Ranger Archive

Hunting Economics
Something to consider.

In economics there is a concept that is referred to as opportunity cost, simply put this is the amount of money that you could have made doing something else.
Grind hunting has a opportunity cost like everything else, but what is it and how do we calculate it?
NOTE: I use grind hunting as opposed to mission hunting, in grind hunting the goal is to acquire large amount of resources, not to complete missions for the credit reward.

So here it is.
I can run 6 4500 credit missions in 1hour (and that is on the slow/cheap side, personally I take missions that pay a lot more than this)
Credits made in 1 hour doing this 27000
Comes out to 450 CPM (credits a minute)

On the grind side
I can harvest about a K of resources an hour (if everything goes perfect, Im already on location ect)
In order to not lose credits on opportunity cost I would have to charge 27CPU!
If the going rate is 15 then I just worked for 250 credits a minute.

I think about this every time I drop serious cash on a suit of armor. The thing is that crafting anything does not take a lot of time, maybe like 15mintues tops for 9 pieces of armor. Just to be silly lets say that armor takes all 1k of resources I gathered ( I know it takes other stuff as well that’s why I said that it took all the hides)
So the armor smith has just spent 1500 credits on hides (15CPU * 1000). And sells the armor for 30K (and you really can’t get a whole set of good armor for that price, but we will pretend you can for this example).
Takes them 15 minutes to craft it. The spent 15K they sold for 30K (15K profit)
CPM = 15K /15 (profit/manufacturing time)
The just got paid 1000 CPM.

For me to make 1000 CPM I would have to charge 60000 for one K (60 minutes * 1000 CPM) of resources. That means my price per unit would have to be 60CPU!
Hmmmmmm
Well, I’m not picking on armor smiths, they are getting what the market will pay (cool, bravo for them). I’m just giving you guys something to think about when you start talking about 25CPU is highway robbery.

Note: this post was not about armor smiths, there is a lot more that goes into armor, and this is a vast oversimplification. This post was designed to show how to calculate opurtunity cost and figure true worth. No insult to armor smiths or any other crafter was intended. The skills that went into crafting the armor were not included in this example and those alone have great worth, but then again the skills included in harvesting all those resources were not either (grin).

I argue, that if soloing, the best is to do the following: Take a hunting mission that requires 30-45 kills for whatever you are trying to harvest from. Then take Destroy missions to generate the lairs. That way you make money from the missions and get the side benefit of selling your harvests. This is if you are playing solo.

Group dynamics change everything. I always am grouped with my wife who is a master medic/ch. This lets us tackle much tougher creatures which have higher harvest output quantities. Plus, since she can harvest as well, we can increase the total amount harvested that we sell. When you can tackle things like Kimos in a small group like that where you can pull in, betwen us both, between 600-1200 hide, for example, per kill depending on if its a giant or regular kimo, then its more profitable for us to wander around than to take missions.

Likewise, if you are a member of a large group that is hunting things, since all can harvest, you can pull in large hide quantities relatively easy.

But yes, in certain circumstances missions will net you more money, but in those situations, you should try and do both missions and harvesting in order to obtain your maximum profit.

Some very good points. I'm gonna add on a few tips to speed things up. Hunting is our bread and butter.

I have been torn between two schools of thoughts on this.

Smaller is better Vs. Larger harder Targets.

I don't worry too much about the credit income. so my views might be a bit skewd on this side of it. I make my credits by selling meat/bone/hide.

My examples Require Max amount of harvests in the Min amount of time.

Example A:
A good Nabooian Leather Spawns.
I have a few choices, Kaadu, bolle bol's, nunas, and d nuna's, chuba's, and motts.
(Kaadu's, nunas, d nuna's also have avian meat and avian bone. Now here is the problem here, Which does one take.)

On one Hand you have the 50-60 hides from one male kaadu on the other hand you can kill 6 chuba's in the same time for 9-11 hides a piece. Which do you do?

Considering that weapon/combat xp doesn't apply, hit the chuba's. Minimal Risk on my end. Zero Down time, same with d nuna's.

If you can do it fast enough you can clear about 500-600 hides rather quickly if you don't blow the lairs up.

Smaller is better applys, do to the fact the creatures aren't rare its faster to clear the area out then risk it on bigger stuff.

Example B:
A good Rori bone or Wooly Spawns
Tattered Torton missions. 45-55 hides
1.8k ham, 1-2 shots with headshot 3
Bigger Risk better Harvest, Because Torton's are much rarer to find on rori then kaadu's are naboo, this will take more time. here is where the bigger is better applys.

Econ For rangers is a wonderfull topic, I would highly recommened any ranger learn what planet offers what stuff. That is great for mass harvests

aka Tat bone is in season, what creatures give tat bone?
well everything that isn't a nuna, and insect (well **edit** near) I cleared 5k of tat bone in 4hrs just walking back and forth from mos eisley to wamprat missions, 500 bone approx each way. so if dummy me can do it , anyone can.

On Rori what has wooly hides? Torton's Gualama's Vir vir's
On Naboo what has bristley Hides Ikopi's , Shaupauts, tusk cats, Veermoks.

On and on. Any Ranger on Radiant I will personally Pay for a round trip ticket from what ever planet they are on to any planet they want, so they can learn these things too.

As Theo_Ranger Brings up some very valid points, any more risk on the rangers end should meen more cost on the "artisans" end.

To review because I can't form paragraphs to save my life is this.
On creatures where there are lots of aviable animals for hide harvests (see naboo sample) smaller is better, but for rarer resources Larger is better do to the time it takes to look for em.

I strongly Recommend Path O Sherman In route to Mission Points, KILL everything IN ROUTE, if it doesn't have what you want harvest meat.


Good Day

"I argue, that if soloing, the best is to do the following: Take a hunting mission that requires 30-45 kills for whatever you are trying to harvest from. Then take Destroy missions to generate the lairs. That way you make money from the missions and get the side benefit of selling your harvests. This is if you are playing solo."

But those destroy missions are not always avalible for what your lookning for, and most of them pay out less than 10K. If you kill the lair and are always running back to get more destroy missions the CPM goes way down, that suff takes time.

"Group dynamics change everything"

Nope, it doesnt change a thing. It actually takes longer, just you are splitting the time with others.
For example. I havest with a friend. It takes 5 minutes of my time and 5 minutes of there time.
Even though only 5 minutes on the clock passed we each gave 5minutes to the CPU 5+5 equals 10. It still took 10 minutes of player time, just not 10 minutes of just my time. In fact doe to the reduction that you get on group harvest the CPM is even higher.

But you could never solo the creatures that you do in a group.

Being in a good group, the yield is incredible. And it's very efficient. You get your missions and you can do several at a time instead of the time taking to run back to town. The creatures are larger so there is more HP and more yield for a somewhat similar amount of time. If you have people working well together, there is far less downtime for healing than when soloing. The game rewards grouping. Immensely.

Funny, but I still play solo a lot of the time. Tee hee hee. I'm working to change that, though.

My preference, failing not being able to find a group, is find out what is good on my base planet (Corellia for me) and target creatures that yeild that in an explore mission. As long as you pick ones that are common and you know were they spawn it's about as fruitful for me as a trip to Lok. I can get 8k per mission on the common stuff, 16k for the rare stuff (I don't usually do those, they take several days to complete). I get 2 missions and finish 16k-20k pure income a night. Then I can sell the Hide/Meat/Bones in addition to that. The trick is chosing the critter, the stats of the stuff you harvest and your knowledge of you planets spawns. This is far more hit-'n-miss then doing destroy missions but I find it more fun, I can go out and enjoy the scenery and I seem to make a tad bit more money this way.

Getting a hunting group is better tho, and if you are all selling to the same merchant he/she gets more stuff as well. I don't know many hunting groups that will do explore missions with me, however. Those hunts tend to be all destroy, but on an advanced planet it's payout is probably comperable.

If I am out for harvest, I pick on little things that yield decent harvest, especially when solo.Example... crazed durni yield 25 hide/meat/bone... I can kill these by the freaking ton and not take wounds. In an average hour, I probably harvest 1k meat, 1k hide, and some bone, easily.

If I am out for weapons xp, while wild durni yield 64 per, I can kill one gronda for 1100 in the same time as maybe 15 bunnies. Gronda win, as the dwarfs are good for 180 or so, and I kill them without thinking. Good mission, about 3k, but takes 20 mins for the spawns, traps, etc.

For cash - hands down - 3k missions for a butterfly hive. 4 warriors, show white con, but are sissies when hit with acid. The other butterflies are nothing, light blue. Crap xp, 450 per. But that mission is done and over in less than 5 minutes. Quick and easy cash in my pocket.

I primarily hunt on Corellia, out of Tyrena. These missions I run when I know I need either cash or material, and will be solo, and I know no one is in the cantina.

If I am with a group, we usually head to Dantooine and harvest huurton stalkers. Good xp, decent cash, good harvest, but a pain to fight in a smaller group and it does take a while.

Regardless, I always always always harvest, hotkeys are fun, and if I can't sell it, I use it for my stuff.

JB

ridding the universe of durni, one lil no-eyed thing at a time

OK, I do agree, a bad group and things aren't as efficient as solo, but a good group, like was already stated, I can pull in more harvests than solo easily. In fact, my usual "medium group" when not just grouping with my wife is a well coordinated group consisting of:

Myself - Ranger/Pistoleer

Wife: Master CH/Master Medic/some pistol

a Master Doctor/Combat Medic/surveyor

a TKA/Commando with some CH

Then maybe some extra combat people on board as well. The 4 of us alone though, can pretty much handle anything we encounter provided we are not overwhelmed. We are well coordinated. The Doctor/Combat Medic keeps up alive and well buffed, Myself and the TKA/Commando handle Player caused damage, while my wife directs her pets for tanking/aggro control and assists in combat or in healing..especially if the doctor takes a hit.

A coordinated group can work wonders, not just in harvesting, but in every situation.

I think you guys are worrying to much.

First things first, im on Bloodfin, which is a heavily populated server and a Council Member of the AR and i have certainly noticed that prices for harvests are starting to go up to what i think they should be.

Ive also worked out a fomula that i think works well and takes into consideration everything and also reflects what i consider a fair price for each harvest.

Ill run through it briefly here

Basically, im goign to sugges to all in my PA that this is the way we charge.

Ill use Avian meat from Naboo as an exmaple (at the moment it is the best avian on Bloodfin)

Now that stats are something like this

940 OQ, PE 640, DR 632, FLV 789

Take all four attirbute and add them together (940 + 640 + 632 + 789) = 3001

So we have 3001 Total, now divide that by the amount of attributes (4) and we are left with 750 average.

Nwo this is the fun part, i just elected a number of 50 to divide by to generate a reasonable amount (started at 100 but it was to cheap for the work gone into the harvest)

so we are left with what works out to be 15 - which is what you charge.

in conclusion

its

940 (OQ) + 640 (PE)+ 632 (DR) +789 (FLV) = 3001, /4 = 750,/50 = 15. therfore charge 15 per unit.

We are not going to make as much as a weaponsmith or doctors, we have to get passed this idea, in affect we are blue collar workers, they are white collar workes.

With all that i havent noticed any increase of armour or weapons, they are always expensive and will stay expensive, its up to us to be savvy with what we charge, while trying to keep it reasonably for everyone, having said that market demands control alot of things. You also have to know who uses what and speak to people about selling your harvest. We as rangers have to rely on selling our resources as well as what we generate trhough missions. To this extent groups are the only way to go, get 5 people, all hutning the same thing and you are getting 300% harvest of the critter, while also getting a share of the mission rewards. I personally think life is good at the moment as a ranger! Aslong as you have the orginasation behind you and things inplace it can be very rewarding.

Hi, Im a master Ranger on Bria and I have about 4 people that send me orders reg. so Im up to my knees in Meat orders! And becouse I've been around I know where to get the different kinds of top quality meat. (and I dont share it with everyone). Since I only sell minimum stocks of 5k units there's a lot of cash involved. I charge 18-25 c/unit(u may say who pays that!!) and its no problem selling it considering the fact that there aren't to many that sell stocks of 10k units.

So my tip is to get a few regular custamers and get them on a mailing order basis!

Aethlon Surbaa<SITH> Master Ranger ----Bria

The doctors in my PA are too nice for me to sell avian or herbivore meat on the market. Their buffs and (constant) rezzes cost them quite a bit and I am quite happy to pay them back in my own special way (i.e. I am too cheap to tip ).

In any case, I wholeheartedly agree about the opportunity cost of specific harvesting. For example, Sunrunner has good Tatooinian wooly hide. This is only available on Banthas. Bantha missions are maybe 5k each. And I do it solo because taking out a bantha lair is easy enough. On the other hand, Pubam missions on Endor pay 5k. I can't do those solo but a group of 5-6 can wipe one out fast and the per person gain is 7-8k with the group bonus and no harvest. With 10 missions per run that is 75k in maybe a few hours. No amount of harvesting is going to equal that so when I hunt for resources, it is because I am doing it for people like my PA's doctors. But sometimesI just want to do something different and I wind up fishing on Corellia or running around on Tatooine looking for the badge spawns and killing Banthas on the way.

We are not going to make as much as a weaponsmith or doctors, we have to get passed this idea, in affect we are blue collar workers, they are white collar workes.

Just as an aside, don't fool yourself. Everyone I know working a trade makes twice as much as office workers.

k you show me anywhere in the world where a labourer makes more than a doctor?

where a farmer makes more than a weaponsmioth?