Very new to trading! I've got a few questions

[Aelfsalia]

 Hi there! I've been playing tf2 for about 100 hours now (only just recently actually got into it across the years), and I eventually noticed the topic of trading.

 I've seen a couple of videos on the matter, and I think I kinda get how the whole thing goes, thing is, I really don't want to go through the grind to get only a couple of items I like.

 Thing is, I'm not exactly a huge fan of higher tier items, I'm extremely satisfied having simple unique items I enjoy, so, I came to a conclusion! But I'm not quite sure how much of a smart conclusion this really is.

 

 I decided I''d buy a single key, then either trade it for ref or just go straight into trading it for a lot of items, but I imagine this wouldn't work quite as well in backpack.tf, so, how do I exactly go about that? What's my best option?

 Should I join a discord server and try to find someone who has the items so I can trade the key with them?

 Honestly, I don't know, I never really traded much of anything in any game, so any help is incredibly appreciated
Thank you!  

[absalonn]

a key can actually get you alot of items, so if you just want stuff to use you would be fine buying a key then trade it for ref, ( just go to bp.tf and sell the key to bots or check sites like qs.store/stn/scrap.tf and see who offers the most for it, it usually wont matter tho as its only a small amount, then just but whatever item you like with that ref, dont even think about going into servers in the game or discord servers, you will get the best deals by just buying from bots
and thats it, if you want to trade for profit then i suggest to not since its 10000 times better to just get a job and spend some money on the game
 

[abcomputer]

17 minutes ago, Aelfsalia said:

 Hi there! I've been playing tf2 for about 100 hours now (only just recently actually got into it across the years), and I eventually noticed the topic of trading.

 I've seen a couple of videos on the matter, and I think I kinda get how the whole thing goes, thing is, I really don't want to go through the grind to get only a couple of items I like.

 Thing is, I'm not exactly a huge fan of higher tier items, I'm extremely satisfied having simple unique items I enjoy, so, I came to a conclusion! But I'm not quite sure how much of a smart conclusion this really is.

 

 I decided I''d buy a single key, then either trade it for ref or just go straight into trading it for a lot of items, but I imagine this wouldn't work quite as well in backpack.tf, so, how do I exactly go about that? What's my best option?

 Should I join a discord server and try to find someone who has the items so I can trade the key with them?

 Honestly, I don't know, I never really traded much of anything in any game, so any help is incredibly appreciated
Thank you!  

why wouldnt it work on bptf?

[Aelfsalia]

As far as I can tell, you can't really buy from more than one person with the same key. Hence why I think it'd maybe be better to trade the key for the equivalent amount of scrap, but I couldn't find a way to do that through bptf, though I'm also pretty new here too so please do correct me if I'm wrong

[eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee]

3 minutes ago, Aelfsalia said:

As far as I can tell, you can't really buy from more than one person with the same key. Hence why I think it'd maybe be better to trade the key for the equivalent amount of scrap, but I couldn't find a way to do that through bptf, though I'm also pretty new here too so please do correct me if I'm wrong

just add the highest buyer  and type the command on the listing to sell

[G R O W U P]

if they have enough change or other items you are looking for then it should be ok. you can add the person, usually bots are easier and faster to interact with, but if you have a person then it should be ok too but they would usually take time to get back to you and respond etc. 

what items are you looking for?

[Russell]

Hey, Aeselfia!

 

I stated trading on and off as a 13 y.o. boy back in June 2012, and now I'm 24 y.o. man who plays from time to time on TF2 as of May 2023.

 

TF2 Trading really helped me grasp concepts for investing in stocks, options, crypto, and the like.

 

Just give your best by utilizing resources you have albeit a key. Also use other sources such discord or on steam or any other social media platforms to help you network.

 

What really matters is that you have fun! If isn't fun, it isn't worth it.

 

Good luck and have fun!

 

- Russell

[Bananas]

1 hour ago, Aelfsalia said:

 Hi there! I've been playing tf2 for about 100 hours now (only just recently actually got into it across the years), and I eventually noticed the topic of trading.

 I've seen a couple of videos on the matter, and I think I kinda get how the whole thing goes, thing is, I really don't want to go through the grind to get only a couple of items I like.

 Thing is, I'm not exactly a huge fan of higher tier items, I'm extremely satisfied having simple unique items I enjoy, so, I came to a conclusion! But I'm not quite sure how much of a smart conclusion this really is.

 

 I decided I''d buy a single key, then either trade it for ref or just go straight into trading it for a lot of items, but I imagine this wouldn't work quite as well in backpack.tf, so, how do I exactly go about that? What's my best option?

 Should I join a discord server and try to find someone who has the items so I can trade the key with them?

 Honestly, I don't know, I never really traded much of anything in any game, so any help is incredibly appreciated
Thank you!  

Dont bother, unfortunately the type of trader you want to be went extinct years ago, and was already endangered from the very start 13 years ago. 
Sell your key for ref, buy craft hats and cosmetics, be happy with your $2 drip.

 

Wasting hours to make pennies is stupid, and you can’t compete with 100s of bots buying and selling 24/7 to make .11-.22 a trade. 
 

Just enjoy the game until you burn out, this shit will just wear you out 10x quicker trying to think about your next moves to “the profit”

[Aelfsalia]

 First of all, just wanted to thank you all for your replies! I got quite confused for a while, but I manged to figure my way around bptf and I kinda know what to do now, again thanks a lot!

 Also, I wanted to clear a slight misconception here, I'm not planning on becoming a trader myself, it's far too much of a stressfull thing to me, and while it could potentially be quite profitable (even the smallest of cents is worth quite a bit where I live), it's still just not my thing lol

 I'd much rather spend some money to get some nice items than spend a lot of time trying to build a market for myself, and this will probably be a one time thing

 But again, thank you all so much! ^^ Hope you all have a nice day/night!

[Kolt]

If you want to buy the items you'd like, just spend $20-$100 on whatever you want and be happy with that.
No real point in trading with 1 key as each trade will only profit you $0.05-$0.10 (I got no idea, I don't know how low-tier trading works)

Better to just work some hours and spend that money to buy whatchu want, or then begin trading around the 50-100 key mark - that can take you far if your willing to put the work in.

[Scott Bakula]

Gonna echo the comments of just use the key to buy some decent loadouts. Trading really isn't worth it until you have enough capital to make bigger trades (think 20+ keys to start with).

 

What I would also suggest to do with the key besides getting some cosmetics is making sure to grab one of each unique weapon you don't already have (not counting reskins). This way, you've got full access to the entire Tf2 experience, and everything else is a purely cosmetic or stat tracking bonus. And you'll still have more than enough to get a decent cosmetic loadout for every class. It also means that any drops you do get will be duplicates, and can be smelted into metal and kept as a small dripfeed for any other desired expenditures, as it doesn't take long to save up for enough for a craft hat/low grade skin, or alternatively, using the metal to buy easily marketable items like paints or steam trading cards to sell on the SCM.

[STEVE]

Not surprised by the common theme in the comments. 

With the current state of bots in trading, it is alot harder to profit in the lower tier.

You are always better off just cashing in 100 bucks or so to really get started.

That all being said-

If you want to trade for the enjoyment of it, I see no issue in hopping around trade servers/backpack listings.

Otherwise, if you want to just buy a dollar or two of items, then trading your key for refined metal and using bots to buy whatever items you want at market value will also work.

If that's the case, backpack is your greatest friend  

[AwesomeSause]

Buy 2 keys

 

Sell keys for metal

 

Buy fabricators

 

Buy robot parts for fabricators

 

Build fabricators

 

Put on strange weapon

 

Sell for around 30 refined profit (sometimes)

Edited May 26 by AwesomeSause
goofy ahh

[AwesomeSause]

Also I recommend using loadout.tf for seeing what kind of cosmetics you wanna buy and if they'll fit

[Semper]

Dont trade, the enjoy the first couple hundred hours of tf2 because 7000 hours later you will wish you could experience those first 300 hours again.