Auction problems
Posted: Sat Sep 03, 2005 7:41 pm
Ok I had a bad experience with my first proper auction and I want to make sure it doesnt happen to anyone else. I am not the sort of person to take enemies with any of the parties, and I mean no disrespect to any of them by posting the story as I got it here. I shall offer the item in question to the 3rd highest bidder if they want it. My aim here is to get some community agreement on future auction rules to make sure this doesnt happen to others as it did to me.
Ok heres the story:
We're rebuilding the guild and need some money to start afresh. I looked around my appartment for some things to auction and I found a max hp q200 invasion dagger. So I decided to auction it for a week on these forums.
I posted it here with the auction to end sat the 3rd at 6pm BST (today). Anissa and Audrey started the bidding, Annisa stopped at 45mil after Audrey outbid her at 50mil.
Yoshi then came in to outbid Audrey and the bidding continued until Yoshi made her last bid at 110mil, outbid by Audrey at 115mil. Apparently Yoshi never wanted the dagger but Yoshi and Audrey dont get along so Yoshi wanted Audrey to pay more for the dagger.
This was an enourmous amount of money for the guild, and early in the auction too. The guild was very happy and looking forward to the money we hoped to be getting.
So the auction finished tonight and I logged in to speak to Audrey about the dagger. Audrey pointed me to a message in my ig e-mail inbox from 11pm last night saying that there were some problems paying. Basically she was apparently bidding on Fasinus's behalf, who couldnt use the forums for some reason. However, they since had a falling out (guild problems I think it was) and Audrey couldnt pay anymore. Audrey says she doesnt have the money and is only lvl 60 in close combat.
So I went to Yoshi. Yoshi said she wouldn't pay because Audrey won the auction and thus, should pay.
This meant that I would have to resort to the 3rd bidder, 70mil lower than the winning bid, but still a lot of money for the guild.
However I decided to ask Fasinus first. He acknowledged that Audrey was bidding on his behalf, but that he said 100mil max for the dagger. So I offered him the dagger for 100mil and he just said "lol no thanks".
Yoshi has said she would make up for it by offering to make some nice armour or weapons for me, and Audrey has offered her services with boss mats or jewels. Both were appreciated offers and I may take them up on it.
I am going to give up getting the money from the two highest bidders, I dont want to make any enemies and both sides have their reasons not to pay, although in reality they probably should. However, I cant force anything and as I said I prefer not to make any enemies.
However, this does leave a problem. How can we stop this from happening in future auctions?
I dont want to see people bidding for things they arnt or cant pay for. This can hurt the person auctioning the item, by making it a run around to get the item and introducing a element of corruption in ryzom auctions. For example someone could have come in and outbid the money that the dagger will now be sold for, however because of the two bidders who later pulled out, was unable to because of the inflated value.
So what can we do about this? Should the community pull together and make some sort of list of people who arnt allowed to vote on auctions because of things like this? I am not calling for any of the people involved in this incident to be banned, but I am just listing it as an option for the future.
Another option could be that the community as a whole pulls together and makes sure the winning bidder pays in some way. Even if they have to pay it off over time or loan money from someone.
Either way I think we need extra bidding rules to prevent this from occuring in the future. For example when the sniper rule was introduced to prevent last minute bidding.
Your thoughts please
-Kibsy
PS: 45-50mil was originally my higest estimate for what the dagger would sell for, but I was a little disappointed as you may imagine by the turn of events. The guild will still be very grateful for this money.
Ok heres the story:
We're rebuilding the guild and need some money to start afresh. I looked around my appartment for some things to auction and I found a max hp q200 invasion dagger. So I decided to auction it for a week on these forums.
I posted it here with the auction to end sat the 3rd at 6pm BST (today). Anissa and Audrey started the bidding, Annisa stopped at 45mil after Audrey outbid her at 50mil.
Yoshi then came in to outbid Audrey and the bidding continued until Yoshi made her last bid at 110mil, outbid by Audrey at 115mil. Apparently Yoshi never wanted the dagger but Yoshi and Audrey dont get along so Yoshi wanted Audrey to pay more for the dagger.
This was an enourmous amount of money for the guild, and early in the auction too. The guild was very happy and looking forward to the money we hoped to be getting.
So the auction finished tonight and I logged in to speak to Audrey about the dagger. Audrey pointed me to a message in my ig e-mail inbox from 11pm last night saying that there were some problems paying. Basically she was apparently bidding on Fasinus's behalf, who couldnt use the forums for some reason. However, they since had a falling out (guild problems I think it was) and Audrey couldnt pay anymore. Audrey says she doesnt have the money and is only lvl 60 in close combat.
So I went to Yoshi. Yoshi said she wouldn't pay because Audrey won the auction and thus, should pay.
This meant that I would have to resort to the 3rd bidder, 70mil lower than the winning bid, but still a lot of money for the guild.
However I decided to ask Fasinus first. He acknowledged that Audrey was bidding on his behalf, but that he said 100mil max for the dagger. So I offered him the dagger for 100mil and he just said "lol no thanks".
Yoshi has said she would make up for it by offering to make some nice armour or weapons for me, and Audrey has offered her services with boss mats or jewels. Both were appreciated offers and I may take them up on it.
I am going to give up getting the money from the two highest bidders, I dont want to make any enemies and both sides have their reasons not to pay, although in reality they probably should. However, I cant force anything and as I said I prefer not to make any enemies.
However, this does leave a problem. How can we stop this from happening in future auctions?
I dont want to see people bidding for things they arnt or cant pay for. This can hurt the person auctioning the item, by making it a run around to get the item and introducing a element of corruption in ryzom auctions. For example someone could have come in and outbid the money that the dagger will now be sold for, however because of the two bidders who later pulled out, was unable to because of the inflated value.
So what can we do about this? Should the community pull together and make some sort of list of people who arnt allowed to vote on auctions because of things like this? I am not calling for any of the people involved in this incident to be banned, but I am just listing it as an option for the future.
Another option could be that the community as a whole pulls together and makes sure the winning bidder pays in some way. Even if they have to pay it off over time or loan money from someone.
Either way I think we need extra bidding rules to prevent this from occuring in the future. For example when the sniper rule was introduced to prevent last minute bidding.
Your thoughts please
-Kibsy
PS: 45-50mil was originally my higest estimate for what the dagger would sell for, but I was a little disappointed as you may imagine by the turn of events. The guild will still be very grateful for this money.