TOPIC: Entire Collection Auction :( Ends 9:00PM 31JUL17

Everyone, please feel free to snipe my bids. I won't snipe back.


I should know better than to make bids while drunk. I do, however, stand behind my drunk bids.

Shady Veldrin wrote: Well, the lack of guarantee is pretty much what makes it an auction I guess. Doing on token at a time in a true bidding auction with the fast talking guy with the "going once, going twice, SOLD!" approach is pretty much the only way I'd get the absolute most somebody is willing to spend on each token. That's just not really possible, and this is still the closest to what Ebay would be doing. *shrug*

Hopefully I didn't come across as slamming you or anything. That wasn't the intention. If I did, please accept my apology.

The problem is, as you discovered a few days ago .. everyone took a deep breath and now there is no more air in the room [which is why you don't see activity .. most folks I suspect are in the 'lets see where it is on the 31st'. mode.]

We *all* know what these tokens usually trade/sell for. Some folks value them at those prices, some lower, some higher .. but we all know. Everyone on the bidding side is hoping for a deal. (usually) and you are, as you should be, hoping to maximize your return.

I think, however, that NO activity actually plays to the buyers advantage. I know, for example, that Kirk has a Charm of Brooching for $300. (and I sold one a few weeks ago around the same price point). So it is reasonable to assume that you know that too, as it was your original opening bid.

A buyer wants to pay less than that .. of course .. or they would just buy it outright from someone (there are several people selling them on the forum). So you are fighting forum prices, and the potential of someone coming in a few days before your auction is over and offering tokens for less. (maybe intentionally, maybe unaware that you even have an auction.)

By basically forcing a model where you try to simulate the 'going once going twice' kind of thing .. it makes people uncertain. "Do I want to bid max price? because maybe tomorrow trent has that up for sale, maybe someone pops in to sell it." naturally they want to wait .. which of course keeps your bids lower.

I don't really have an *answer* .. I'm just saying - more from a 'human being' perspective that trying to eBay in a forum is tough. I think it works in here better than most other places because the TD community as a whole is very welcoming and friendly.

I've been selling tokens for a few years on everyone's love-to-hate-friend ebay, and the vast majority of activity on an auction is the last 30 minutes.

Funnily enough though, 90% of the 'buy or best offer' listings I put up sell within 4 days.
I don't even *do* auctions anymore, because its like 9-10 days of watching nothing happen, followed by a brief flurry of activity (assuming people all remember to look) netting me the same as if I just took a best offer

I would just hate to see you (or anyone) set themselves up for six more days of work, (and waiting) just to get where you would have anyways.

*meh* .. somehow this migrated from an apology into thoughts about how humans tend to bid on auctions. My brain is swirly.

Oh no worries Steve, I totally understand your view on this, and no offense was taken so no apology needed

I did do a fair bit of research beforehand on what a lot of these tokens list for, and opted to start pretty far below in many cases. My hope was to both get extra interest and drum up some friendly bidding along the way. I'd be THRILLED if I got the high amount I found for each token price, but that kinda defeats the fun of the auction itself and the hope of the bidders still ending up with a good deal too.

So in the end I'm expecting a fair amount of activity, and no matter where the final prices lay, we're all on the same team, against Jeff's monsters and nightmare machinations

I will also take the following rares:

* 1x Hat of Intellect
* 1x Belt of Ogre Power

Thanks!

Edit: I will also take a charm of enlightenment

kurtreznor wrote:

Marlon Hestetune wrote: Here's the problem with #2.

I am the sniper. I bid $5 more at 11:59:59 and I am the seeming winner.

Now the snipee gets some allotted time to answer back?

Do I, the original sniper, who has now been counter sniped, get my own allotted time to answer back?

If no, why not, is my bid less valid because I waited?

Correct, your bid is less valid. Sniping breaks the DBAD rule.

I don't understand this perspective - especially for an auction format where you name your own price and pay it, with fairly substantial price jumps.

If person A is willing to pay more than person B, then person A will win, regardless of the order of the bids are.

What is wrong with waiting till the end to place your bid?

I'll give you at least one good reason to wait:

* Someone may offer an identical token for less before the end of the auction.

To me the upside of not having a free standing commitment is more important than the downside of someone else bidding exactly my top dollar and winning because they got it in first.

Shady Veldrin wrote: So I've had a few people inquire about the end of the auction, with concern to how last minute bids will be handled regarding the end time. My intention isn't to allow a bid holder to be "sniped" with somebody putting in an offer at the last second, but that's entirely possible.

So I wanted to ask you, what would make the most sense? Options I've considered:

1. Keep the "final bid inside of time wins" but move the end to something earlier, like 8PM EST
2. Keep the "final bid inside of time wins" but allow the second highest bidder at the time of auction close 24 hours to increase their bid one more time (requiring at least $5 or $10 depending on the token)
3. Use some sort of "floating end time" after 8PM on a token-by-token basis that extends on that token by 5 minutes each time a new bid comes in. After 5 minutes of no activity, the auction closes on that token.

The third option sounds tough to administer, especially when 3 or more people are potentially bidding over one another, and have that happening across multiple tokens.

We have 1 week left, and the bidding has slowed on most tokens, so I'm not sure how night of an issue last minute bid sniping is really going to be, but I wanted to come up with a good fair solution. My ability to stay up until midnight next Tuesday is also limited, so the only thing for sure that I know I want to adjust it moving the end time up by 4 hours to 8 PM EST.

Thoughts? Suggestions? Funny jokes?

I was planning to bid, I noted the challenges this auction structure has on page 1 of the comments.

I would stick to what you said initially - I happened to pop into this thread on a lark - I haven't been following it - because the auction rules initially expressed mean all I need to do is post my top dollar before the auction ends - not follow any of the preliminaries here.

Frankly I don't understand why anyone is bidding now (unless they are concerned they'll forget, or think that other bidders would bid their amount, but no higher).

I'd suggest none of the above, just wait to see who posted the highest price before midnight Tuesday, and collect that amount - easy!


But I'd take heart, 1/2 the bidding on eBay happens within the last few minutes, I'm sure you'll see people putting down their earnest best offers shortly before auction close.

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Shady Veldrin wrote: So I've had a few people inquire about the end of the auction, with concern to how last minute bids will be handled regarding the end time. My intention isn't to allow a bid holder to be "sniped" with somebody putting in an offer at the last second, but that's entirely possible.

So I wanted to ask you, what would make the most sense? Options I've considered:

1. Keep the "final bid inside of time wins" but move the end to something earlier, like 8PM EST
2. Keep the "final bid inside of time wins" but allow the second highest bidder at the time of auction close 24 hours to increase their bid one more time (requiring at least $5 or $10 depending on the token)
3. Use some sort of "floating end time" after 8PM on a token-by-token basis that extends on that token by 5 minutes each time a new bid comes in. After 5 minutes of no activity, the auction closes on that token.

The third option sounds tough to administer, especially when 3 or more people are potentially bidding over one another, and have that happening across multiple tokens.

We have 1 week left, and the bidding has slowed on most tokens, so I'm not sure how night of an issue last minute bid sniping is really going to be, but I wanted to come up with a good fair solution. My ability to stay up until midnight next Tuesday is also limited, so the only thing for sure that I know I want to adjust it moving the end time up by 4 hours to 8 PM EST.

Thoughts? Suggestions? Funny jokes?

I was planning to bid, I noted the challenges this auction structure has on page 1 of the comments.

I would stick to what you said initially - I happened to pop into this thread on a lark - I haven't been following it - because the auction rules initially expressed mean all I need to do is post my top dollar before the auction ends - not follow any of the preliminaries here.

Frankly I don't understand why anyone is bidding now (unless they are concerned they'll forget, or think that other bidders would bid their amount, but no higher).

I'd suggest none of the above, just wait to see who posted the highest price before midnight Tuesday, and collect that amount - easy!


But I'd take heart, 1/2 the bidding on eBay happens within the last few minutes, I'm sure you'll see people putting down their earnest best offers shortly before auction close.

Lest you miss your bids Matthew, the time of the auction close has been moved up to 10 pm Eastern I believe.

Most forums I've been on that allow auctions typically use this format... 1- set time for auction to end. 2- If a bid is made eithin the last hour (3 hours on some) the auction is extended. 3- The auction closes when there have been no bids for 24 hours.

Yes it could make the auction take longer, but it eliminates sniping completely.

I'll go $65 On Stu's Handy Stein

Ring of improved evasion 80
Rays ring of remembrance 35
Rays other ring 35
Charm of heroism 200
Blessed redoubt mail 210
Stus handy stein 70

Charm of heroism 210
Blessed redoubt mail 220

I'm in for the +2 Ring of Protection $80. I don't think I will be attending Gencon this year, I will pay via PayPal with shipping. What are your shipping options?