Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Question about survey droids...
EwokkilVader wrote:
they should be around 8k for 12 uses
...agreed...that's a realistic price IMO. I've even heard rumors of 5k per stack.
Vevy wrote:
EwokkilVader wrote:
they should be around 8k for 12 uses
...agreed...that's a realistic price IMO. I've even heard rumors of 5k per stack.
I've seen 5k per stack. guess what I did when I found those? I cancelled my plans to do a factory run of survey droids and bought ALL the survey droids that the DE selling at 5k per stack was selling. Now I havea supply on hand and didn't have to waste any valuable factory time. my factory time is worth more than 5k per stack to me. /shrug
8k for 12 charges is a reasonable price, but like I said, it's not worth my time to make them at that price.
I'm not talking about gouging the customer to make more money or anything. With the current schematics requirements, I don't want to make these things, and if my customers insist on having me make them its going to be 2k per charge. I even tell my customers: you'll find better prices elsewhere. I overcharge on this particular itembecause I consider these things a royal pain in the butt to make on many levels. Some of my customers buy them anyway. /shrug.
vexy, it'd be nice if you would talk to me rather than tofictitious perception of me that you have cooked up in your head somehow. 
Let me point a few things out. I say they are difficult to make when compared against what else I could be doing withmy factory time. How that relates to the other crafting professions is irrelevant. All that matters for my business is how my business spends its time. When I walk up to my factories I have a choice: do a run of EGP and EMM components so I can then do a run of Survey Droids, or do factory runs of chassis' for R3's, Probots, LE's, etc, which are far more versatile and will be far more useful for me. I can't do both at the same time because I am not allowed an unlimited number of lots. So I have to choose between them. The real droids (R3's, R2's, Probots, LEs, Mice, etc.) sell for good money and have many many different uses, Survey Droids have one single use. Unless those survey droids are going to net me a good profit, I would be stupid to make them when I am alway low on the chassis' and other more versatile droid components. So I am going to make the regular droid chassis' and their components first. And that is the root of the issue for me, I never have time left over to dothe survey droids. I am always doing factory runs of the more versatile droids. If I had factory time left over for the survey droids, I would consider making them, but the simple fact is that my business has no left over time for that.
You keep putting words in my mouth and assuming things that are not true. You keep talking pedantically and acting like I am some kind of cry baby for complaining about "how hard they are to make". Bah. That's a load of dung. Safe it for somebody else.
I am not complaining that they are hard to make.
I'm saying that for the amount of my personal andfactory time they consume they aren't worth it. My business only has a finite number of factories at its disposal. Those factories are busy making R3's, Probots, LE's, etc. If the survey droids could be done in a single factory run, I could find time to make them without impacting my ability to manufacture the other droids. But because of the MA components, the survey droidsend up tieing up the factories for too long. Making them means I have to sacrifice my ability to make the other droids and that is a sacrifice I am not willing to make.
Your comments about the results you get when using low quality resources have nothing to do with anything I said. Doesn't change the fact that these droids aren't worth the investment in time and resources for my business. Let other DE's who aren't as successfull selling R3's and other droids make them.
Then you ask "do you honestly believe that a 3:1 subcomponent ratio is unusual?". No. I don't. I never said it was unusual. But that's beside the point. The reason for bringing up the 3:1 ratio is because the 3:1 ratio is the reason the survey droids tie up the factories longer than I can afford. That is all I said. Your other comments regarding that point are irrelevant because they are directed at the guy who thinks 3:1 is unusual. That person doesn't exist.
In any case, what the heck are you ranting about the cost for anyway? You can claim the thread was hijacked, but you brought cost into the discussion. Your surprise that the discussion evolved into one of the costs after you brought up your opinions about typical costs is silly. And attacking me because I explain the reasoning for my costs is disengenuous.
Message Edited by Vevy on 05-04-2004 04:29 PM
Vevy wrote:
Malitevv,
Let me quote you from the very first post you made in this thread...
"i know 2k per charge is a high price but the raw resource required to make them are worth at least that much."
Now apparently as the discussion has progressed you've backed away from this position and are now touting the time arguement instead hoping that has more of an impact.
Vevy wrote:
Malitevv,
The fact is the whole first page of this thread was devoted to bashing me on how hard these droids were to make based on the RESOURCE INVESTMENT and you yourself even tried that arguement initially as well. Unfortunately this is not your personal crusade Malitevv and you can't simply alter the arguement when one position doesn't work for you.
The fact that you personally are not willing to invest the time in making them, is STILL not a justification for higher prices. I'm not saying you HAVE to make them. I'm saying that your inability to manage your production on a larger scale does not justify the charge you're asking for. I agree it's your shop to price however you want but again I go back to Handsnake's comments about his perception on the price of stun armor.
This is not about YOU Malitevv, it's about the overwhelming attitude many droid makers had on this issue.
Yes this whole discussion has ALWAYS been about the resource investment and the "difficulty" in making them. Even your time concerns still translates to "difficulty" in making them.
The issue I'm making here is the DE perspective of what is "difficult" and "frustrating" and "time-consuming" is considerably inflated compared to the rest of the crafting professions. If these DEs want to use my stun armor pricing to justify their survey droids pricing, then they need a better arguement than simple vertex. As I've laid out in the previous post, the resource/time investment for a survey droid doesn't even come close to a single piece of armor, yet you seem to want to price it out like it does.
Message Edited by Vevy on 05-04-2004 04:29 PM
you mischaracterize the situation. only a couple people bashed you, as you say, and you are responding to everyone as though they were all participating in the so-called bashing. which is completely false. second you are taking statements that aren't completely explained, filling in the details yourself and then drawing a completely erroneous conclusion about what is being said. at least that is what you have done when replying to me.
also in the case of survey droids and BH droids, when I am talking about the resources, I am mostly talking about the MA components. they are a resource effectively, and THOSE are like gold to me because everything I make requires them in mass quantities. i am always running out of them. so anything that requires them has a premium for me.
theoretical calculations of the cpu cost are only half the story because they ignore the time factor, which is a part of the resource cost as well. it takes time to mine the resources. it takes time to search the bazaar for the resources. etc. I attach a premium to that time investment that factors directly into what I consider the cost of a resource to be for me. the market value is only secondary as far as I am concerned.
Malitevv,
Everyone that has jumped on my case is arguing the same point...that these droids should be priced at 2k per charge...you may have a different logic behind it than Lexy or Handsnake...but the end result is still the same.
I addressed the time issue in my previous post and whether you like it or not, the market value of the item DOES affect you. You can put them on your vendor for 100k per charge and you simply won't sell them.
We're not discussing your personal rebellions against the market value, we've been discussing what is a FAIR market value for these items. If you're running off on another topic then you're on your own there. Your personal time constraints have nothing to do with this discussion, nor the value of the item.
Make them or don't make them, the issue here is not what you thinkyour timeis worth, but what would be considered a fair market value. Your personal value on your own time is a subjective issue that really has no right or wrong answer. If you've boiled your whole position down now to this one point, then I would say it has nothing to do with the topic at hand any more because there is no formula on how you value your time.
If you WANT to make it relevant, then you HAVE to compare it to other items in order to determine a fair labor cost...you can't simply say your time is worth 100cpu an hour and call it fair because it suits you. Some armorsmiths think 2mil per stun suit if fair but Handsnake obviously took offense to that and used it as his justification in his arguement...the crafter's time investment HAS to be compared to other profs in order to establish a base for pricing.
lol. nobody said anything about a personal rebellion against the market value. that is sillyness which i never stated and is a complete mischaracterization of what I did say. stick to the point and dispense with the rhetorical nonsense. it serves no meaningful purpose.
I've already explained that I don't care if people don't buy them at the price I have set. i know 2k per charge is a high price, but that I'm not willing to make them if they sell for less than that.
i understand the free market economics involved. I set my price point at 2k per charge for my own reasons, knowing full well that people might not buy them at that price.
but I already said that in my first post, it only bears repeating because you are acting like I posted on this thread for a different reason.
the discussion with me could have ended with that, but you chose to attack me and make personal accusations and mischaracterizations of what I did say, so I took the time to explain that your assumptions about me are completely false.
in the endany persons attemptto prove thatthey know how to figure out proper pricesbetter thaneveryone elseis pointless nonsense. I'm not hear to prove anything either way. at this point i'm only posting to defend against continued rhetorical mischaracterizations of my initial explanationhow I pricethese droids.
the market will determine the prices no matter what anybody in this thread says.
...you've also adapted your position several times now so that you could be neatly positioned on an issue which quite honestly is so subjective it's undebatable. Your value on your own personal time really is not the issue at hand nor was it what started this topic off...As I pointed out you initially began your comments the same way the others did,on the complexity of the resources involved and the time and cost to get them and THAT is what I've been addressing as invalid...but that's fine, I'm happy to end the conversation with you on that point. As I said you can price them at 100k per charge if you simply want to make a statement about your time. I'm speakingrealistically onwhat these droids are worth in terms of resources and construction time.
Personal production capacity really has no bearing on the discussion IMHO.
umm wow 20k for a survey droid???
I priced, not cost but priced mine at 2k lol
word of advise, NEVER buy anything in this game that is new. The damn vehicles was 80k then 60k then 30k lol in like 5 days lol.
I guess it is good business though, people want to be the first on the block to have to to show off so they pay the extra money lol.
Anyway if anyone on gorath and wants a survey droid for 2k email Lifeline. =) untill i refigure out what I missed in pricing these things lol.