hit or miss. People likely use trade or their own friends to get those kinds of products (especially on a low pop server).

BTW Gevlon, that act of kindness may have cost him a bit of cash, but it also made my day and I will certainly go out of my way to return the favor. AND it draws me into the guild, creating a sense of community and loyalty.

Value isn't always measured in Gold.

Anonymous said...

If the trademen are out there, but just not selling, has soliciting them in trade chat worked? If you use their services enough, perhaps they could turn into a direct-supplier for you.

Even on a well-populated server, it seems that once the demand in a market becomes inconsistent for processed (not gathered) goods, the supply collapses, except in cases like enchanting mats, which have no listing fee. My low-level enchanter waited for days for a silver rod, only to finally find the market flooded one day from a single seller (must have been leveling blacksmithing).

So even at a low level (my main just hit 46, tradeskill alts at 20), it has been easy to become sole-supplier of many lowbie trade goods. I admit that once my main hits 80 and can do dailies for gold, the 1G/sale might no longer be worth the time.

Gevlon said...

@bbrant: 1G/sale is not bad if it does not cost you time. If you are a sole supplier of a low level stuff that you create with a click, list it with your other stuff, than you spent 2-3 *seconds*/sale. 1G/2 secs is 1800G/hour. Far from being bad.