Plea to all fellow AH users. Please set up your auction addons properly.

[Devlin1991]

I logged out with 15x these gems in for 800g each, sold 20 so far at 1k a pop until the prices dropped a bit. I was surprised to see them all returned to mailbox so I check Ah and I am confronted with this nonsence.



This is one of the only things in wow that genuinely frustrates and makes me irratated IRL.
undercut by 1c or at most 1g, and worst of all don't undercut YOURSELF. Take the time to set up your auction addons so that you don't repeat this guys mistakes.

[Perfectdark]

Wait....people still need auction addons? LOL

[Warwithin]

Wait....people still need auction addons? LOL

People do it without them?

[wMw]

That's technique used to broke Auctioneer addon, who making gold by playing auction house

[sscavenger]

Oh by the gods that one copper thing infuriates me beyond belief. I try to sell reasonable they undercut by a copper. Then let the price tank, things ain't worth squat. Next thing you know AH is demanding 40g for 10 wool. Just insane, and I have friends that complain about that. I ask them why they buy the cheapest only even if it is a copper. They say to save gold, I tell them those 1 copper people are the same ones charging you 1000% more than what that item is worth. Well yeah, but not when they are undercutting.

At that point I am bleeding from my ears, eyes, and nose.

[Massacre]

Oh by the gods that one copper thing infuriates me beyond belief. I try to sell reasonable they undercut by a copper. Then let the price tank, things ain't worth squat. Next thing you know AH is demanding 40g for 10 wool. Just insane, and I have friends that complain about that. I ask them why they buy the cheapest only even if it is a copper. They say to save gold, I tell them those 1 copper people are the same ones charging you 1000% more than what that item is worth. Well yeah, but not when they are undercutting.

At that point I am bleeding from my ears, eyes, and nose.

you have to be trolling, because why would you want them to undercut you by more? that's what keep the price at relative levels.

[blizzy]

I don't get it. What's wrong with undercutting by 1c?

[Endus]

Without getting into the "undercutting yourself" bit, people undercutting you by dozens or hundreds of gold is what economists like to call "competition". If supply is outpacing demand, and if there's a bunch on the AH, that's what's happening, then competition will drive prices down as suppliers drop their prices to make their selection more appealing to customers. This is basic economics.

As for why to drop it significantly; what any supplier needs to worry about is future competition. If your price is at 13g, and they undercut to 12g99s, what's to stop the next guy from going to 12g98s? To prevent this, they drop the price far enough to make future undercutting unlikely. This guarantees them sales.

Because one fact in economics is very true in the AH game; a sale is a sale is a sale. If I sell 4 items for 70g each, and yours were listed at 100g, you might think I lost 120g, but I didn't. I gained 280g. And you lost 280g, because if you'd set your price lower, those sales could have been yours.


This is how a free market in a capitalist society works. Why people continuously argue for a controlled market, I will never understand.

I don't get it. What's wrong with undercutting by 1c?

It's a hoary old retail tactic, where you hope enough customers just see the "9" in "$9.99", and mentally think it's only $9, while your competitors list at $10.00 even. So they psychologically feel that they're saving 10%, when they're really only saving 0.1%

It's relying on your customers not paying attention to pull in sales. It's treading the line of dishonesty in marketing.

When I see stuff listed for 12g99s, I buy the stuff that's listed at 13g00s instead, just to spite the guy who thinks he's outsmarting me. I kill one extra mob every 3 months to make up for my losses for doing so.

[Deleted]

I don't get it. What's wrong with undercutting by 1c?

Nothing. The OP was prefering 1c undercutting. I think you misunderstood or misread the post.

[Omarian]

People use auction addons these days? Why would you? It's pretty much l2auction, if you wanna get rid of it fast, put it way lower than other people, if you want it at the same price, do it with 1c,1s or 1g, I duncare.
Auctioneer or something is handy to buy stuff fast, see current AH price etc.. Don't need to use it for making gold?
Just play WoW and earn money, I made 75k in the last 6 months just by looting bosses and playing WoW as you should, I'm just sayin'....

[Endus]

People use auction addons these days? Why would you? It's pretty much l2auction, if you wanna get rid of it fast, put it way lower than other people, if you want it at the same price, do it with 1c,1s or 1g, I duncare.
Auctioneer or something is handy to buy stuff fast, see current AH price etc.. Don't need to use it for making gold?
Just play WoW and earn money, I made 75k in the last 6 months just by looting bosses and playing WoW as you should, I'm just sayin'....

I use AuctionLite, which lets me buy and sell in bulk far more efficiently than the default UI. It has a default undercut when selling, but you can easily just change that to whatever you like.

It comes in handy for sorting by "price per item", since the default auction window sorts by bid or buyout price, leaving odd stacks somewhere between the singles and full stacks. Also for when I'm powerleveling a new alt and need to buy 300 thick leather in one fell swoop or something.

Using an addon to track prices, though, is only helpful if you already know what you're doing, and are just using the mod as a tool to make it easier to do. Not to mention, this early in an expansion, those systems are pretty much entirely useless.

[Marahdeka]

Because one fact in economics is very true in the AH game; a sale is a sale is a sale. If I sell 4 items for 70g each, and yours were listed at 100g, you might think I lost 120g, but I didn't. I gained 280g. And you lost 280g, because if you'd set your price lower, those sales could have been yours.

The matter is a little more complicated/complex. i see it a little bit related to the realm we play on. for example, i play on Eu-Sylvanas, an old, high populated realm. a lot of people have enough gold to spend any sum on a said item, provided it's the cheapest listed on AH.
On this kind of realm, you can/should post your 4 auctions at 99g99s99c, you will sell them( ofc, if buyers are interested in said items and no one undercuts you until you sell them all) and bang, you gain 399g99s96c instead of those 280 you suggested.

[Borcster]

Are you seriously qq'ing about someone selling their gems cheaper than you?

YOU need to setup your auction addon properly, so you don't overprice your gems by 200gold, or get undercut. In the grand scheme of things, 1c undercut doesn't mean jack shit, if you're still not selling, the problem wasn't the 1c undercutting.

Basically, YOU need to l2ah.

[Endus]

The matter is a little more complicated/complex. i see it a little bit related to the realm we play on. for example, i play on Eu-Sylvanas, an old, high populated realm. a lot of people have enough gold to spend any sum on a said item, provided it's the cheapest listed on AH.
On this kind of realm, you can/should post your 4 auctions at 99g99s99c, you will sell them( ofc, if buyers are interested in said items and no one undercuts you until you sell them all) and bang, you gain 399g99s96c instead of those 280 you suggested.

And the guy who listed for 280g total probably sold his first. People undercut because speed of sale matters to them. If I'm farming ore, I want to sell a lot of ore and I want to sell it fast so I can get my next patch I'm farming on the market. Pricing low makes sense, whereas someone who's more concerned about profit per item might hold out for a higher profit margin.

This is fundamentally the reason you pay $3.59 for something at Wal-mart that you'd pay $4.39 for at Billy Bob's Hardware. Wal-mart relies on bulk sales, because selling 30,000 items for a 10 cent profit is better profit than selling 100 items at a 60 cent profit.

Fact is, they couldn't sell 30,000 at a 60 cent profit, because it's only by dropping their margin so low they can outbid other competitors enough to get that many buyers to choose them over the competition.

[Devilyaki]

This is just the norm, everyone wants their stuff to sell first so to put it at the top of the list you get undercutting. It's just compention, if you don't like it don't use the ah.

[purpledrannk]

Oh by the gods that one copper thing infuriates me beyond belief. I try to sell reasonable they undercut by a copper. Then let the price tank, things ain't worth squat. Next thing you know AH is demanding 40g for 10 wool. Just insane, and I have friends that complain about that. I ask them why they buy the cheapest only even if it is a copper. They say to save gold, I tell them those 1 copper people are the same ones charging you 1000% more than what that item is worth. Well yeah, but not when they are undercutting.

At that point I am bleeding from my ears, eyes, and nose.

thats all in the game, friend. If i could undercut by .0000000002 copper i would.

[Marahdeka]

And the guy who listed for 280g total probably sold his first. People undercut because speed of sale matters to them. If I'm farming ore, I want to sell a lot of ore and I want to sell it fast so I can get my next patch I'm farming on the market. Pricing low makes sense, whereas someone who's more concerned about profit per item might hold out for a higher profit margin.

This is fundamentally the reason you pay $3.59 for something at Wal-mart that you'd pay $4.39 for at Billy Bob's Hardware. Wal-mart relies on bulk sales, because selling 30,000 items for a 10 cent profit is better profit than selling 100 items at a 60 cent profit.

Fact is, they couldn't sell 30,000 at a 60 cent profit, because it's only by dropping their margin so low they can outbid other competitors enough to get that many buyers to choose them over the competition.

And the matter becomes even more complicated ) definitely, speed of sales matters for some, they want to get rid of that ore stacks filling up their bags or they just need fast cash. in other cases, like mine( i make money by selling crafted items), it's the profit margin that's important and i want it to be as big as possible, even if it takes 1-2 days to sell a said item. and it works quite ok, i've just sold a titanium rod for 349g99s99c( i undercut some other guy by 1c), while the mats cost 30g.

[Cortenzo]

Jeez, not this crap again.

1c "undercuts" are not undercuts. You simply try to trick the buyers by posing as the cheapest, even though your stuff is still stupidly overpriced.

With multiple sellers, the one with the lowest profit expectations win. Always.

Adjust your pricing or keep getting your auctions back unsold.

[Arazu]

Without getting into the "undercutting yourself" bit, people undercutting you by dozens or hundreds of gold is what economists like to call "competition". If supply is outpacing demand, and if there's a bunch on the AH, that's what's happening, then competition will drive prices down as suppliers drop their prices to make their selection more appealing to customers. This is basic economics.

As for why to drop it significantly; what any supplier needs to worry about is future competition. If your price is at 13g, and they undercut to 12g99s, what's to stop the next guy from going to 12g98s? To prevent this, they drop the price far enough to make future undercutting unlikely. This guarantees them sales.

Because one fact in economics is very true in the AH game; a sale is a sale is a sale. If I sell 4 items for 70g each, and yours were listed at 100g, you might think I lost 120g, but I didn't. I gained 280g. And you lost 280g, because if you'd set your price lower, those sales could have been yours.


This is how a free market in a capitalist society works. Why people continuously argue for a controlled market, I will never understand.


It's a hoary old retail tactic, where you hope enough customers just see the "9" in "$9.99", and mentally think it's only $9, while your competitors list at $10.00 even. So they psychologically feel that they're saving 10%, when they're really only saving 0.1%

It's relying on your customers not paying attention to pull in sales. It's treading the line of dishonesty in marketing.

When I see stuff listed for 12g99s, I buy the stuff that's listed at 13g00s instead, just to spite the guy who thinks he's outsmarting me. I kill one extra mob every 3 months to make up for my losses for doing so.

The fact is that if you search for an item a lot of people have it setup so the cheaper price shows up on top so the 9g99s will be ahead of the 10g.
Now if it makes you feel better that you took an economics class and felt like educating the noobs about something completely irrelevant to the game then more power to ya. WoW auction house has nothing to do with real life economy.

You say you would buy the stuff for 13g instead of 12g99 instead just to spite the guy who thinks he outsmarted you. Do you really think that person knows or even cares that you did that?
Like I said I'm not trying to trick anyone by putting it there for 1c cheaper, its just how it works, if i want my stuff sold before yours i'll undercut you. When you're trying to move the product you'll put it at the cheapest price out there, even if it's just by 1 copper.

[Endus]

WoW auction house has nothing to do with real life economy.

Only because certain factors, like manufacturing and shipping costs, are nonexistent. The same rules which govern real-world economies also affect WoW economies, in a practically textbook-pure way.