Weekend Selling Report

Just got back from a mini vacation. With a number of Diablo III gold auctions of commodities having completed over the weekend I was excitedly expecting to see some gold waiting or me.

Instead I found 10 items in my auction log. Not one success. Complete and total failure. Could this be dumb luck, or does it prove that you simply cannot ever place a bet over the weekend. Is this proof that you must actively manage selling every single thing you put in the AH? While one try does not prove anything there most likely won't be many times in the future where I'll need to make such a bet.

The big problem with the plan is that it violates 'buy low; sell normal'. It was a bad idea from the beginning because you have no way of know what 'normal' will mean in the future. It would have been better for me to dole out those items over the course of the few days before the weekend before prices rose... I still would have made profit, because all items were acquired well below 'normal'. It just would not have been as much gold as what I was guessing the weekend high would be.

Live and learn. And listen to Markco.

Weekend Selling Strategy.

Here's a problem.  Most of my gold is currently locked up in commodities and I'm about to take a vacation for the weekend.  How am I going to move all these goods that I've gathered through the week?

I have collected 8 Fiery Brimstone (to experiment with).  Currently they are going for around 83,000 each.  I acquired them for 50,000, each, or less .  One was actually a drop from a Rare salvage!  I would like to double my investment.

I want them to sell near the top of the market, but I don't know what that is.  I have to place my bets now, because I'll have no access to D3 until Sunday Night/ Monday Morning.

Most of my auctions are going to be devoted to commodities this weekend.  Two auctions of 8 total Fiery Brimstone.  Another 4 auctions of 200+ total Exquisite Essence.  And maybe one or two of Iridescent Tears to get ride of them.

5 Fiery Brimstone for 100,000 gold each. 3 Fiery Brimstone for 90,000 gold each.  Basically I'm assuming that FB are going to hit 100k at some point this weekend and they will get purchased.  Why that assumption?  Path 1.0.3 decreased the drop rate, and the increased activity over the weekend.  More people can play, so weekends are a good time to sell.

Granted, it's a total guess on my part about the price going that high.  And we know how well that guessing worked out in the past.  I'll report back Monday about how it went.


D3 Commodities 6/21/2012

Exquisite Essence: 1935 gold
Iridescent Tear: 214 gold
Fiery Brimstone: 81505 gold
Tome of Black Smithing: 44 gold
Tome of Jewel Crafting: 1087 gold
Tome of Secrets: 530 gold

D3 Commodities 6/21/2012

Exquisite Essence: 1977 gold
Iridescent Tear: 312 gold
Fiery Brimstone: 63000 gold
Tome of Black Smithing: 56 gold
Tome of Jewel Crafting: 892 gold
Tome of Secrets: 527 gold

 These prices change on a minute by minute basis. Something that is addressed by Marcko on Diablo 3 Gold Guide Blog. Which makes recording them a little problematic.  Quoting a single price gives the impression that the price was steady all day.  Which is not the case.  It makes the most sense to record the lowest values seen that day as most folks use the lowest price to get their products to move.  In addition to reporting them in the blog, there's a google doc started to record the data.

Inflation Economics in Game Design

Playing the Auction house and running through various levels grinding gold has got me thinking about inflation and economics in games.  There are quite a few players who are disparaged by the inflation in Diablo 3.  Instead of griping about how the D3 economy is at the moment it would be more productive to think about how different games could be balanced in order to re-leave some of the player tensions.

D3 Commodities 6/20/12

Exquisite Essence: 2000-2100 gold
Iridescent Tear: 400-500 gold
Fiery Brimstone: 53000 gold

These are today's ranges for the commodities.  As a big fan of Disenchanting from WOW, salvaging seems like the way to go to gather some serious gold.  The best way to do that is to track the market.  What's the best way to track that data and display it on blogger?

Google Docs -> Blogger?

Gem Experiments

The patch notes seemed to suggest that there would be increased demand for gems.  Prices on gem combinations were drastically reduced.  Which seems like it would increase the number of sales of gems.  Spending all day testing this has been both simple and boring.  They haven't sold.

This means my last post is wrong.  The price of combining really isn't a factor in the value or liquidity of gems on the AH.  Droping the price of combining gems hasn't really effected the short term market.  Too bad, I was going to sell through all mine today.  I have quite the stockpile.

Something that was a pleasant surprise, a spike in the price of Fiery Brimstone.  The price then dropped during the day back.  This may be a bit premature as the salvage rate has greatly changed.  One sold early today for 53125 gold, and I'm going to buy one now, and watch the price to see what happens.  Don't sell your last one!

Also I put together a fair set of Gold Find items.  All level 60 Magic Items, all 25,000 gold or under per piece.  Tried it out in nightmare, attempting to put together the Staff of Herding.  Got first three components with no problem.  Shinbone had droped randomly for me without even looking for it, which kicked off my interest.  The mushroom took a few runs, but showed up fairly quickly.  Bought the bell, no trouble.  Ran the quests for the other two pieces for 3 hours last night, and 4 or 5 hours this morning.  Never got the other two.  Decided to do Izual to break things up a bit, and the plans dropped on the first run.

How have things been going of you out there?  Good gems sales today?  Bad?

Patch Day...

It's time for another patch day, and there are some big changes if you play the auction house.  Things are getting fixed, bugs squashed, and paths corrected.  And we sit here and write blogs to kill time before we can play again.  But how is this going to affect your ability to make money?  The official patch notes are posted on Reddit.  Let's take a look.

There are two things that jump out right away.  Crafting changes and changes to drop rates. These are the obvious 'first glance' changes that are going to impact the AH and RMAH right away.

The Three Hundredth Spear: Item Analysis

The key to selling an item on the auction house is understanding how to value the item.  To value the item you have to be able to pick out the things that players want.  Here is a great presentation that goes into the topic of item valuation among a lot of other things.  Markco, who formerly made a fantastic WOW gold guide, has been talking about Diablo 3 with Sixen.

Initially this seemed like a bad Legendary item which would never sell.  But that opinion may have been created by the failure of my first item up for auction on the RMAH.  After listening to Markco and taking a second look The Three Hundredth Spear has a really nice stat and may be worth selling after all.  Let's take a look at the item, and discuss how to use it to best effectiveness.

Diablo 3 RMAH Experiment Day 2

Are there buyers?  Yes and no.  There are buyers for level 60 gear.  ONLY.

It was pointed out on /r/diablo that trying to sell anything under level 60 is pointless. It seems they are correct.  My level 42 Legendary did not sell for the $75 buyout price, nor the $60 asking price.  Theories of arbitrage tell us there is a price that people would be willing to pay.  The only question is, hoe low is that price?  It seems like bad legendary items will not pay for my copy of Diablo 3 after all.  Well at least not a single such bad legendary.

The item was re-posted for a $29.99 buyout.  It's doubtful it will sell.  Next stop $14.99.  Perhaps we should cut to the chase and just put it up for $4.99...  But lets play it out and see if we can get someone to buy it for more.

On the other side of the auction house I have been raking in the gold using old WOW techniques.  Even before leveling my barbarian to 60 I started bidding on level 60 Magic Items.  Buying at a certain price point and salvaging the items yields a nice profit.  There is basically a constant supply of such items as most gearing is done with rare or better items.

This illuminated a key point in my mind. You have to learn how to buy something in order to know how to sell it.  My last post was basically a 'guess and check' experiment.  It was my first data point in learning how to sell things in the RMAH.

At this point 3 legendary items have dropped.  Level 42 Armor, Level 44 Weapon, and a Level 55 Spear.  Basically crap.  Why?  The market is only interested in level 60 items.  Just like WOW, Diablo 3's economy will suffer from late game, or level cap issues.  Most players will want to spend money at the top level for better gear.  This means the economy will be relatively flat.  If you don't have THE best item, you cannot command prices anywhere near the top.

This will also mean that all those $250 valuations we see will be coming down quickly in the near future.

Diablo 3: RMAH. Are there Buyers?

Personal stuff

Diablo 3 RMAH fact and speculation after the jump!

Having passed series 6 and series 63 the Commonwealth of Massachusetts says that I can sell people investments in mutual funds.  However, over the past 6 months I've learned that working on comission is not for me.  So I'm looking to work for New York Life Investment Management in Customer Service.  Fortunately that job requires series 6 and series 63 licensing.  My future and the future of this blog is unknown.  At this point it's a waiting game until NYLIM goes through the interview process.  Until then I have a few clients that need some financial goods and services to tide me over.

From a game design point of view, a small Ma game development company likes one of my game concepts, and wants to work on it.  This is a loose deal, but means actually making a real game prototype with someone who knows what they're doing.  I expect no profit from this, but look forward to starting a real game and giving it a go.  (Well another go).

So in the past year I've started two businesses, and two businesses have failed.  This is encouraging.  At this rate I'll be a successful entrepreneur in 2 years (or 4 more failed businesses, which ever one comes first)!  What better way to celebrate then with some speculating in Digital Goods!  Maybe D3 can be business #3.  That brings me to Diablo III!