Central Bank Question? (in General)

I'm still fairly new to CB2, but I think I have a fairly firm grasp of the game and its mechanics. One that I don't quite understand the need for is the Central Bank auction sniper. Looking back at past forum entries it seems that this is just a bot that snipes items from auctions that it considers are too low in price. Correct?

This is done to make sure the item goes for market value, correct?

Well, here's where I don't quite understand the mechanic. If the auction was going to end at a certain price, wasn't that the market value? This isn't enforcing fair prices, it seems to enforce continued high prices. If the demand is lower, and less people are interested (thus less or lower bids) shouldn't the price go down?

Before the "ST[admin: Please watch the language]U NEWBIE!!" and "HE'S JUST MAD CUZ HE LOST!1!" come out. Yes, this post was spawned in response to multiple auctions that this central bank has won where I would have. I am not mad, I am more curious as to the real reason. Like I said, it looks to be an enforcer of fair price but who's to say that the price IT sets is always fair?

It doesn't exactly work that way. It doesn't bid "market" value, it bids the next increment up if the item is below market value. This means that over time, if an item is always underbid on, that the price will drop.

Shabaz,

An excellent set of questions asked my almost all of the CB players in the past.

CB bids to keep the values of items at a reasonable level. What level we do not exactly know. Why this bot is needed has been pondered many times and some people still question its value. However, it is a part of the game so we all have to deal/live with it. The concept of supply and demand does not completely apply in this closed ecosystem. This is basically all one can say about the whys of the bot.

CB will only bid if an item already has a bid on it. CB will only bid in the last 20 or so minutes of an auction. I have found that if one bids in the last 10 minutes, CB will not overbid and you can get a good deal then.

Items are introduced into the game in an automated way. It should be fairly obvious that it matters how much of which type of items are added to the game, in order to please as much users as possible ;) This is very difficult to achieve while they are spawned, as the server then has to guess what's in demand and what's not. It's much easier to get the same effect by spawning (slightly) more items than needed, and recall those that apparently are not as much in demand.

Also, Central Bank does *not* snipe. People should learn how eBay-style autobidding works...

I suppose snipe is not quite the right word, you are correct.

I also fully understand how automated proxy bidding works, but when you set every last dollar you have as the maximum it's hard to go higher.

Like I said, not mad, just looking for a method to the madness here.

Thanks for the answers.

There is a method, as has been said, Central Bank will only bid the next increment if the current price is below the calculated average.
If you want lower prices, all you need to do is bid a lot lower than the current 'value' time after time and let Central Bank win them until you and get it cheaper.
The reason for the 'madness' as you call it, I consider it very logical is that if items were to keep getting cheaper due to times of short demand then sellers wouldn't get a reasonable return on investments and Central Bank is there to ensure they at least get a little closer to what they should.

Like all they said it kinda keep market value. It also help control numbers of rares and amount of money in game as item bought by central bank will be destory. Also central bank help us well at least me to get rid of high nw item. Cant remember how much excatly but i sold around 50mil nw worth of items to central bank at abit lower or close to 50% nw. I once sold the 2nd largest AX 24mil nw to central bank for 11mil or 12 tats when pl first come out.