Jump to content

How to create a good unusual price suggestion.


jjjon123

Recommended Posts

For a quick and updated check, use this: http://forums.backpack.tf/index.php?/topic/6033-new-unusual-price-suggestion-guide-the-cheat-sheet/

 

EDIT: V2.0 coming soon.

 

Everyday, the moderators at Backpack.tf accept and reject dozens of suggestions. Unfortunately, many times, an unusual price suggestion, in particular, is rejected simply because the user that created it did not know how to make a good suggestion. Not only does the suggestion get closed and the user loses points but if they are a new contributor, they can be left frustrated by rude and biting comments left on their suggestion and stop using backpack.tf altogether. Bad suggestions also waste the moderators time if the moderators have to research the price themselves and explain their actions by writing a lengthy comment. And this is simply because the users do not know how unusual prices are judged by the community and moderators at Backpack.tf.

The following tips will help new contributors, and perhaps experienced contributors alike, create acceptable suggestions and become an outstanding member of the Backpack.tf community.

Choosing an unusual to price.

• ✓ DO choose an unusual you have experience with. If you have had experience with an unusual, you will be able to put together a price quicker than if you tried to piece together scattered proof. You also may notice when a price is a bit off while browsing through the pricelist if you have traded around that unusual before.

• Don't be afraid to update an unusual you own! As long as your proof is solid and range matches, your suggestion will be accepted with no problem.

• ✓ DO choose an unusual that has an outdated price. In order for the unusual price section to stay up-to-date and relevant, unusual prices must be investigated from time to time to keep up with changes in the market. If the unusual price section is to remain a invaluable resource within the community, we need people to carry out the task of reaffirming old prices.

• ✖ DO NOT choose an unusual that there is not much proof for. Finding and presenting proof will be explained in the next section; but for now, just know that it is not wise to choose an unusual that there are no past or present listings that you can find on any major trading site. A one of a kind unusual with no trade history that has never been listed or has only been listed for a short time and has received very few offers as a result would be a good example of a lack of proof.

 

• ✖ NEW unusuals need at least two sales. Unusual hats with no previous price cannot be priced with a single sale. There needs to be at least two sales in order to ensure that they are not being priced off outliers or quicksells. If the two trades so far are very far apart, wait for a third. Click for more info and questions.

 

Finding and presenting proof.

• ✓ DO find written evidence of offers. Use major trading sites such as TF2Outpost, TF2Bazaar, SourceOP and others to find written offers on active or past listings. Try not to take the word of the seller, make sure it is in writing. Listed C/O's can be retracted, out-dated, or even fake.

• ✓ DO find confirmable past sales. TF2Outpost and TF2Items let you see the trading histories of many items, including unusuals. Dig into the past and find offers on past listings that are by future owners of the hat. If you cannot find any written offers, try looking at the histories of promos and other unusuals traded around the time by both owners to see if they were traded between those owners of the hat you are researching. But remember that this method may not tell you ALL that was traded. Just use some common sense; a burning flames noble was not just traded for a vivid plasma one! Something else was added.

• ✓ DO highlight the offers you are focusing on in the links you provide and clarify your proof much as possible. Do not just slap up a few links to trades and say that a price should be raised/lowered. Explain why you settled on the range you suggestion and point out the offers and sales that led you to your decision. Try to mention if the offers are in pure, unusuals, items, or mixed. Doing this saves the moderators time and allows them to spend less time researching individual suggestions.

• ✖ DO NOT use outdated proof. How old is outdated? That can vary from unusual to unusual, depending on how rare it is and how often it is traded. A good length of time is 1 month. Try not to provide proof older than 1 month if at all possible.

• ✖ DO NOT use very young trades as proof. More specifically, do not use the buyout of a very recent listing to support bumping down the price of an unusual. It may be a quicksale or discounted price. A few days to a week or more should be enough to tell the difference between a quicksale and a normal buyout.

• ✖ DO NOT present opinion, speculation, or effect/tier comparison as your primary proof. All those can be used to support a written offer or past sale if offers and sales are sparse, but do not form a suggestion around any of those reasons.

Evaluating the proof and setting the range.

• ! Remember, all prices should assume that the hat is clean (not duped or gifted), not-glitched, and should be in PURE BUDS OR KEYS. That means that unusuals offered must be valued lower than their normal values. This is what is commonly referred to as "unusual overpay".

 

• ! Remember, use original suggested values of unusuals.

Most of the current listed prices are way off due the storage system of values. Until that system is changed, you have to use these prices. Click for more info and questions.

 

• ! Remember, Always put a RANGE for an unusual, not just a flat value. Backpack.tf prices are not to be used as strict guidelines but as general ranges showing what an unusual is worth. (Note: A flat value may be used in some extreme cases, like for a 1of1 hat or an extremely rare and expensive unusual. Sometimes in those cases, only the sale price can indicate what it is worth since other offers may only be obviously low offers (or "lowballs). )

Setting the high end.

• ✓ DO set it to the highest reasonable past sale. This is the best way to set the high end.

• ✓ DO set it slightly higher than the highest rejected offer if no past sales are available. If ~3 buds was the highest offer found but all owners of the hat rejected it, then set the price slightly above 3, but only slightly. Perhaps all those offers were pretty low. Giving the owners a chance to find to the right sale without undervaluing their unusual is only fair.

• ✖ DO NOT set it to just the buyout or asking price. This is a problem that many new contributors run into. A buyout is what the seller will instantly sell for and is set at the sellers consent. Just because someone has a buyout set does not mean that offers or past sales have reached that amount. Consequently, if buyouts have been reached, it is ok to use them as part of your range, but in that case you would be using past sales or offers. Don't be fooled by the term "quick-sale". If there is a "quick-sale" buyout that has not sold for one or two weeks, then it is probably not a quick-sale.

There is one exception to this rule that is when an unusual's price is being lowered. If there are several buyouts on the market that are lower than the current mid-high range, you may set the high end to those buyouts, showing that the price is outdated.

• ✖ DO NOT set it to an unusually high offer or sale. One or two buyers may have offered or paid an insane amount for the unusual you are investigating. Don't use these as proof that it needs a raise. High sales and offers like these may be labeled "outliers" Usually, these occurrences are easy to spot and your suggestion will be rejected.

Setting the low end.

• ✓ DO set it to lower past sales, if many past sales are available. This is the best way to set the low end, but may not be practical if many concrete sales can not be found or if all the sales traded for about the same amount.

• ✓ DO set it to a commonly offered amount. If 3 buds was offered multiple times, rejected, and the hat sold for not much more, then perhaps 3 buds is a good low end to set it at. But be careful not to set it to a "lowball". Also make sure the range is not too wide or too narrow. A 0.5-1.5 bud range is a good range for most unusuals.

• ✖ DO NOT set it to a genuine quick-sale. If there happened to be a genuine quick-sale where somebody sold an unusual for much much less than what it goes for normally, don's use it as reason to lower the price on the unusual you are researching. Just like an unusually high sale, these occurrences are easy to spot and your suggestion will be rejected.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hahaha. It could likely use some clarification. It's just fine to have it a high range if it's proven to be achievable (ie. low range is within reasonable distance, past sales have met that buyout). The problem is when people take a B/O as a worthwhile high range simply due to the B/O existing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

oh. thanks Vincent. By the way, how come many of the old (or never) bumped unusual hats do not have that little red triangle next to it? Makes me wonder how many new traders look at them at think that is the real price while in actuality it is very old.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Way back when the Unusual prices were directly put in the database, without having a proper price suggestion for them, so they don't display the outdated suggestion warning.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Way back when the Unusual prices were directly put in the database, without having a proper price suggestion for them, so they don't display the outdated suggestion warning.

Well actually that's not completely right because It happens with some new unusuals too.

 

What happens is that when a unusual is first priced, for some reason, no date is applied so it never gets tagged for being old because it doesn't have date to begin with.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

"DO NOT choose an unusual that there is not much proof for. Finding and presenting proof will be explained in the next section; but for now, just know that it is not wise to choose an unusual that there are no past or present listings that you can find on any major trading site."

 

How much is "not much proof". Would it be sensible to create a suggestion for a hat that is currently only one-of-a-kind if it is on a major trading site? (Outpost in this case)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Are there any known sales behind it? Has it been on the market for a long enough time to have a wide variety of offers behind it? Those are the most important things.

 

A 1 of 1 item that's only been on the market for a week does not have enough info to be priced. It should be avoided. A 1 of 1 item that's traded at least once and has been on the market for at least a month should have enough to work with. There's always exceptions, so if you're unsure, just ask. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh, it's never been traded, it's just been unboxed like a day ago or something. Thanks for the advice then, I'll keep an eye on it. It's a Scorching Flames Wraith Wrap.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

http://backpack.tf/vote/id/513b2dbe4bd7b85c0f000007

People don't even read his suggestions anymore, they just upvote. So he suggests that impersonating him will result in successful suggestions.

If only people criticized him like they did on his too early key suggestions. When I was a voting noob I would just upvote blue stars without looking. Can't

do that anymore, especially on long

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"DO NOT choose an unusual that there is not much proof for. Finding and presenting proof will be explained in the next section; but for now, just know that it is not wise to choose an unusual that there are no past or present listings that you can find on any major trading site."

 

How much is "not much proof". Would it be sensible to create a suggestion for a hat that is currently only one-of-a-kind if it is on a major trading site? (Outpost in this case)

 

 

Are there any known sales behind it? Has it been on the market for a long enough time to have a wide variety of offers behind it? Those are the most important things.

 

A 1 of 1 item that's only been on the market for a week does not have enough info to be priced. It should be avoided. A 1 of 1 item that's traded at least once and has been on the market for at least a month should have enough to work with. There's always exceptions, so if you're unsure, just ask. :)

 

I added "A one of a kind unusual with no trade history that has never been listed

or has only been listed for a short time and has received very few

offers as a result would be a good example of a lack of proof."

 

Also, one day I might make a visual example of a good suggestion, and also how to trace history and connect the dots of recently traded items. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

I did some research for an unusual but can't make the suggestion.

1. Is this good.

2. If so then someone can use it.

 

CM Jeep cap.  New range is 5.7 to 6.8

 

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/1413915 - no recent offers

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/10094907 - asking for 6 buds + sweets,  1 week old no offers

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/3149909 - offer of hat worth  5.7 – 6.8

 

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/10135928 - hat offer worth 5.1 – 6.5

 

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/9803786 - hat offer worth 5.8 – 7.4

 

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/9803786 - hat offer worth 3.8 - 4.3 (some will complain that is a lowball offer but wouldn’t any offer below current range be considered lowball by an unusual owner.)

 

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/10135928 - offer of a pile of hats, and 1 bud, worth 6.07 – 6.83

 

These are all the offers I found.  The average of the offers is 5.29 buds – 6.37 buds.  The median of the offers was 5.7 buds – 6.8 buds.  I chose the median for the new range.

 

I valued buds at 24 keys for this suggestion.

 

Now I will deal with the one sale I found.

 

http://www.tf2outpost.com/trade/9835513 - Like many of the other Cloudy Moon Jeep’s posts,  Kay offers his hat and sweets.  This seller agreed but while I found the hats in the exchange I did not find sweets.  In addition, Kay mentions small sweets only.  Consider that each trader is getting something.  One is getting high tier effect with mid tier hat.  The other is getting high tier hat with mid tier effect.  There may not have been need for sweets.   With that in mind I only record this transaction as a hat for hat which means that the CM Jeeps went for 5.7 – 6.8.  That reinforces my new range.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Is it acceptable to make a suggestion for np change. Validating current range and updating

 

If the price is 3 months old, or older.

But provide proof why the current price is fine.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alright.

This unusual suggestion got accepted:

http://backpack.tf/vote/id/517d178bba2536a83b000004

Which I am fine with but my suggestion, which was made a few days ago, on the same hat was not. 

I have had two previous sugestions accepted using the same proof method as was used in this one.

http://backpack.tf/vote/id/51795212ba2536ad29000001

I received very strong support for mine as well.

As I said all three of my suggestions were done with the same logical method and my first two were accepted.  I want to do more as there are many more to update but I will not spend the time if its not going to work out.

 

Also, I have considered barrowing some unusuals so that I can work on high tier items if possible but will not try if no chance of success. 

Please help out here.

 

Btw, not all of my suggestions will be to drop the price.  There are a couple I am targeting that could get miner bumps.

 

Thank you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's hilariously easy to get lots of positive votes when dropping the price of an unusual so long as you disguise it with at least one link. The community just loves to watch unusual prices plummet.

 

'Median of all offers' is a horrifically inaccurate approach, and neither unusual suggestion you made using it should have been accepted. Seek out trades, and failing that, only work with the best available offers. The majority of offers are bad, and using the median of all offers just leads to pricing around bad offers that no one would take.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alright.

This unusual suggestion got accepted:

http://backpack.tf/vote/id/517d178bba2536a83b000004

Which I am fine with but my suggestion, which was made a few days ago, on the same hat was not.

I have had two previous sugestions accepted using the same proof method as was used in this one.

http://backpack.tf/vote/id/51795212ba2536ad29000001

I received very strong support for mine as well.

As I said all three of my suggestions were done with the same logical method and my first two were accepted. I want to do more as there are many more to update but I will not spend the time if its not going to work out.

 

Also, I have considered barrowing some unusuals so that I can work on high tier items if possible but will not try if no chance of success.

Please help out here.

 

Btw, not all of my suggestions will be to drop the price. There are a couple I am targeting that could get miner bumps.

 

Thank you.

http://backpack.tf/vote/id/5153dfdf4bd7b8df4b00001f your support is like support I get from bumping up a coupe

In all seriousness, how hard is a suggestion anyway? Find one underbumped unusual (like 500 of them) set low end as lowest buyout/lowest sold to highest offered/highest sold. Oh wait am I missing something?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's hilariously easy to get lots of positive votes when dropping the price of an unusual so long as you disguise it with at least one link. The community just loves to watch unusual prices plummet.

 

'Median of all offers' is a horrifically inaccurate approach, and neither unusual suggestion you made using it should have been accepted. Seek out trades, and failing that, only work with the best available offers. The majority of offers are bad, and using the median of all offers just leads to pricing around bad offers that no one would take.

 

Median is the most accurate way to know what the market is willing to pay in those situations.  When there are 5-6 of one type being posted and the buyers, as a group, are only offering X then they are signaling what they believe the hat is worth.  Also, few to no pure offers.  The sellers only want upgrades to there hat in many cases or pure.  Both are Take your argument up with those that accepted those suggestions.

 

Just because one person paid a certain price once doesn't mean that buyers would pay that all the time.  Regardless, if the hat is worth the higher number than it will go to those willing to compete against other buyers for it.  That's called demand.

 

Part of the problem is that, unlike real market, there is no pressure to sell.  Expenses force businesses to take losses.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...