Weaponsmith Archive
Thread: Weapon Prices
DToxWeaponsInc wrote:
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I *am* one of my server's living money sinks. I make it so that people HAVE to go out and buy a Novice's weapons when their broke. In other words, I'm the guy that's really looking out for the little guys.
However, if you want to be a Master, and sell items at dirt-cheap prices, and totally ruin it for the rest of up-and-commers, go ahead...I know a pack of wild Novices that would love to rip you apart.
I feel the same way. I sell a ridiculous amount of guns - I have 4 factories going mostly nonstop and I have nearly 10 million in liquid assets, another 20 million in resources (at market value) and spend on average about 500k a day on resources. I pay well for resources to keep the money flowing and keep my suppliers engaged.
There's an upside and a downside to this. If I act responsibly with my wealth - I can be a boon to the game, as any rich person can be if my interests are philanthropic. The downside is that I AM a business. I don't do anything but make and fill orders, stock vendors, operate machinery, answer questions and experiment on new designs.
I can handle this, I'm obsessive enough to do it but like the man said sometimes I feel like a human moneysink. Why do I need 10 million credits? I don't know yet. Eventually I'll do something cool with that money that'll be fun for me and everyone else, but I just don't know yet.
If I charged less for my guns, and enott charged less and NoTig charged less and etc - people would have too much cash. As it is, we are the only real drain in the economy.
I'm charging 1000 credits for powerups now and they are FLYING off of the vendor. I *know* people have too much money.
- nox
2775 for a master weaponsmith made Scout Blaster? THATS where my business has been going. As a master in only techniques and firearms the Scout Blaster and the odd FWG5 were the only weapons that moved regularly on the bazaar. I thought I was undercutting the masters by pricing them at 2500, but why buy from me when they can get a master-made Scout for a fraction more? Good lord I dont want to go back to missions to finance my steel mining operation.
--Dregs Dolo
--Expert Weaponsmith?
--Scylla Galaxy
I don't think that pricing your weapons on a cost plus basis is a wise strategy for many of the reasons stated above. If you are going to do it that way, I think you're underestimating the cost by using a rate of5 credits/unit.
Here's some of the things you may be missing in your calculations:
- initial cost of house, vendor, factories and tools plus recurring maintenance costs.
- material waste incurred when creating a schematic. With constantly shifting resources if you want to produce the best weapons you can change schematics frequently.
- loss of inventory that occurs when new resources and schematics make your current weapon obsolete.
- unexpected cost incurred by bugs. I have re-deeded my factories 3 times in the past week.
- some rare orhigh demand resources can cost substantially more than 5 cr/unit. Once a resource is no longer available a cost greater than 5 cr/unit is very common.
- costs associated with customer service; such as lost weapon replacement, volume discounts, etc.
Isis
Charging by any formula other than "as high as the market will bare" is just shooting yourself in the foot, really. There are going to be freaky things (like the Rocket Launcher example) which just won't fit into the system. Plus, when you take shifting resources into consideration, like it's been mentioned before, the actual "cost" of that resource you're using up is going to be WAAAAAAY different.
Sales are based on the market, never on the product...that's just how it is.
My pricing formula takes into consideration the DPS of the weapon, the HAM costs in comparison to the damage it deals out, and lastly a simple scaling variable that I adjust up or down to increase or decrease the final price to the level I think it should be at. This lets me price out, for example, two different FWG5 pistols relative to one another if they do different damage amounts.
I'll typically make a bunch of the weapon in question, determine what I think the best one I made is worth in the current market and then price the others relative to the first based on the formula. This is really only applicable though when I'm hand-crafting the weapons as opposed to doing factory runs.
If it sells out fast, you priced it too low. 
Tigsen
Econics are all well and good but this is a game, not real life. At the end of the day the only thing you need to do is make sure you can pay for your house, harvesters and factories. That's it, you don't need to worry about long term savings or anything like that.
If a person feels the need to only charge a certain amount then let them. Me personaly I don't need to make a huge mark up on weapons I usuall sell them for 5cr per resource and round up to a nice neat number. If a resource is peticularly hard to get I'll charge a little bit more.
I've no need to make so much I've nothing to spend it on as I can make my own weapons, I've never needed or used armor. What good is having 10,000,000 cr in the bank? I guess it looks nice, but I don't keep things that look nice I keep things that are functional. If I'm not using it its waste.
Shardonis wrote:
Okay here is the deal, I recently redid all my prices using the formula (5CPU*ResourcesUsed)*5=Price
For example a laser Rifle Uses 299 Resources, I buy my Resouces at 3 to 5 Credits a Unit, so 299 X 5 = 1495 my cost to make the weapon, I then Multiple it by 5 again and get 7475 as the cost I charge my customers. I think it is better than Charging 15k Plus for a weapon that costs me onlt 1495 Credits to make. If Anyone can give me their thoughs On this would be great... I will give you an Example of my Price List below
Laser Rifle 7475
Laser Carbine 6900
T21 Rifle 15975
Elite Carbine 7800
Rocket Launcher 34225 (Most Expensive and resource Intensive weapon in the game)
Scout Pistol 2775
FWG5 3675
Any one think my Prices are Reasonable, more than fair?
Avinista
Master Weapon Smith of Broken Hills
Officer of the Trade Federation
I charge what the market will bear.
> T21 Rifle 15975
You are going to charge 15k for a rifle that requiresPolonium iron, gallinorian rainbow gem crystalline gemstone, Ditanium steel. How exactly are you going to get those materials? You plan to have 50 harvesters, and maintain those harvesters? You think anyone in their right mind is going to SELL you good ditanium or polonium for cheap when another weaponsmith who is selling their T21s for 65k can afford to pay 100 credits a unit for gallinorian rainbow gem?
Do you realize how rarely polonium iron spawns with good stats? Are *you* going to be the person who puts the big harvesters on the sweet spots? If you are, and you spend your time tending harvesters how are you going to be making weapons? When will you have time to operate your factories?
> I think it is better than Charging 15k Plus for a weapon that costs me onlt 1495 Credits to make.
When did 'better' enter the picture? Where's this moral high ground coming from? If you aren't a weaponsmith in it for profit, that's fine - go ahead and spend your time going broke as an act of egregious apologetics for being in a position to exchange services for money. I'm not, and I hope you aren't on my server.
My weapons are worth whatever I successfully sell them for. The materials it costs to make them is MY cost, and doesn't dictate the cost of the final product.
Your theory is naive of the reality of business.
- nox
Which is why bloodfin is in good shape. All of the master weaponsmiths there charge what they can for weapons, which creates a market for the less than masters to sell weapons for less than 5k.
I would hate to be a new weaponsmith on this person's server. imagine.
DToxWeaponsInc wrote:
Price is based on demand. The reason people even ASK about prices on these boards is due to the fact that there are sooooo little Weaponsmiths, compared to the size of the market, that nobody really knows what the standard prices are on their server.
3 Master Weaponsmiths, selling at god-knows-what on their server aren't going to set standards.
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With the vast amount of weaponry we can build that's in demand, you have 1 of 2 options: Specialize on a few items, and sell them better and cheaper than anyone else....do a large array of items, and sell them at a price high enough that your stock isn't wiped out every night.
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That's exactly what I do. I specialize in ranged energy weapons. This means I only have to have about 200 different materials on hand for all the weapons I make (3-4 types of some of the same stuff in a few cases). I sometimes throw some good melee weapons up if I get special requests from good suppliers or good customers, but generally I stick to what I am good at.
Because I buy materials from people in mass quantities, for less I can afford to lower prices on my materials. Because I don't operate harvesters, I can survive dry spells without incurring a high burn rate.
DLT20a - 1500
DL44 (either kind)- 1500
DH17 Carbine - 1500
Laser Rifle - over 400 dmg 5000
Laser Carbine 2,6 speed or so 5000
T21 Rifle - Havent seen a resource shift to make
Elite Carbine - Refer to T21
Rocket Launcher - Refer to T21 again
Scout Pistol - 1.4 speed 1500 cr
FWG5 - 1500
Prices i charge never exceed 5000 credits - tho they may change up 1 or 2k tops once i make the highest level weapons, and if their good. I base my prices on quality, i destroy junk. My pricing is not because Test Center population is tiny, it is because i dont think anyone should be forced to pay ungodly amounts for a weapon, period.
I hear you on "why would you lower prices if they'll pay top dollar?"
Answer is simple, just because you CAN sell it that expensive, doesnt mean you have to.
Some people ( alot ive seen ) only do charge this much to get rich fast, and are greed ridden, that is IMO not the way to play. As a Weaponsmith, your obligation to the folks you play with (unless you have a major grudge against them ) is to supply them with the finest crafted weaponry possible, not to rape them of their money and perhaps fun factor.
There are many WS's out there that sell crap weapons for the same disgusting prices, because they can, this is just plain robbery.
Popojiju wrote:
Prices i charge never exceed 5000 credits - tho they may change up 1 or 2k tops once i make the highest level weapons, and if their good. I base my prices on quality, i destroy junk. My pricing is not because Test Center population is tiny, it is because i dont think anyone should be forced to pay ungodly amounts for a weapon, period.
While I understand you are on Test Center and thus things might be slightly different there, on other servers, charging 1.5k for a1.4 Scout Blasteris highway robbery-- on theWeaponsmith community.
Anyone, I mean anyone, can make 1.5k instantly. Those easy Survey missions?Pay 2k a pop. Pick a couple of missions asking for a certain resource and keep doing that resource mission over and over again after you find a nearby spot, extremely simple and no risk. Higher level destroy missions pay 16k a pop. Faction missions have much higher payouts now, as well.
So, if you are basing your prices off of what the average player can afford, they can outfit an army within a few hours with your prices. What's worse, any Tech IV smith on TC has absolutely no chance in hell at selling a gun with prices like that for Master-level guns. Let's see, in one easy destroy/survey mission, I can afford your best Scout Blaster. That took me all of ten minutes, why in the hell should I go for the Tech IV smith's gun? In an hour of this, I can afford five more of yours!
It's one thing to charge like that on TC for the better of community, seeing as how it would greatly benefit all of us to give players an easier opportunity to test weapons and the profession, but to throw out baseless accusations of greed because of your own lack of foresight? That's just disrespectful. Do usa favor and donate all of the money youare not spendingto the other lesser smiths on Test Center, you obviously do not need it.But as there's no way they can advance in their profession and continue testing with you undercutting them like this, they will need it.