One less TSA in circulation... Thanks Mr. Chairman (in General)

Body Odor [22] (+37)

cool... good to know we lose to Mr. Chairman :)

Cool,

Makes mine more valuable since they are supporter items and no new ones will be made!!!

Looks like Chairman got it for only 500k above NW.

Nobody really wanted it, apparently, or they'd have bid a decent price for it.

I wanted it, but I just spent my $ repaying my last debt... When I noticed that Mr. Chairman was winning, there were less than 3 minutes left before the end of the auction. :(

I despise Mr. Chairman. Worse "feature" ever.

At least the e-bay style auctions solve 98% of the Mr. Chairman problem.

If you dispise it, you don't have enough money to bid on the thing it bids on ;)

"Nobody really wanted it, apparently, or they'd have bid a decent price for it. "

Or didn't see the auction......

I think Mr. Chairman's involvement in auctions has to be one of the all time unpopular features. I've read all the explanations and justifications for the setup and I still can't see how it is a good thing.

agreed ^^

Also agreed.

The thing I don't understand about the Mr. Chairman concept is its complete absence from the "Buy It Now" option.

If Mr. Chairman prevents users from bidding too little on a certain item, why isn't there a minimum "Buy It Now" value imposed as well?

For example, the bid on the TSA was considered too cheap for Mr. Chairman, yet the user who posted the auction could have put a "Buy It Now" of $1M or even less and Mr. Chairman would have been completely ok with that.

Mr. Chairman wouldn't buy it because it'd ruin the opportunity for other players to get it...

"If you dispise it, you don't have enough money to bid on the thing it bids on "

Uh, no.

It doesn't matter how much money you have. When Mr. Chairman comes in and snipes the auction at the last minute, you're finished. The only way around it is to inflate your own bid so that Mr. Chairman's bid just pushes you into paying an artificially higher amount. Who's going to voluntarily pay more than they have to for an item? It's terrible.

I agree it's about 10,000 times less terrible than it was before the E-bay style auctions. Back then it was the equivalent of having the game's owner come in and say "you know what, I'd rather you not have this item you won fair and square, so I'm taking it from you, just because. Sucks to be you, you lowly little peasant." I can't tell you how many auctions I lost - that I legitimately won - because Central Bloody Bank came by and stole my item with 10 seconds left on the clock. I was so fed up with that nonsense that I almost quit the game over it.

It may be 10,000 times less terrible now, but it still sucks. I say strip Mr. Chairman of his powers and feed him to the N*Bs.

"Mr. Chairman wouldn't buy it because it'd ruin the opportunity for other players to get it..."

Um, that's exactly what Mr. Chairman does.

"It doesn't matter how much money you have. When Mr. Chairman comes in and snipes the auction at the last minute, you're finished. The only way around it is to inflate your own bid so that Mr. Chairman's bid just pushes you into paying an artificially higher amount. Who's going to voluntarily pay more than they have to for an item? It's terrible."

Mr. Chairman only bids on items it thinks is below market value. And that's why you put up more money. Auction sniping doesn't even exist anymore.

"Um, that's exactly what Mr. Chairman does."

Talion was referring to a BIN auction. It wouldn't take the BIN.

"Mr. Chairman only bids on items it thinks is below market value. And that's why you put up more money. Auction sniping doesn't even exist anymore."

We shouldn't have to put up more money to anticipate a sniping. We, as players, are trying to get the goods for as low a cost as possible. Having what amounts to a bot come in and bid over us at the last minute isn't fair.

And about sniping not existing anymore, it certainly did in the TSA example above.

"Talion was referring to a BIN auction. It wouldn't take the BIN. "

Talion said Mr. Chairman doesn't snipe buy nows because it would ruin the opportunity for players to get it. But that's exactly what he does - ruins the opportunity for players to get it. Or at least, that's what he DID. That problem has mostly been fixed. Mostly. Now he just ensures that players must bid well over what they would normally need to bid to win the item. I can't see a reason why this is acceptable.

Eh, I misread. Talion didn't say that. You did. My bad.

"For example, the bid on the TSA was considered too cheap for Mr. Chairman, yet the user who posted the auction could have put a "Buy It Now" of $1M or even less and Mr. Chairman would have been completely ok with that."

Really. That's a quote from Talion. So unless if I'm his multi, I didn't say that.

"We shouldn't have to put up more money to anticipate a sniping. We, as players, are trying to get the goods for as low a cost as possible. Having what amounts to a bot come in and bid over us at the last minute isn't fair."

The bot won't bid unless if the item is below market value. How is that not fair? It prevents people from getting things for too cheap. Which is good... nor is it a real big problem to lay down a bit more money to outbid him again.

because "market value" to central bank is not "market value" to everyone else.

To be more accurate, CB bids when it THINKS an item could / should sell for more, not when that's actually the case. And so it removes the item, thus increasing demand so that people must in the future pay more for it.

In general, it really doesn't matter at all. Where issues arise is when CB bids on supporter items. This is just plain wrong, as there is no ebb and flow of support items... only ebb. When CB removes a normal item, that item will respawn eventually. When it removes a supporter item, it's gone forever.

"It doesn't matter how much money you have. When Mr. Chairman comes in and snipes the auction at the last minute, you're finished. The only way around it is to inflate your own bid so that Mr. Chairman's bid just pushes you into paying an artificially higher amount. Who's going to voluntarily pay more than they have to for an item? It's terrible."

It doesn't really work like that, well it doesn, but it's not as bad as people make out.

You find an Uber Deal on the AH, a HoC with only a current bid of 1 CB2 for example. 16 Minutes to go (or however long) and no one else seems to be bidding on this. If you can't wait arond for CB to place his one bid at the next increment, place a bid high enough to cover the next. You'll still get the item at a marvelous steal, CB didn't really have an impact, and the price was driven up by two bid increments in total.

If CB could continue to bid, upping the price until it reaches a level it thinks 'fair', then we'd have a problem. In that case you might just as well place system based minimums on auctions.

And I've been beaten by CB. And it sucked. I put a bid in of 600K on a HoE, a good price I thought. CB didn't and I lost out.

I then bought one later on a buy now for around the same price...

If I had had the forsight to place an auto increasing bid to cover a CB snipe, I would have won.

So don't tell me no one has pulled out the calculator and multiplied the current high bid (by none other than yourself) by 5% to get the next bid increment... then changed your max bid to be just 1 cbd over the next increment. It takes all of 1 minute to do and it saves you the time and hassle of posting threads like this.

I do it all the time and I bid on a bunch of auctions every day.

I think a lot of people dunno how Mr. Cman works - this thread is probably going to solve a lot of problems.

personally all i see is that Mr chairman is going to push prices higher and higher until they will never come down again -.- kinda like HOCs... imagine if you bid 3 mill on one and he snipes it...
however i dont see a problem of getting around him... just monitor your auctions before they end... if they get sniped its your own fault -.-

And if you bid 100K on a HoC and CB bids 105K?

If no one wants and item, and no one is bidding on it, the CB bid will be tiny.

CB can also be very useful for getting a return on massive items no one else would usually have purchased.

I'm just too lazy to do what Draco suggests, and I paid for it. Don't be lazy...

mimic, that is completely incorrect.

If people fail to meet the market value repeatedly then that one increment will never push the value higher, in fact M Chairman's valuaton will continue to decrease.
He only bids once and never at exactly the market value, only we can push up the valuation from it's current average, if you were to autobid market value or even a little less and nobody else wanted to go near that amount then you'd still get it cheaper, the way the system works it can never artificially inflate prices unless we bid higher amounts.

So Zoglog, you are also saying there is no need for a Mr.Chairman anymore. Right?

Also, when I wrote: "For example, the bid on the TSA was considered too cheap for Mr. Chairman, yet the user who posted the auction could have put a "Buy It Now" of $1M or even less and Mr. Chairman would have been completely ok with that."

That meant that Mr. Chairman allows people to sell a TSA for $1 if that is the "Buy It Now" price, but wouldn't allow someone who bid over $2.5M to win that same item. That is the inconsistency.

In my opinion, Mr.Chairman should be removed and replaced by a minimum "Buy It Now" price. The minimum "Buy It Now" prices could simply be set to the values currently used by Mr. Chairman. That would make a lot more sense.

Talion, cheap Buy It Nows are for people who want the item to go quickly so your idea is a bad one.
And there is a need for Mr Chairman because although he doesn't inflate prices he does his best to give sellers as close to what they deserve as possible and also removes unwanted items from the game to preserve their value.

Zoglog wrote: "... does his best to give sellers as close to what they deserve as possible ..."

You are wrong. That is definitely not the purpose of Mr. Chairman. To make sure he gets what he deserves, a seller can use a nice little feature called "Minimum Bid".

Zoglog wrote: "... and also removes unwanted items from the game to preserve their value."

Wrong again. That TSA what definitely not unwanted. 4 people bid on it and if I had possessed the necessary CB$ when I notice the low price it was going at, I would have bid on it too. I am also 100% certain that many other users wanted that TSA. It might have been considered expensive by Mr. Chairman, but I am certain that it was not considered unwanted.

Ok, not everybody likes using minimum bid becuse it discourages bidding, same with reserves in real auctions.
And unwanted means 'not wanted enough' because if you really wanted it that much you would have made sure to research past prices and bid a sensible amount which would beat him.
The system works well, you're just pissed off that it screwed you because you didn't put in the neccessary effort to win the item.

Forgot another interesting comment...

Zoglog wrote: "Talion, cheap Buy It Nows are for people who want the item to go quickly so your idea is a bad one."

With my idea, if a user wants an item to go quickly, he can simply set the starting bid to a low price, set the "Buy It Now" to the minimum, and make the auction last for a short period of time. My idea is not that bad in my opinion.

Zoglog wrote: "...you're just pissed off..."

Wrong again. Please do not put words in my mouth and try to interpret my feelings.

I didn't even bid on that auction. Why would I be pissed about not winning it???

Doing it that way will result in them getting even less than they currently would with a cheaper Buy It Now. And enforced minimum Buy It Now which for your idea would be somewhere in line with the systems valuation will not encourage people to pay a Buy It Now.
Give me an non-counterable way for your idea to work well for a seller and I may very well start thinking of them as reasnable solutions.

Ok I'm sorry for assuming you bid on it but either way the concepts are the same, buyers are going to get annoyed that they didn't get their bargain because they failed to bid enough to beat that last increment but sellers need to be protected too.
The buyers aren't being screwed, they just aren't being prudent enough to predict what CB is going to do.

"Doing it that way will result in them getting even less than they currently would with a cheaper Buy It Now."

What???

"And enforced minimum Buy It Now which for your idea would be somewhere in line with the systems valuation will not encourage people to pay a Buy It Now."

If a user really wants an item and someone else is bidding on it, they will pay the "Buy It Now", even if it is higher than the minimum value.

Your arguments are valid with a Mr. Chairman in place. If you replace Mr. Chairman with a minimum "Buy It Now", your arguments stop being valid. Users would naturally change their auction behavior along with the system.

And if the minimum "Buy It Now" price would be considered too high, there is always the FS/WTB forum. In there, you can sell anything for any price at any time. But I think the auctions would remain the preferred selling method for most items.

A short auction time with a low starting bid but an imposed minimum BIN was your idea for a quick sale.
The reason I said sellers would get less is because without an automated bidder like Mr Chairman the likelihood is that at many times of the day you will only get one serious bidder who notices a short auction therefore resulting in them getting it far cheaper than they intended without the need for using the BIN, the seller is then getting far less than they should.
I feel my arguments for the current system are valid regardless of the system being used otherwise I could say the same thing, that yours would only be valid if we were using that system but I'm not saying that because I don't feel you have to use something for a point to be able to be made. You have good points but currently there are large flaws that I am pointing out.
People may not like our current system but it really is the best all-round solution known to us at this time.
Why should users have to change their behaviour to suit an inferior system where a seller will be worse off than a buyer is within the current system? That statement is far more dictatorial than any part of the Jonocracy in my opinion.

"I could say the same thing, that yours would only be valid if we were using that system but I'm not..."

Actually, that is exactly how you should think. My arguments are for a new "Mr. Chairman free" system, so they all apply to that system, not the current one. Thinking of an imposed minimum BIN with a Mr. CHairman in place is total torture. However, if you remove Mr. Chairman, it would work out pretty well imop.

The points I have put against your argument do not involve Mr Chairman so your argument that my points are only valid if he is there is null and void.

That is your opinion and I respect it. However, I am in complete disagreement, but this thread is dead by now because of our bickering so I will stop arguing.

I apologize to everyone for getting into another flame war.

For the first 10 posts between you two delightful souls, I was thinking the argument was at least interesting, if relatively one sided. But there were some VERY un-pg thoughts expressed, and it will continue to run in circles. So please either A) refresh your persectives or B) take it to CM. Talion, this is your thread. Why would you allow it to become cluttered and spammed up? That's what most of that conversation was.


The chairman is necessary. Bidding on supporter items is risky, true. Just bid higher on them. I find it hard to believe that in a game with billions just sitting on characters, someone can't afford 2 mil for a TSA. It was wanted, just not that bad.

I would like to point out something. A big problem with the the economy, in my opinion, is the players hoarding wealth to either sell for USD or to start an NCB.

This creates little black holes for cash. In the case of USD, it's just a delayed release. Not good, but not really bad either. However, in the case of NCB, the huge amount spent on BA is just draining away from the game. With so many players running NCBs, the cash is just disappearing. To put it simply, for the number of players in the game, there is not enough cash readily flowing through the market. Because the money AND items are hoarded. I personally have a Roe, two jiggies, and a TSA. I probably won't use them for a long, long time. If ever. But I want them because I know in a few years they'll be worth sooo much.

Something needs to be done about this. Somehow.

I actually like the CB Bank bidding concept, however I believe supporter items should be exempt.

From what I've read from Jon, it seems Mr Chairman is there to remove items that have been "over-spawned" and that rather than artificially changing spawn rates, CB Bank bidding on items is a more market based way of changing the circulation of items. I like this and think it is a good way of allowing the number of an item in circulation to increase/decrease depending on market conditions.

Supporter items however don't spawn and IMO should therefore be exempt from the Chairman since the numbers in circulation cannot be adjusted upwards (through spawning in Auctions) in the case of an undersupply, only downwards. If the primary reason for Mr Chairmans existence is too control the relative spawn rates of items then it should only apply to items that actually spawn.

"If the primary reason for Mr Chairmans existence is too control the relative spawn rates of items then it should only apply to items that actually spawn."

It makes total sense. I second that.

Ecolicola
"Really. That's a quote from Talion. So unless if I'm his multi, I didn't say that. "

Now you're misreading. I quoted you directly, not Talion, and my response addressed what you said, not him. So unless you're his multi, you did say that.

"The bot won't bid unless if the item is below market value. How is that not fair?"

Because the market value should be set by the consumers, not by an automated bot.

"It prevents people from getting things for too cheap. Which is good..."

How so? If I find an item in auctions for a lower than average price, I should be able to bid on it and win it fairly. You wouldn't see this kind of junk in any other auction system, so I don't realize why it's so accepted here.

If Jon wants to control the number of rares in the game, he shouldn't have so many spawn. Allowing items to spawn that shouldn't spawn, then letting a bot "steal" them, or even just inflate the price, doesn't seem like a good solution.

"I personally have a Roe, two jiggies, and a TSA. I probably won't use them for a long, long time. If ever. But I want them because I know in a few years they'll be worth sooo much."

Jiggies aren't increasing in value. TSA isn't increasing that much in relative value, and neither is the RoE - if you'll notice, though the cash value appears to increase, the USD:CB2 ratio is also going down. You're a lot better off moving your assets around than sitting them in one spot.

Heres an answer to your prayers... use FS/WTB Forums to sell stuff and you wont have to deal with Mr. Chairman.

"use FS/WTB Forums to sell stuff"

I think the ones with the problem are the ones trying to buy stuff, not the ones trying to sell stuff.

And if you use it to sell stuff... there will be more items to buy in Forums. More sellers equals more buyers....

Oh? 500-600k for a near base tat is a lot. Somehow, I don't think they price will ever go down.

"use FS/WTB Forums to sell stuff"
tried that, most of the "bids" were retracted, that can't happen in auctions.

As talion pointed out if you're a seller who cares who bought it. If Central Bank out bids you, GOOD! more money for me the seller! If I get out bid by Central Bank, well then I guess I should have set my auto bid at a slightly higher max (that's what it's for, set it at the max you are willing to pay, not for the cheapest you think you can get it for!!)

"Because the market value should be set by the consumers, not by an automated bot."

The market value is set by consumers. I may be wrong but I think that Central Bank uses past auctions to determine what that market value is.

"It prevents people from getting things for too cheap. Which is good..."
This is very good if you're a seller! I want every dime I can get for what I'm selling and if Central Bank is going to out bid you and put more into my pocket then great!!!

"The market value is set by consumers. I may be wrong but I think that Central Bank uses past auctions to determine what that market value is."

Exactly...

But the point I have been typing is:

If a market for an item is tanking, why does CB need to over inflate its price?

Ebay does nothing like this, nor does any other auction system I know of.

Supply and demand should set the price of items, without artificial inflation.

Heh, well IMO there are some players out there that try to over inflate item prices much worse than "Mr. Chairman" does....

They aren't trying to over inflate the market... they are just selling at what they want to sell at... nobody has to buy the items... but if they want an item bad enough they will pay whatever it takes to get it.

and that differs from MC how exactly?

"and that differs from MC how exactly?"

AC gives more, well AC..

MCM doesn't have penalties ;)

*tosses Zachie a brewsky*

"If a market for an item is tanking, why does CB need to over inflate its price?"

It doesn't.

Unless you want to call over inflating placing a single bid at the lowest price on an auction no one has bid on...

Very simply, there can be made valid arguments for CB bidding on stuff. However, I have yet to hear any valid argument, no matter how outlandish (and I'm not trying to invite outlandish arguments...) that it is O.K. for CB to delete supporter items.

If nothing else, CB should *NOT* be allowed to bid on those.

CB doesn't have to auto delete the items it bids on. supporter items could be given to tourny/contest prizes.

;)

I'm a relatively new player, so I'm not entirely familiar with the way these things work, but if I understand correctly the mr Chairman character automatically bids on items it thinks are sold below market value. Like I said I'm not very familiar with the inner workings of Carnage Blender, let alone it's economy, so forgive me if there's something I'm not seeing.

From my point of view, there are a few things very wrong with that. First of all, market value is supposed to be determined by -surprise- the market itself. Supply and demand and all that. If people aren't willing to pay more for an item, and the seller is willing to ask less than what mr C considers "market value", then obviously the market value is less than what mr C thinks it is. This is artificially raising prices to the detriment of the players, not only because they don't get the item they would have otherwise legitimately won, but it also removes an item from circulation, which in case of Supporter items only serves to artificially raise prices even more by decreasing (potential) supply.

Now if, for some reason I fail to see, a free market mechanism is considered a Bad Thing, the Central Bank idea is still a bit of an awkward way to do things. A better way would be to simply set a mandatory minimum bid that would be considered an sufficient price. This way noone has to be afraid the auction will get auto-sniped minutes before ending, and limited items won't just disappear. Of course, this means that some items will be considered too expensive to buy in auction because it's minimum price is out of sync with the real market value, but in effect that's not very different from what is happening now.

Mr. Chairman may be more beneficial to the seller, but 'more beneficial' does not mean it's fair. Artificially raising prices and even removing rare items from circulation is, the way I see it, a Bad Thing, and a free market mechanism is at least equally fair to all parties involved. In regards to mr C handling overspawning of certain items by removing them from circulation, I can certainly see the point in that, but wouldn't it be a more honest thing to simply throttle the spawning rate of an item if it's relative popularity (and thus it's price) become too low for the arbitrary standard that has been set for it? This wouldn't be a quick fix like mr C is supposed to be, but it would allow prices to resettle in a more natural way, without directly interfering with the actions of players.

I'd have more 'feeling' for the loss of supporter items in this way if there weren't so many of them - and other rares - just sitting there not being used. The TSA for example - of the top 50 30% aren't being used. Only a small portion of that is because the players are no longer active. People just sit on items; they're not even in rentals where some use could be made of them. IMO hoarding does far more hurt than getting rid.

i totally agree... other then HOC of course

In Response to Aargh: keep in mind that Central only bids the next increment in an auction AND only if the current bid is under current market value... in no way does Central inflate the market value, especially since Central does not bid more than once to drive the price up... unlike some people that bid in auctions.

And also keep in mind... with the current cb:usd ratio even if the price seems to be going up it is actually staying about the same as it was with previous cb:usd rates.

DrAcO5676: I understand that central bank only bids if the items is being sold under the perceived market value, but my point is that that perceived market value must be off, or people would be willing to pay more for it. Simple as that.

Now I realise that there might be people willing to pay more who don't have the money (I'd love to buy a TSA myself, but can't afford it), or who have simply missed the auction (which is the risk of a short auction I guess). Tough luck; those people don't count, because they wouldn't have bought the item anyway.

I also understand that the increase in price the Central Bank causes isn't very big, but it isn't to be ignored either, especially since it means any bid lower that the perceived market price is in danger of being outbid by a bot. I know there's a way to prevent this, but since the way to prevent it is bidding more than you would normally need to win, it still raises the price of the item by forcing the buyer to pay more.

On the USD issue... I don't know what the US$:CB$ ratio is or was, or how many people are willing to trade one for the other, and honestly I'm not the slightest bit interested in that, so I won't even go into that. I don't know what the general idea is on this, but I find it somewhat hard to believe the CB economy is meant to be based on US$ rather than CB$.

"it still raises the price of the item by forcing the buyer to pay more."

Again, so what? Items shouldn't go to people who bid too low. Plus, I'm sure as a seller you wouldn't wanna get ripped either.

"Items shouldn't go to people who bid too low."

The problem is that 'too low' is a meaningless statement in this situation. If people wanted to pay more they'd bid higher, and if people wanted to sell for more they'd set a higher minimum bid. The idea of an auction is that the item goes to the one who's willing to pay the largest amount of money. If that amount is somewhat lower that expected, there shouldn't be some kind of automated mechanism saying you can't have it.

A Reserve Bid :)

"I'm sure as a seller you wouldn't wanna get ripped either. "

Higher min bid, or a BIN auction ;)

"I can certainly see the point in that, but wouldn't it be a more honest thing to simply throttle the spawning rate of an item if it's relative popularity (and thus it's price) become too low for the arbitrary standard that has been set for it?"

I really like Aargh's ideas.

Simply reducing the amount of rares that spawn would be the best way to handle this. It's my opinion that there are too many rares anyway, and the game is way too "hurry up and get a rare!" focused.

"Again, so what? Items shouldn't go to people who bid too low. Plus, I'm sure as a seller you wouldn't wanna get ripped either."

As already mentioned, it's the seller's responsibility to set a starting price (or buy now) that he's comfortable with, not Jon's bot's responsibility to auto-insure sellers. The admins at e-bay don't come in and snipe away auctions they feel are under priced, and it shouldn't happen here either.