DoS and patience

I've mentioned denial of service before off and on, but today I'll go a bit more in depth with it. This only works with certain things, so you can't expect it to happen with every profession or item. The main thing I want to get across is the mentality of the seller (you) and the buyer (the moron).

Buyer posts in trade chat: LF enchanter, 30 SP to weapon, my mats and 1g tip!

Now you can do that enchant, you happen to be in a different city or even the same one. The question is though, how many others can do it? Answer: not that many. You can either go to them and do the enchant or sit on your hands waiting for them to finally make it to you without tripping over their shoelaces. Or you can just continue with what you were doing to begin with.

The customer has a want which they have confused with a need. So they must have this enchant done NOW or else their super cool BoA staff is now somehow worth less than the one I bought. Naturally this isn't the case, but having an unenchanted BoA item makes them seem not cool, and your typical moron can't afford to be uncool to their peers. They also can't afford to wait for anybody to finish what they're doing or wait and keep posting later on in the day/night.

The seller knows that only a few people can do said enchant, and most have either stopped playing or won't be around when the enchant is needed except for them. That gives them a pseudo-monopoly on it meaning they can set the price for the most part. The seller then gets on their banker and makes sure that they have a scroll of +30sp on auction at lowest price then continues on their way.

The buyer gets curious and looks for a scroll on AH. They add the sellers to their friends list to perhaps ask them to be "cool, helpful friendly" and go from where ever they are to them for an enchant. Lo and behold, they are not online...QQ. They then are overcome by the "need" for that enchant and buy the scroll for 550g. They are now sitting with 100g in mats which are now "worthless" so they put them on auction for 50% of the current value.

The seller, comfortable in the knowledge that they're likely to have a sale soon, eventually finishes their business and gets on their banker. Behold! A scroll of overpriced awesomeness has sold! They then do a scan for the materials and find a pair of golden pearls on sale for 25g which they eagerly purchase with a smile. Enter the enchanter who makes another 30sp scroll for the low low price of 80g to list for a whopping 550g.

Lather, rinse, and repeat.


AH giggle of the day!
I was on my ench/bs banker collecting my nightly mail when I noticed that a bunch of enchanting rods had sold to the same person (including a copper rod for 18g). Then as I'm posting scrolls I find that same person listing 7 of the same scroll of major stamina to shield for material price. I buy them and list at my fall back of 150g as there were no others besides them. Morning comes and 3 of them had sold. Do I need to go on?

Lesson learned:
When you have little or no competition, please don't list things for 20% of market price. Pointless undercutting is pointless.


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