Market manipulation and why it doesn’t work on Orbis

[Vincent]

Trading in market as long as it doesn't put the other nations at an unfair disadvantage should not be a problem

Edited October 28, 2014 by vincentsum8

[SoS]

How would increasing prices of tanks and improvements add variables? As opposed to... I don't know, natural disasters or whatever.

 

Don't you think humans add enough variability?

The variables part Was a separate thought and should have been a separate paragraph.

 

I've suggested random economic cycles before.

[Ayayay]

In the risk of going slightly off topic, do not increase the price of tanks. The reason steel didn't go as high as people expected for a longer period of time isn't that the price of tanks is too low, its that its too high, and so tanks are massively not worth it in long term war and alliances instruct their members to avoid them. I do, however think both aircraft and ships could have a higher resource cost.

Not sure about ships but I can confirm the Tank and Aircraft costs. Before WWA started I had about 4000 steel and just under 3000 aluminum. Within a few days I was out of steel and had to buy more whereas I still had over 1000 aluminum by reset. I suggested back in February/March that tanks should be reduced to .5 steel each and I stand by it. Either that or raise aircraft to like 5 aluminum

[Phiney]

Not sure about ships but I can confirm the Tank and Aircraft costs. Before WWA started I had about 4000 steel and just under 3000 aluminum. Within a few days I was out of steel and had to buy more whereas I still had over 1000 aluminum by reset. I suggested back in February/March that tanks should be reduced to .5 steel each and I stand by it. Either that or raise aircraft to like 5 aluminum

 

[elsuper]

Anyone who puts up buy and sell offers on the same resource are not value trading material and need to be embargoed, nuff said. 

 

I would disagree with this; this practice is only profitable in proportion to the discrepancy between buy offers and sell offers. Because overcutting buy offers and undercutting sell offers closes the gap between these, it causes the market to equilibrate sooner.

 

And the more profitable it is at any given moment, the more people will hop onto the speculative gravy train, simultaneously making it less worthwhile in terms of time invested because you have to continually check to see who has undercut you.

[Placentica]

I think tanks would've been used more if it had been an even war.  Like if EoS only had declared war on TAC and not UPN/DEIC as well.  I still think they are a great way to win land battles when you both have the same amount of troops.  Costly, yes, but still going to be necessary cost.

 

I just think when VoC and UPN joined they felt they didn't need tanks to get the job done.  In an even fight that would change drastically as tanks don't get destroyed as fast and don't require as many improvement slots.

 

But I agree planes should have cost raised along with maybe 2-3x the alum requirements.

[Ashland]

I think tanks would've been used more if it had been an even war.  Like if EoS only had declared war on TAC and not UPN/DEIC as well.  I still think they are a great way to win land battles when you both have the same amount of troops.  Costly, yes, but still going to be necessary cost.

 

I just think when VoC and UPN joined they felt they didn't need tanks to get the job done.  In an even fight that would change drastically as tanks don't get destroyed as fast and don't require as many improvement slots.

 

But I agree planes should have cost raised along with maybe 2-3x the alum requirements.

Can I inquire as to the math behind this?

[naTia]

Can I inquire as to the math behind this?

Easy.

 

X(6000)+EoS=i

Y(3000)+TAC=i

 

X of course being the effectiveness of troops without food

Y being the effectiveness of troops with food

 

So what have we learned?

This is hypothetical, no math backs it up.

And I take jokes too far.

(Get it, they equal i? As in an imaginary number?)

[SoS]

The spike in food prices supports your theory that soldiers need food.

 

Now, I'm not sure the math behind what Terminus was inquiring. Tanks in a dog-pile or aircraft cost? I Think Sheepy will need to make Weapons cost more and more as the game ages. 2x current cost isn't the magic number, just the next number.

[ooohu]

I, too, like the idea of trying to control the market. I've proposed suggestions addressing this before, but they weren't very well received.

 

1) Trade Unions

 

Trade unions would be player created and ran organizations that nations would join, and those who ran the union could set minimum caps on prices. So, maybe in the Steel Trade Union, all member nations can't sell steel for less than $3K. This prevents people from just undercutting each other left and right which is a common practice and results in reduced profits.

 

There are two main problems here, 1) Why join when I could just sell for $2,999 and have my stuff sell faster and 2) Are we going to get every steel producer in our trade union? If not, how are we ever going to sell anything?

 

For a trade union to be effective there would have to be some sort of incentive to join, and you'd have to get a huge share of the market involved.

 

2) Rainbow Council

 

This idea is based around each of the 10 colors being able to elect 2 representatives to the "Rainbow Council". The Rainbow council (with some majority) would then be able to embargo nations for all players, etc. or have some sort of influencing power on the market.

 

There is also the idea of simply having color senates, where representatives from each color are selected to create rules for nations on that color. For instance, maybe the Pink Senators decide that no Pink nation can sell resource X for less than Y amount. 

 

The issue with this is deciding how to make it fair, useful, and not overpowered.

Adding a percentage bonus to resource production tied to whatever resource union would be a good incentive I think. Limiting the number of unions a player could be in to a total max of two; one per raw resource & refined would prevent it being outright abused to boost all resources. Lore wise, it'd be a simple as saying unions hold "trade secrets" to better methods of refining a resource.

 

IE: Iron Union receives a 2.0 boost to resource production. Iron Union sets prices to 1.5k PPU and sure there will be nations outside of it but then members of the Iron Union can simply buy them out and resale at their price point and if a union's active it'll basically dominate the markets. 

 

As for controlling the unions I think there would need to be some form of a "rainbow" council in the sense that each alliance could have a designated nation as their representative to the unions to set a price point. In essence creating mini OPECS for each resource with their own councils. This would also give incentive for unaligned nations to join alliances in order to benefit from these unions. In effect giving alliances a new job, a Minister (or Ministry) of Resources.

 

---

As for the Rainbow council suggestion itself, I think it's a bit weaker independently because alliances would just use them to set embargo's on each other during wars and that would only harm the markets. I think the above suggestion holds a bit more teeth personally and is a bit less prone to abuse given it's much harder to have all of the alliances represented agreeing on a measure then it would be for the 1-3 per color.

Edited October 29, 2014 by Thulium

[Mortimer]

Placentica,

 

Let me first off start by saying I have a lot of respect for the way you play the game, and while I can't speak for all of my alliance members when I say it wasn't personal, it wasn't, at least from my perspective. I play the markets as well, as I am sure you know. Our alliance has several members who also play the market, and being that economics is such a large part of this game, it is natural that we view you as THE competition.

 

While you are correct, we may only account for possibly 3 to 4 percent of the total trade, and we certainly cannot control what people in other alliances do with their money. We can control what we do with our money, and since you are our main financial competition, we simply chose to get our warsources elsewhere. I'm sure you made a killing nonetheless, but with the extreme rush on the market prior to the war, we chose not to give you our money. I may not be able to stop Walmart from making billions, but I can choose not to give them my cash. (btw I hold you in much higher regard than Walmart, if that is any consolation).

 

We get a lot of flack on this forum, a lot of it deserved. But we are constantly experimenting with the gameplay mechanics to try to get every possible competitive advantage we can get. Not all of them go over so well in the community, and not all of them work out as planned (color change to yellow anybody?). C'est la vie. But we are not afraid to try anything. This embargo may be have absolutely no effect at all, but nothing ventured, nothing gained. 

[Shellhound]

I can at least respect that Mortimer. But the reason we were told by your members (market manipulation) made it seem as if you believed that Placentica was cheating or something like that, which is what prompted this post outlining what is manipulation and how most forms of it simply won't work.

Edited October 30, 2014 by Shellhound

[Ashland]

I would argue that, short of hacking, cheating is impossible in this game.  All there is is playing and playing better.  If you game the system then good for you.  But if people want to disassociate with you because of that, they can.  And that's a cost that you have to weigh.

[Placentica]

I have no issues with people not trading with me.  I too don't try to trade with alliances I feel are hostile towards mine.  But I don't need an embargo to do this.  I just do it naturally.

 

And there is the hypocrisy of DEIC/VoC members doing the same thing as me.  It's interesting how after the VoC embargo and my post that 2-3 people who do what I do, got booted out of their alliance and were told to stop their trading methods, hindering their nation growth.  I'm not a fan of VoC leadership strong-arming nations in allied alliances to stop doing something VoC themselves do.

Edited October 30, 2014 by Placentica

[Clarke]

And there is the hypocrisy of DEIC/VoC members doing the same thing as me.  It's interesting how after the VoC embargo and my post that 2-3 people who do what I do, got booted out of their alliance and were told to stop their trading methods, hindering their nation growth.  I'm not a fan of VoC leadership strong-arming nations in allied alliances to stop doing something VoC themselves do.

The simple answer for the embargo is protectionism.

Edited October 31, 2014 by Diabolos

[Placentica]

Anyone who puts up buy and sell offers on the same resource are not value trading material and need to be embargoed, nuff said. 

You better embargo this guy.

 

 

Don't worry I embargoed him when I noticed he wasn't "value trading material".  TISK TISK!

Edited October 31, 2014 by Placentica

[Clarke]

That's for other people to decide. 

[John Baraboo]

Anyone who puts up buy and sell offers on the same resource are not value trading material and need to be embargoed, nuff said.

[Aisha Greyjoy]

Isn't that how all of the top nations got to the top?  Buy Steel 1100, sell 1400, collect 300ppu profit?  Wouldn't we have to embargo you too?

[Ashland]

Uh... Is... Is that... Is that sort of behavior... frowned upon?

[Clarke]

Isn't that how all of the top nations got to the top?  Buy Steel 1100, sell 1400, collect 300ppu profit?  Wouldn't we have to embargo you too?

No not all, well me and most of the others did not. 

Only a few people do it in the game. 

[Ashland]

No not all, well me and most of the others did not. 

Only a few people do it in the game. 

What, precisely, is the problem with it?

 

Let's use an example.  Person A posts an offer to buy steel for 1200 dollars per unit, overcutting an offer of 1150 pu.  Person B sells him 100 steel for 1200 dollars per unit.  Person A then posts a selling for the steel at 1400 dollars per unit, undercutting 1450 dollars per unit.  Person C buys it from him for 1400 dollars per unit instead of 1450.

 

Let's say that Person A never did any of those things (which was more work than what B or C did).  None of that would have ever happened, so B would have sold steel at 1150 per unit and C would have bought it at 1450 per unit.  So Person A doing what they did:

 

Earned Person B an extra 5,000 dollars.

 

Saved Person C an extra 5,000 dollars.

 

Earned, for themselves, 20,000 dollars.

 

Yes, Person A earned more than anyone else.  But you know what?  Person A also did more work than anyone else and they took more risk than anyone else and their actions saved other people money and made the market allocate money more efficiently.  Is Person B complaining?  Is Person C complaining?  The only people who complain are the people that A undercut and overcut.  What A did was good for the market, good for people producing steel, and good for people buying it.  By exploiting a gap in buying and selling prices, they also reduced the gap!

 

Everyone who engaged with Person A from beginning to end benefited.  Isn't that the point of a market?  Mutually beneficial interactions?  Person A is receiving a premium, in the form of cash, for taking on additional risk, work, and waiting longer to see a return.  These things have value.  That is where the extra money is coming from.  To say that they are not producing value is false.

[Phiney]

No not all, well me and most of the others did not. 

Only a few people do it in the game. 

 

No, you just got there by getting people to aid you to your first few cities at the beginning. Because that's so much more moral.

[Clarke]

No, you just got there by getting people to aid you to your first few cities at the beginning. Because that's so much more moral.

That was our alliance growth strategy, each member aided each other. 

And besides you received 5 million from your bank yesterday that you have yet to pay back. 

Edited November 3, 2014 by Diabolos

[Phiney]

did I receive it? or did I take it, from the cold dead hands of my terrible alliance mates. Hey, I never claimed to be moral. Back on track, what do you define as "value trading material"?