2 questions about tourney characters and auctions (in General)

I am asking these questions due to the fact this can be abused.-

1) Should tourney characters be able to bid on BIN auctions?

Let's say someone puts in a high level weapon, 1M NW or so near the end of the tourney for a "buddy" with a BIN of 50k or so, less then the store price. The buddy snatches it up and wins with this upgraded weapon.

Or, imagine someone getting a high level lesser tattoo for less then the store price on a BIN auction, is that really fair to all those in that tourney?

I propose that all tourney characters cannot bid on BIN auctions. Since auctions can be over in 4 hours that is enough time to stop any under the table funny stuff.

2) The other problem that I cannot find a solution for yet, is a tourney character putting in a low level item such as a short bow in auction, 4 hour duration and having a "buddy" bid like 500k for it to funnel money to the tourney character to upgrade their items.

I do not know of a way to stop such abuses that way.

It may seem I am being paranoid, but tourney are supposed to be fair to all, but there are abuses that can occur, especially with prizes over 5M cb as the goal.

Point one is pretty reasonable. My only concern is that it might hurt tanks in the beginning of tournaments, but that would likely only be for a short time.

Point two could possibly be solved by imposing Maximum prices for auctions by tournament characters. They would prevent low level items from selling for more than an appropriate amount, as determined by CB.

Mythology[T], July 2 6:11 AM EDT

4) I need a Lesser tattoo of endurance on my tournament character, there arnt any in auction but I have one on my farm character, I ask someone in chat that if I send them the tat if they would put it in auction for me.

AdminJonathan, July 2 11:52 AM EDT

4) i don't see a problem with this since anyone can bid

DJ

That is a wrong answer as they can put that tattoo in auctions with a low BIN and its gone quickly.

Hence my point number 1, NO BIN auctions for tourney characters.

ANYONE can buy it now.

Camp the auction!!!

I like your idea for preventing number 1, no BIN for T-chars. Number two was always against the
"unwritten" rules on Cb1, so if this begins to happen I'll just start watching auctions by T-chars.
As long as the item is being sold for market value then it will be allowed, but your example, 500k
for a worthless item, would lead to disqualification and a reset of the T-char.

1) For tournament characters, there's a cooldown period for auctions. If we assume enough people scan auctions for deals like this, most attempts are discovered even before the tourney character can bid on it.

2) See Myth's post about possible tourney abuses. Jon's reaction to a scheme like this was that money laundering is illegal, even without tournaments. If you find such an auction, please report it to Slayer or another admin, so that we can hit the appropriate reset buttons...

DJ,

If 2 people in PM chat about putting a 50k lesser tattoo in auctions for lets say 10k, there is almost no way of camping to prevent the abuse from happening.

All they have to do is time it right and no way camping can prevent it.

I believe the cooldown is 20 minutes... do you really want to risk giving away an expensive item to a random person?

Bart,

I have not noticed a cooldown for auctions on tourney characters.

In fact I bought an item just after it was put into auctions. There is a cooldown for store items though.

Also, there already has been a sale of a lesser tattoo to a tourney character for less then the store price of said tattoo. Via a BIN auction. In NO way am I saying these 2 people were conspiring, again IN NO WAY, however it is already happening. Good items for tourney characters going for below market price, even below store price.

Is this fair to all in the tourney? Especially when there is a nice price at the end.

What about another situation - say for instance GL puts a base Lesser Tattoo in auctions with a very low BIN specifically for me to be able to purchase it...does that count as an exploit, or is that allowed?

If the BIN was not less then the store price, that is a grey area.

Something I am trying to figure out.

And one reason I proposed a no BIN for T-characters.

Well, there was a cooldown for CB1 tourney auctions, it was generally considered a great idea, so I assumed there also is a cooldown for CB2 tourney auctions.

Cooldown for cb2 auctions will work the same.

I like the no BIN idea better but that is just me.

I think anything that could compromise the idea of a level playing field is probably a no-no. I think that should be the bottom line IMO.

Adds a little extra thrill to the game if you're all competing in auctions as well as on the battlefield! ;)

I've certainly been waiting for some more smallish lessers to hit the auctions, come on people there are profits to be made :)

Ah, the fun begins.... I had some problems with less than sporting folks abusing just these issues way back when.

I believe Ranger is right. There should just be no BIN as that immediately eliminates the possibility of abusing the auctions.

There was another set of shenanigans that used to occur in auctions. A tournament char 1 would bid on an item. Then not being able to afford to block the purchase of his opponent, tournament char 2 would use his regular char to out bid him. That was deemed unfair and unsporting as a tourn char will never be able to compete with the cash on hand of a regular player. I think it was something along the lines of, "If you are in a tournament you can't bid on any auction that has already been bid on by a tourn char."

I only mention this because it seems the rules are being hammered out as we go instead of just modifying the old ones. Surely they must be sitting dusty on the back of a server somewhere.

All of the issues I've seen raised so far were addressed there.

Happy hunting.

added the auction buy now waiting period bart referred to.

Thank you. IMHO, 10 or 20 minutes cooldown still feels a bit short, because of BIN. Why not have this at 1 hour or so?

Agreed Bart,

A 1 hour cooldown would be perfect. But at least 10 min is something.

The requested URL cannot be accessed due to a system error on this server.

AOLserver/4.0.10 on http://www.carnageblender.com/
when trying to BIN a tat...

and now it's gone...ARG...

I'm getting a server error trying to BIN novice's RoBF.

oops. fixed

woo...hoo.

Can't sell anything now...

Tournament Characters must wait 10 minutes after an auction is posted before using Buy Now.
I have been trying to buy the same BIN auction for over 15 min now and get that message.

Why do tourney chars have access to auctions anyway?

tattoos?

Experiencing the same as Ranger's last post.
Probably the same item too :)

Ditto...I can't BIN on anything in auctions with my Tourny char.

I'd like to see tourney fighter have to camp the store for lesser tats personally...if you can't auction them no much reason to buy the base ones...

lesser tats spawn in the store?

yes NS, the stork has nothing to do with it...

fixed better

I guess I thought they were spawned in auctions.