Why did he not want the extra 30 million? Who knows. Possibly someone in a hurry to get rid of his stock or maybe someone who doesn't think minerals/datacores/bpcs count towards manufacturing costs. Regardless, I was faced with a horrible decision: give up 20 million profit myself and list my ships just under his price, or post at the 94 million mark and hope his three were bought up before other sellers followed suit. Damn, if I had the ISK I would have bought and relisted them myself.
In the end the decision was made for me while I deliberated as a second seller listed at 84 million range and I saw that the migration to the new price point had begun. I listed with a grimace and accepted the loss like a man. Make no mistake, I'm still going to make a profit after manufacturing and invention costs, just 20 million less. What stings more is the four more Onyxes coming in a few days which means at least 40 million profit less. Ouch.
Fortunately, the two sold quickly and I was able to start buying parts for the Cloaking Devices production.
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In other Industry related news, in a comment to my last post on the Orca and a miner Mugen stated some interesting facts:
Unless you want to get TWO designated miners to support your orca pilot, you really do not create much of any extra efficiency going hulk + orca.Actually, Mugen, I think I remember reading that months ago and forgot that salient detail. I do plan to have the Orca for future alliance activities as a fleet ship, I just want to use it for some light solo play and I figured that an Orca and Hulk would work well. However as you pointed out, two hulks would be more efficient: I did some math and saw that an Orca and a Mining Foreman Mindlink gives roughly a 50% increase to the Hulks efficiency whereas two unbonused Hulks would be 100% over one Hulk. So the optimal is around 3+ Hulks and an Orca.
I can look up some data for you later, if you'd like (I just got home and I am waaayy too tired for that now), but I have seen lots of info describing the main differences of up to three accounts, such as:
Hulk(MLUs)+Hulk(MLUs)
vs
Hulk(Cargo Expanders)+Hulk(Cargo Expanders)
vs
Hulk(MLUs)+Orca
vs
Hulkx3 and so on.
The differences are NOT that great. When it comes to bonuses, the Orca is really designed for FLEET support. That is where it really shines. I hear the break even point is as high as 3 hulks, as in, the third hulk would still be more efficient than an Orca.
You should really look into this further before you waste half a year of training on one of your accounts.
Also keep in mind, the MAIN reason why everyone wants an Orca is that they are still one of the most flexible transport type ships in the game (for hi-sec). You have already achieved this goal.
All that being said, the Orca does solve some hauling problems in a one person - dual box setup that might be worth using it over a second Hulk if only for convenience. When I get up to speed with the second miner later in the year, I'll do some tests and come back to this issue.
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Posts
Last I checked, undercutting your opponents for a quick(er) sale was good market strategy no matter what the forum - not sure how this warrants the title "idiots". Maybe the price cut he made available was a lot more than necessary to achieve that goal - but as you said, you're still making a good profit.
ReplyDeleteBesides, your desired course of action amounts to price fixing - something I'm sure you'll agree does nothing but screw the buyer, and deter competition. (Which from your vantage point as a seller may be just peachy.... but isn't the most principled of stands.)
Its not the undercutting which I am complaining about. Undercutting is alive and well in Eve markets. But undercutting for 10 million ISK is nothing but a waste of his money when undercutting for a handful of ISK would have the same benefit for him for greater profits.
ReplyDeleteAs for your second point: I disagree with the pricefixing comment. Reasonable competition without collaboration is not price fixing. Unreasonable competition, i.e. slashing your prices for no advantage, is plain stupid.
price fixing issue: I put this down to the lenghts some people will go to to avoid 0.01 isk wars. It's basically a bet that he's put it low enough that most of the other sales guys will simply set his ships sell first rather than try and undercut him. The fact the rest of you followed like minnows simply means he didn't cut enough from his point of view.
ReplyDeleteOrca issue: Since the typical dual box (or dual client scenario) involves 1 miner and 1 hauler, having a more capable hauler really does reduce your workload. Especially with it's corp hangar what you can do is simply have your Orca follow your hulk at 500m and dump directly into it's corp hangar. Then from time to time move the stuff in the corp hangar into the normal cargohold. Nicely immune to can flippers that way. So in this scenario the Orca replaces a hauler not a hulk. Big difference.
Rather, he is probably a smart person for doing as he did. The point of such a big drop is to reduce the overall number of competitors. The idea is to drop the price of items until its no longer viable for others to build those items, then when everyone else has stopped building anymore, you buy all the stock in the market at a lower price then sell for a much higher price. For items that sell quickly, this is a great way to make obscene amounts of profit.
ReplyDeleteIts possible, but I think unlikely. We'll see if the price rises back to 94 million any time soon to see if your hypothesis has any water.
ReplyDeleteI prefer to side with the "people are stupid" hypothesis because its held up so well so many times in the past. :)
If you had money at hand then... why not buying him out? I mean, you buy his two Onyxes, sell your three at your old price, then his two, then your upcoming four... that is 90 million already to your favor.
ReplyDeleteYou could try with a few of the remaining 84M Onyxes, just to see what happens...
I would have definitely bought him out had I not had all my isk devoted to current projects. :)
ReplyDeleteIn the end, I still made a profit and life goes on.