TOPIC: [FUNDED!!] 8k Auction w/ Buyouts #3! End: Tuesday, July 8 @ midnight EST

And the Academy of Goblins! I'd like to thank them too!

Big, BIG thanks to everyone that participated, gave feedback, or simply poked me and said "What if..." - and Grunnel, of course!

WE HAVE FUNDED!

We went a tiny bit over due to how "Buy It Out" works. The overage will be set aside for the charity stuff I do in the fall (more on that later, but I need to talk to my co-conspirators next week).

Invoices will be delivered to winners before midnight Eastern time on July 10

Under Bids & Buys section on the first post, he stated:

"If funding is achieved before the deadline, the auction will end when the sum total of bids and "Buy It Out!" actions meet or exceed the funding threshold. For example, if the auction is at $7,998 of the targeted $8,000 and you raise the bids on two items by $5 each, only the first item's bid will be counted as this meets or exceeds the auction target. So! Put your most desired items at the top of your list!"

I'm guessing he took the bids in the order received and bids before yours pushed it over the $8,000 threshold leading to the conclusion of the auction as it was funded and therefore closed before the time expired.

So far as I know, Alan had more than a day’s worth of bids to process, and he processed them in the order they were sent/time stamped in his email - first in, first out. Alan stops processing bids when he hits $8K. Some auctioneers keep going and process every bid up until the deadline which will allow their auction to overfund, but that’s not what Alan has done:

I think Alan is a fantastic auctioneer and I’ll certainly not hesitate to participate in any of his auctions.

I am confused as to why 6 of the "winners" of the UR are lower bids than what I put in 5 days ago.

Steve, how did you word your bid?

SAMPLE BIDS:
<send me a forum PM with your bid!>
"Hi, I'd like to bid as follows:
- $50 on Ultra Rare #1
- $50 on Ultra Rare #10"

(in this case, I'd only enter your bids on Ultra Rares #s 1 & 10)

or:
"I'd like to bid $55 on Ultra Rares until I'm winning at least 2 of them"

(in this case, I'd start with Ultra Rare #1 and enter your desired max bid until you've got winning bids on at least 2 of them; if you go through every Ultra Rare without a winning bid at $55 I'd let you know that you raised current bids but weren't winning any)

or:
"I'd like to bid $55 on two Ultra Rares"

(in this case, I would randomly determine - via Google's dice roller - which Ultra Rares your bid goes on; if you wanted two 'of the lowest price Ultra Rares', I'd randomly determine from just those lowest price ones. I want to help you place bids, but I'd like to stress that I'm doing my best to remain as neutral as possible!)

Steve wrote: I am confused as to why 6 of the "winners" of the UR are lower bids than what I put in 5 days ago.

For some reason his bidding rules only process bids on specific URs rather than auto bidding the entire lot. That could be why. This also confused me and unfortunately also allows people to game the auction by not bidding against their friends. I hope that is changed in any future auction.

Daniel, two comments.

First, you can bid against the lot if you want to. You just need to specifically say so in you bid.

or:
"I'd like to bid $55 on Ultra Rares until I'm winning at least 2 of them"

Second, even if this weren’t the case, lot-specific bidding is the standard on trenttokens.

I did bid against the lot.
$55 each for 2 UR was my exact wording. It was not item specific.

Scott Kwiker wrote: Daniel, two comments.

First, you can bid against the lot if you want to. You just need to specifically say so in you bid.

or:
"I'd like to bid $55 on Ultra Rares until I'm winning at least 2 of them"

Second, even if this weren’t the case, lot-specific bidding is the standard on trenttokens.

Im aware lot bids are accepted. Nonetheless, I had an issue in the auction earlier where I bid like Steve did and it was arilbitrarily applied to URs 1 and 2 instead of down the line as I had intended. I will be curious to see if that is what happened to Steve.

With respect to Trent, down the line bidding was standard everywhere until Trent diverged from that. As I recall the explanation at the time was technical reasons. Nor does "Trent does it" make it a good idea. Individual bids enable people to game the system by colluding to not bid against their friends. Not cool.

Daniel White wrote:

Scott Kwiker wrote: Daniel, two comments.

First, you can bid against the lot if you want to. You just need to specifically say so in you bid.

or:
"I'd like to bid $55 on Ultra Rares until I'm winning at least 2 of them"

Second, even if this weren’t the case, lot-specific bidding is the standard on trenttokens.

Im aware lot bids are accepted. Nonetheless, I had an issue in the auction earlier where I bid like Steve did and it was arilbitrarily applied to URs 1 and 2 instead of down the line as I had intended. I will be curious to see if that is what happened to Steve.

With respect to Trent, down the line bidding was standard everywhere until Trent diverged from that. As I recall the explanation at the time was technical reasons. Nor does "Trent does it" make it a good idea. Individual bids enable people to game the system by colluding to not bid against their friends. Not cool.

You can't completely game the system, because not everyone that is bidding on items is from a particular group of friends. I'm very happy with the auction, even though my final bids didn't make the cut either, and will definitely bid on future auctions.

Steve wrote: I did bid against the lot.
$55 each for 2 UR was my exact wording. It was not item specific.

Maybe an honest mistake all around. However, his auction format did include this guidance:

or:
"I'd like to bid $55 on two Ultra Rares"

(in this case, I would randomly determine - via Google's dice roller - which Ultra Rares your bid goes on

Based on the auction rules I can see why he might have randomly assigned two lots using the google dice roller.

Anyway, I think “down the line bidding” would be a very good method to run an auction, and I agree that just because Trent runs his auctions one way doesn’t make it the best way. Still, I think Alan was pretty straight up with the auction format, and don’t see a reason to throw shade his way. Running an auction is a lot of work, and Alan ran his without taking any tokens (incl the random URs or Golden Ticket) off the top, and is contributing the $20 overage to charity.