Counteract auction zombies, limit bids per day!

Can you expand on the nature of the topic? What is the definition of an auction zombie? If someone is motivated to buy a lot or bid a lot, that's their time and their PED, I would think. If someone really wants something and rebids on an item if their bid is surpassed, that doesn't make them a zombie, that makes them a market player.

I'm trying to fill up my Components I and II books, so I've been posting a number of bids on prints I'm missing. If I have 17 or so bids up, am I a zombie?

Now I don't camp the terminal or anything. As a lot of these prints are available regularly cheap, I'm not running back to the terminal if I get a "bid surpassed PED returned" message. (Only bidding on the basement cheap listings.)

So yeah, I don't see the issue or it isn't well detailed enough for me to see the grievance, so I vote "No, leave them zombies in piece!"

I mean, is this zombie thing just being upset at being outbid? Heck, you could if you want, just like on eBay, wait until an auction is just about expired and post a last minute winning bid. I haven't done that but you can sort the market by time remaining, so that tactic looks to me like a feature.

 

I see the point and the need, but the need is rather to ban a few certain "players". But I guess another one just pops up instead.

Gretchen your points are very valid and I agree with your vote kinda. At least the limit in amount of bids might not be a solution...

 

@Amber I suppose it's the same problem that crops up in any multiplayer game about any game dynamic. There's folks who will find the weak link in the rules and gain some advantage at the expense of other players, while not technically violating the rules. I suppose one can be "economically griefed" in a real money game. I'm still interested in what the initial post meant to be the specific behavior referred to as the problem.

 

Well ok, lets put some more info into my words. I'm not sure this is what Tass refers to though.
So the problem I see are the "players" who I believe are bots, just placing bids for their masters based on what they are prepared to pay to make a quick buck on sales that the average player miss out on and thus getting an item way below the actual MU.
These bots are breaking the rules aka EULA since it is a software interacting with the game, I have no proof that these exist but imo it's very obvious.

And these bots lack the need for stamina and patient that we real players need to last in a 1 PED increment endless bid war and I agree with Tass that this sucks!

I could write a few more lines on how they operate and the pros and cons of their existence but I rather not if you don't really want me to ;)

 

people are very crafty about their methods, making some sort of EU-bot that can navigate through the auction panels opening categories and sorting columns and making bids, I'd think anyone with that much skill could find more highly compensated jobs than making a couple bucks here and there on the auction. And as pointed out, buying low and selling high is a legitimate method of raising PED, especially for non-depositors. Some sort of item tag for mandatory relisting delay would just be a new subroutine for such a program, and would it follow parts of split stacks...and the other suggestions would hit active actual traders along with suspected bots.

In EQ, people would bot their characters to run back and forth between merchants and forges to auto-skillup in crafting...and players would defeat them by occupying the forges, making the bot program fail.

In SWG, they disrupted bot-programmed mining while AFK by periodically popping up a Captcha-style thing you had to respond to to prove you were at keyboard.

Maybe that sounds most tenable, every 5 auction transactions, it asks you a Captcha response. Before something like that would likely be implemented, it would have to be documented somehow that this was a widespread problem that was skewing the player economy. I've heard it said for instance, that Sleipnirs used to be cheaper and now they are around 70ped. What tends to drive things up and down the most, player demand or market manipulation, human or bot?

Also, as for devoting to market play on the auction to the exclusion of other activities...nothing says people have to play in all areas. Toward the end of my time in EVE, I was spending all my time buying, selling and researching torpedo blueprints, and wheely-dealy in the market. Many many areas of that game, I had ceased to do. Players make their game out of the parts they like.

 

It's the "personally" part that makes it a fine line to draw. I'm mostly playing devil's advocate here, and I'll stop. :) Not trying to tweak anyone, just exploring the issue from different directions.

EU is a cash sucking machine and getting PED to feed your decay is just part of the magic of EU life. Not much you can do without PED, however you can get it, aside from letting things beat you to death naked for defensive skillups. (Although I recommend Next Island sunrises and sunsets as awesome free things.)

 

My favorite part of EU, besides chatting w/ my friends, is actually getting those good deals on the auction. Yeah, sounds boring to you but that's OK. Personally I think diversity's a good thing.

Before you assume us 'zombies' have a negative influence, consider what would happen otherwise in two circumstances.

1) Someone is looking for a quick sale, but doesn't have the lowest BO.
Often people will list something for 24 hours, 0 ped start bid, fair but not the lowest BO. Someone already bid TT+0 right after listing. If those 'zombies' didn't each keep raising the bid it'd go for TT and the seller'd be screwed. The global economy'd also be hurt a little because the MU would reflect an unfairly low sale.

2) An unusual item is listed, and interested people don't notice.
Rarely, a rare high(ish) value item is listed, again w/ 0 start, fair BO, but with 7 days. For some reason those few people who would love to have it don't look for the posting. The same results as above, except the MU would crash since so few are every listed. (I've bought items that have only had 3 prior listings.)

From my experiance, 'rarely' do those 'zombies' get something for a discount greater than 10%.
It's good for the seller since they get a better price.
It's good for the economy since prices are more stable.
It's good for MA since those auction fees to relist add up.
It's good for the next purchaser since they don't have to check the auction every day.
It sucks for the person looking for an unreasonable deal.
People can be confident they'll get a reasonable price.

If you want to get rid of the 'zombies' here's what you do. A) Never list without a BO. B) Never have a 0 start bid. C) Only list for 7 days. Oh, and D) check for 'everything' you might be interested in buying, and have the PED on hand - every day.

I'm not defending those few people who destabilize the economy by trying to artifically manipulate the market. Just sayin' - just because some people make a few PEDs doing something you find boring, it doesn't make it evil.

EDIT : I only have 1 avatar. From what I've seen, 'zombies' aren't bots - if you can run EU in a window while working it's easy be semi-aware 8+ hours a day.

 

the one thing that annoys me in an auction is where someone places several bids in succession with noone else bidding on that item. That is what i would call a zombie tbh, and that should be changed. It does nothing but drive the price up unnecessarily or artificially limits the downward market movement on the item. You shouldn't be able to bid again until someone out bids you

 

It is impossible to constantly reload and check for every possible item you are interested in without being aware or having a semi-conductor brain...

 

Make a new zombie planet.

Through all auction zombies on there and let them keep bidding and listing items against each other forever to their hearts content without influencing proper planets.