Architect Archive
Thread: And I quote: Holy s#$t, you are WAY overpriced
Another thing those newbie Architects can do to help them out and not sell at undercut prices to the public.
Get in with someone that runs a General Store/Shopping Mall, etc.
You can sell to them for the price you were going to sell to the public (usually a lot easier than standing around hollering such and such for sale) and the other person can sell it forgoing prices and also make a profit.
The Newbie Architect has a source of somewhat steady orders coming in and money and the person running the mall has some product ot supply his customers with.
I have done this quite a bit.
Sterma wrote:
Well guys I may be one of the guys you hate I may one of the guys you love, but here it is.
My prices are inline with most of you I may be a little bit cheaper, but here is my difference.
I don't argue with these folks. Period.
How much is a medium Tattoine house?
55k
WOW! That's expensive let me look around..
Cool
I am currently working on upgrading all my harvesters to heavies and if i have to run missions for two hours to pay for em, no big deal, but I won't.
I give a shout every time I hit a port with what i have in my backpack and someone says when can you have it done and I say NOW, and it is sold
Yeah the UBAH PA kidz are undercutting the market, well brothers sooner or later some of the little errand boys that are running the harvetsers and using their lots are gonna want a piece of the candy and that my frineds is where it will fall apart.
They have a case of the hereafter disease...
I will be here after they are LOOONG gone
PA's break up...friends don't.
You guys on chilastra want to even the playing field? Find his guild's harvetsers and find who the belong to and offer to buy the materials...
undercut the undercutter, cause if they are just GIVING him the resources, well money talks, hehe.
"if it is worth doing, it is worth doing for CREDITS,
If it is worth doign well, it is worth doing for MORE CREDITS..."
Sterma,
Woot, tell it like it is.
I do the exact same thing. My prices are right in line with where they should be so I'm often told I'm overcharging and someone can find it cheaper somewhere else for xx amount.
I respond with "That's a rockin' deal for you. You should buy from that Architect."
I don't bother explaining how many resources it takes or badmouthing the other guys. I already know how much it takes and how much I need to charge for it - end of story.
I also keep a bunch of deeds in my pack and most of my sales are on-the-spot sales. People really like to get what they want immediately. I just craft a variety of stuff beforehand (when I feel like it). I probably have 2-3m worth of deeds collected in my pack right now.
And on the side I sell resources from my heavy harvesters. Makes good money and no crit fails. I don't have to actually sell structures at all (and I sometimes wonder why I still do).
I prefer to enjoy the game instead of trying to corner the market. I suppose the biggest benefit of being a Master Architect is that I can help our village residents and that I can make and plop down different houses on different planets to my heart's content.
I've also noticed another trend and that is that a lot of Master Architect friends of mine seem to have stopped selling, except occasionally. I used to refer customers to them on a regular basis (I sell infrequently myself)and they've asked me to stop sending any more customers.
Right now, I sell maybe one or two structures a week and I turn down PA Hall requests. I made those during Beta and am proud to say that I haven'tmade a single **edit** PA Hall at all during the live game and I don't intend to either.
I'm not exactly rich, I rarely have more than 500k credits in the bank, but I'm the master of my own game time.
Does that make me too selfish?
NarfleTheGarthog wrote:
I have to aplogize to you all, having undercut prices myself. At the time it seemed like the right thing to do. Yes I knew that my price was half of the market rate but at 0 credits, and knowing that there was 2k of aresource I needed to make another house sitting in the bazaar for 3k it seemed to be the best way to get the XP. This is the key to understand about undercutters. Most of us don't do it for long. we aren't trying to make a profit yet, we are just trying to offset the cost of gaining XP. Having mastered Artisan now and moving into Architecture I am charging 2x to 3xthe priceI started with. But I see the market getting drastically undercut by people doing the same thing I was. So what is the fix?
The best Idea I've seen so far is to help out Novices. Few shoppers are really concerned about the experimentation you put into the deed starting out (small houses and harvs). They just want the extra storage capacity. So If you are a master, Find Players that are starting out and take them on as apprentices. Give them 25% more than they would ask for and resell it your self. This seems cheap to some people but when you look at it, it isn't. The Grinding crafter isn't concerned yet about turning a profit, they are concerned about affording more material to get XP. So you help them out by giving them the extra cash, make a little extra your self and help keep prices stable. This has another benefit for you if you are workingon merchant XP. You will have more items to sell in your vendors and there will be potentially less vendors meaning more people will visit your shop and give you a better chance for return customers.
I have always thought this was a great idea, so I tried to help out a guy I saw selling smalls for 5k on Starsider. Offered him 9k for wall modules, as many as he could build. He said "Wow! That's way worth it." So I gave him the waypoint to my vendor, it's very near Keren on Naboo and went on my way, happy that I would be trying to help out a Novice architect. Know what? He hasn't spoken to me or offered anything to my vendor.
My guess? He thinks he's establishing a customer base with his 5k houses, so he continues to build them. What he doesn't realize is that when he gets to medium harvs, his costs will shoot up, and his prices just won't cut it anymore. And those same customers won't tolerate the price increase, they'll always want it at 1.5 CP/R, and you can't survive that way and have fun at the same time.
Next time you run into him buy up all he's got and resell em .. that's what I do ... if they insist on making houses and selling them for 5 with similar amounts of resource it takes to make a wall unit which you offered him 9k for (which I think is nutty, but that's just me 
) then just take him off the market. Maybe offer to have him come over and watch as people buy his houses for 5k more from you than they do from him and you make 5k in the process He'll catch on eventually.
I simply don't tolerate people who say I overcharge. First off, knowing what people sell for on average on my server I know I am ritgh in the middle on most things maybe even a little cheap on some things. If they give you static just simply say " Well I'm sorry I could earn your business. i hope you find what your looking for" and be on your merry way /shrug
I am being forced to dump architect. The undercutting has drove me out of business, i can no longer afford to create buildings at a loss and refuse to spend all my time attending harvestors and worrying about resources.
Watching people sell for 3creds a resource then almost EVERY **edit** PERSON who wants a house either wants it free or for next to nothing. Sod it.
The sad truth is there are only so many houses that can be built before everyone has one. The only way for houses to disapeer is for people to upgrade, destroy them for some reason or if they rot and even then they will goto a Master Architect who can charge low low prices which are almost base cost.
I guess i'll take up weaponsmith or something since people always need weapons and they dont require astronimcal amounts of resources per try. Kudos to the people who enjoy architect and make it work (i love it but cant make it work in the face of the aggresive competition and the cretins who belive houses are overpriced). Since im a smuggler weaponsmith makes better business sence to me anyway and at least ill get the satisfaction of sales and advancement without cutting my own throat.
All they have to do to make it more different for the Cartels is to modify the program code so that a characters name can only be listed in 10Hopper/Admin structures. Doesn't seem like a big deal, but it may make a dent. These PA's that are out to monopolize the market and make the game no fun for the other people who pay good money to play SWG are the bane of the profession. It may be a little harder for them if 10 different people had to run to a set of different 10 miners to collect/pay. No more having 1 or 2 people make the rounds every couple days to 100 harversters while theother 8 or 9 run around and have fun. Still possible to grief, but a little more difficult.
If SOE really cared about the casual player having the opportunity to have fun playing Architect, then they should also modify the lots awards to be fluctuating. Why does a new character need 10 lots? Why does a pure combat character need 10 lots? Everyone should start with 2 or 3 lots (for a house, eventually) and you should get more only if you are a crafter or merchant. Even then, you would only get 1 lot every time you reach the 25%, 50%,75%, and Master level of XP in your Novice prof, and again in the Elite prof. This would grant a Master Artisan 6 lots (2 free + 4), Master Artisan and Master DE 10, someone only a Master Architect 6 (2 free + 1 for 25% Artisan xp + 4 Architect).
Stop allowing small groups of players RUIN the game experience for the rest!!
To all the players criticizing Dumin,
How do you think WallMart or lets say Microsoft managed to be successfull in the real world ?
Actually, I'm selling about one structure every four or five days. I can only play two hours a day due to my work schedule, but architect is just no longer a casual player friendly profession at all, so I can't really be too suprised. But that one structure isn't paying the harv bills, but I need to stockpile for Urban Planner.
DToxWeaponsInc wrote:
B) Are you guys selling NOTHING at all, or simply not selling 10 Houses a day? .
All I can say is...I bought my medium generic house for 55K (It was 60, but the architect kept me waiting). A few weeks later that house was BORKED by the server...but that's beside the point.
I had never met this person before.
Think about that.
SWG economy is a joke. If you want to seea beautifully set-up player economy,check out what Eve did. This game in NO WAY matches the complexity of that economy. Granted, a lot of things were sold and supplemented by NPC to get things going, it had such a beautiful execution that you really had no room to complain about it.
Tbh i cant be bothered to read the rest of the thread...but a couple of points.
Dumin..is there really any point in playing an mmorpg..your mentality seems better suited to an fps game with "Pwned Jo0" Part of the fun in playing a class is yes, the competition, but also the cammeraderie, but you seem intent on killing off the rest of your class on the server.
Something that most people seem to miss, is that customers are lazy..in game and in real life, yes there may be a product cheaper a starship and shuttle away or 200 miles in real life..but especially in game when credits arent real and have no real effect on your life..an extra 5-10k instead of hanging around doing a run out to vendor..so what. most of us have probably done it..yes we know its cheaper to harvest than buy..but we want it now..same with customers..they want it now...not standing around for a delivery..or travelling.
* It's not that hard to sell furniture for 5cpu (and higher for things that everyone wants, like torches).
* It's hard to sell the largest structures for much more than 3.5cpu (guild halls being the occasional exception, because those who want them are generally well-funded anyway).
* Factories sell much more slowly now than two months ago.
* Medium and heavy mineral harvester prices do not scale up well with extraction rates.
* You can sell steadily at a minimum of 3cpu.
My conclusions:
* People are much more willing to pay a higher cpu for low-resource items because they do not understand the resource requirements, and don't care to. People just think "1,000cr for a chair, cool, I want one" and will also think "65,000cr for a medium house! That's crazy! I can buy six FWG5's for that!" Are they right? If you don't know what goes into a large structure you'll think this way. TIP: Charge higher cpu for lower resource items.
* Similar problem with medium/heavy mineral harvesters. Part of the problem is the drastically different resource requirements for each - about 3,700 for a medium and about 27,000 for a heavy. At 3cpu the price difference is nearly 75,000cr. I'll throw some wacky numbers out there - If someone considers that extraction rate makes up about 70% of the functionality, with cost to operate 20% and storage capacity 10%... Now consider a ER10 medium and an ER10 heavy. The heavy has about double the storage capacity. The medium is about 1/3 cheaper to operate... The big question becomes: should the medium cost MORE, or should the heavy cost LESS, based on FUNCTIONALITY? The medium is worth more - identical ERs, cheaper to operate, storage capacity of little value for most people... We can't drop our heavy prices due to cpu on resources, so we must raise the price of mediums. Or, we should charge a price based on extraction rate. 10,000cr per ER? Will overprice unexperimented medium minerals. 4,000cr per ER? Will undercut heavies in all circumstances. Heavies really aren't worth it compared to highly experimented mediums UNLESS you absolutely need that extra 40% or so. Different strokes for different folks. I'll take a heavy at 14 any day and mine ore like a wild banshee.
* Charge what you are willing to take for your resources. Keep track of what you sell, and at what prices. If you don't think you're getting your money's worth, try selling resources directly, either through a vendor or through the bazaar. Determine what's best for you and go for it!
* Find out what people are willing to pay a premium for and sell a lot of it. Is it better to sell 1,000 chairs at 5cpu or 10 large houses at 3cpu? It's up to you. :-)
FYI... There's a player vendor on Corellia (Wanderhome) that sells resources for 5 to 20cpu. If they can do it, why can't I? Then again, I don't know if they actually sell them or hope to sell them, the vendor is always stocked, seemingly with the same stuff. Might have to monitor more closely...