Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: Underselling the bane of our lives
Here we go, you’ll like this: 
I’m setting up my second ever big factory run of droids. I want to build Advanced R2 units with full armour; a Lvl 6 storage module and one of each crafting station. That’s Weapon/Droid; Food/Chem; Structure & Clothing. It’s a standard unit, a good seller.
Here’s what we need to do a run of say 50 droids, I won’t even bother giving resource requirements:
264 Electronics GP modules
368 Electronic Memory modules
52 Advanced Droid Frames
52 Manipulator Arm Packages
53 Control Units
52 Droid Sensor Packages
103 Droid Brains
102 Lvl 4 armour modules
51 Weapon/Droid Crafting modules
52 Food/Chem Crafting modules
52 Structure Crafting modules
52 Clothing Crafting modules
These are then further refined into the following:
52 Advanced Droid Brains
52 Advanced Droid Motive Systems
51 Lvl 6 Droid Storage modules
51 Combat Clusters
Further condensed into:
51 Advanced R2 Droid Chassis
And finally all remaining products are used to create:
50 Deed: Advanced R2 Droid
Now bear with me, we haven’t finished yet. Let’s assume that we have 4 factories and are currently employed full time or are a full time student (thus we’ll be doing these runs overnight), that comes to 6 full nights of crafting, at least a weeks playing time, again, we won’t bother with resource finding and harvesting and what have you.
Anyone, ANYONE who sells these units for less than 50k a pop is insane, crazy, fruitloops and generally MAAAAAAD.
IMHO 
R0ZM4N wrote:.
Anyone, ANYONE who sells these units for less than 50k a pop is insane, crazy, fruitloops and generally MAAAAAAD.
IMHO
I understand you perfectly!
I became an MDE about a month ago and couldnt wait to earn back the time and credits I used. To no surprise another DE has set up a vendor with under priced Droids not far from me.. What to do? There is no way I can compete with his prices, I just cant afford it 
Even though it is healthy for the economy on our sever with competition this isjust plain dumb it ruins the purpose to why I even wanted to become a DE. One could wonder if it is even worth being one at a time like this!?
gardenhoth, eh? I like that 
Cheers - It's something I'm starting to do myself, I'll let you know how it goes. I appreciate that I'm likely to attract a lot of fire by selling low, but I'm not doing it to be a pain, see?
/fails to find an "edit" function.
As for despair and complaining, go for it; I think all my venting happens on the stratics boards
Now I know Caix is a thorn in my side on these forums, and I would like it noted that I post here, not in Chimaera, so as not to have an argument in public, so to speak, which will damage our profession in the public's eyes.
Why thank you, I'm sure the public image of my shop would have been severly damaged by having another DE tell me my prices are too low.
Caix, what are you doing to the DE profession? Don't you care at all about your fellow DE's, Lord knows we are few there and the market is big enough.
Once in a while, I swing by other DE shops listed on the planetary maps. Ideas on designs and prices are always useful. Of course, half of these stocks less than ten items, and I'm including batteries and seekers. Naturually, that says little of the custom orders that passes by the owners of these shops, but so far, I remain utterly unimpressed. Three vendors, and two were run by the same person/group, carried what I'd call an interesting stock (no, 7 R5's all with the same configuration for 50K a piece is not what I call awe inspiring).
I'm building droids. And I'm having other people use them. And somewhere in between I make money.
As for the size of the market, despite my lower prices I only sell about one R3 a day. There are what, 10+? DE shops around Bestine? I know there's three close to Coronet, and one of them has a good stock of stuff too (also has an outpost on Naboo with good stock). Since I loath the idea of spamming my shops waypoint in a city (I'll gladly get a barker droid though), the only customers I'm getting are either people who bought things from me before and turn to me for that reason (which I enjoy), people who live in the region and the occasional stray who sees my shop on the planetary map. My shops relatively unknown, it's far off compared to others (as I said, the one outside Coronet can definitely supply an adequate stock to keep clients happy, so why go nearly two klicks northof Tyrena), so "matching" my price to that of others,gives people zero incentative to get out there.
25k for an R3 Combat is absolutely silly, and I know that server well. An R3 utility droid is cheap at 45k, or was till you started this nonsense. Ahh well, do what you want, but I do believe you are seriously underselling. I did respect your comments here, but now I see you are playing the cut-throat game I wish you well and goodbye,
And at this point, I'm getting annoyed.
I have zero qualms with people telling me why the prices I have are wrong. Factory time, mathematical calculations etc. That, I can handle, that I think is fun. Prices can easily change and when the day comes that I can't keep up with demand, they will (... though I have enough materiel for at least aweek or twoof getting bought out ).
What I get annoyed at however, is:
That my prices are wrong because they compete with someone else. If I want to get less profit per droid than you do, that's my issue. We're playing a game founded on capitalistic principles and in most countries with that, cartels are forbidden for a reason. I will not alter my prices because my decrease of personal profit may potentially pull customers away from anyone else. Sooner or later I'll probably find myself in a position where there's more orders than time anyway, and then I'll adjust.
The fact that I'm seeing a post that beyond the start, the quote, and the disclaiming little section about how thoughful it is to post here instead, talks to me, about me, and blatantly addresses, me. Which means that using the checklist of things-that-go-in-a-PM, we have aquired enough points for the next skillbox. You have an issue with me and actually care about working on it, PM's are a great option.
Of course, if your just looking to inform the world of wherein your issue with me lies and the consequenses of that, a post on a public forum is the way to go.
And lastly, I have to ask: What is the point of the first post? Make me change? No reason except what "others" charge was provided, and even that information was limited. If I'm going to alter anything no matter what the subject, I need a lot more than "I no longer respect you because you think like this".Make me aware I "need" to change? I point right back to the part about PM (though that's a theoretical issue, as I do try and keep track of what other people on my server charge...). Sparking a discussion about droid pricing? Er... Right. We already have those. More than one. Besides, saying "I hold no respect for ..."remains a bad way to start a discussion about anything.
The options that remain are dissappointing, to say the least.
Hear. hear, Caix! I too have been given the scarlet letter U for under selling my combat droids by the guardians of profit margins. And I don't care. I sell LvL10 droids as any Lvl10 pet. They simply aren't worth 60k and I'm not comfortable selling them that high.Do I lose money on some droids? Sure. Do I care? Heck no. I have a real job in real life that takes care of real balance sheets. This is a game for fun. I sell droids for fun. If I lose a couple k on a sale, I'll sell some extra resources on the bazaar or run a mission. It's not like my phone's going to be disconnecting in the game because I didn't make enough net profit that week. I don't have a shop on a main planet so I discount my wares to drive traffic to my city. My BH droids are pretty darn cheap too. And you know what? I don't make that many sales in a week, so the fire and brimstone calls of retail collapse never happens to those who like to charge more. I tip my hat to you for not being pressured in the price fix cartel.
Baylor
scot740 wrote:
Hear. hear, Caix! I too have been given the scarlet letter U for under selling my combat droids by the guardians of profit margins. And I don't care. I sell LvL10 droids as any Lvl10 pet. They simply aren't worth 60k and I'm not comfortable selling them that high.Do I lose money on some droids? Sure. Do I care? Heck no. I have a real job in real life that takes care of real balance sheets. This is a game for fun. I sell droids for fun. If I lose a couple k on a sale, I'll sell some extra resources on the bazaar or run a mission. It's not like my phone's going to be disconnecting in the game because I didn't make enough net profit that week. I don't have a shop on a main planet so I discount my wares to drive traffic to my city. My BH droids are pretty darn cheap too. And you know what? I don't make that many sales in a week, so the fire and brimstone calls of retail collapse never happens to those who like to charge more. I tip my hat to you for not being pressured in the price fix cartel.
Baylor
that is fair scot, but your reasoning shows that the game economy isn't founded on capitalist principles. it's so easy to make large sums of money without contributing any products to the economy in this gamethat it is possible for a player to run most crafting business like DE at a loss forever ifit is subsidizedit with resource sales to the crafters that do turn huge profits.
this is a bit of a problem with the design of the game. some crafting professions really do make wares that are worth more than the resources required. but most others do not. so all the professions where thevalue of the wares is minimalend uphaving lop-sidedbackwards economies.
It is annoying that the game is designed this way, but I don't mind. My prices are low, but I do turn a profit and am not underselling. And so far as I can tell, I appear to be the only DE on Naboo in Kauri that still keeps his vendors stocked. I don't seem to have much competition.
Either way, I don't feel that I am overcharging either. I'd like to charge less, since the products aren't as useful for combat purposes as other considerably cheaper items, but I can't because the things are too expensive to make. Droids, in my mind, are luxury items anyway. And the price of a luxury item is not driven by its usefulness but by what it costs to make it and by what people are willing to pay.
jemelby wrote:
One thing I have not heard mentioned here specifically is factory time. Did you know that all the seperate componets for an R3 ADV Combat droid takes 1 hours and 46 minutes? (Thats X amount of time for 9 brains, 2 advanced brains, 8 GP modules, etc...) An Combat Advanced Probot takes 1 hour and 2 minutes....
I don't think factory time is a huge issue. While 1 hour, 2 minutes might seem high to you that means that a DE with 2 can turn out nearly 100 fully loaded R3s every 2 days. Assuming you could actually sell that many at the prices most people quote that would be around 3M a day in income, and that is with only 2 factories running.
Of course you can't sell that many R3s a day, but then you don't need to restock as much. It still works out to roughly 60k an hour of factory time, which isn't bad at all if all you are figuring is time (yeah, you can earn a lot more running missions, but the factory will run without you).
The bigger issue for me, and I think for most, is the PITA factor, like you said.
Man, you guys are nuts - you don't feel like you're ripping people off with all the problems we have charging as much as most of you do? I charged 30k for a maxxed our R3 combat droid with 109 CR combat modules and I thought I was making bank...looks like I might need to reevaluate my prices...
Obviously most of you aren't going by the simple cost of resources I take it? It's no wonder the economy of the game servers is screwed, everyone overcharging everyone else for everything, and then the pure casual combatants feel like they can't ever afford anything. I'm going to have a serious look at the other DEs in my area today for comparison.
Message Edited by jefmes on 03-23-2004 11:25 AM
Message Edited by jefmes on 03-23-2004 11:25 AM
jefmes wrote:
Man, you guys are nuts - you don't feel like you're ripping people off with all the problems we have charging as much as most of you do? ...
Nope. My pricing is largely based upon my time, and as people have pointed out it takes a lot of time and energy to produce a fully equipped R3. Also, I would only be ripping people off if I were to misrepresent what it is that the units could do or if they were a neccessity. These droids are not a neccessity, they are a luxury. If players do not wish to spend the money on one they are under no obligations to do so.
Additionally, I think I have a higher estimation of the new combat droids than you do. Last night, with only a LE Repair Combat droid, I was able to take out a large group of Giant Mountain Worts. Considering my only combat skill is Polearms-4 (Polearms, from the basic Brawler tree, not Pikeman) I am pretty happy with the results.
Yes, these are not uber droids that can simply be sent at a large group like that and will kill everything in sight. In fact my LE got incapped at one point before I could get to him, but when I repaired him in combat he came right back up and started slugging away again. However, I also know that I would have had no real chance against the worts without him. The new combat droids give a definite boost to power when used intelligently. When I started to take too much damage I would back away for a bit to heal, repairing the droid as needed, then I would return to combat and fight for a while longer.
All this was done with just an LE Repair Droid. A fully loaded R3 is actually several steps better in combat. Do I think it is worth it to shell out 65k for a droid that would help me like that? Considering on my server a good composite helmet can run 85k+, yeah, I think it's a good deal.
Message Edited by Icarus-6 on 03-23-2004 11:53 AM