Ok I'm not sure how this can be answered easily but anyway.
I have a level 36 Arti who at some stage I will level for better crafting.
In the mean time I craft shots for extra cash.
I have several other items I can craft not available in shops and also various mats. I've often thought about setting up private creation shops but as I try to be fair about my prices I don't want to over charge.
How do other players work out a fair price to charge?
EG (as an example) I can offer all D and C shots, ELS, SOL, Brig stuff etc. Crafting shots myself and selling them is easy because I know what the going rate is for them. How do I work out a fair cost for players to craft mats, items, shots etc if I set up a Private Creation.
Or is it just a case of working out roughly what the item they want is worth and charging around that area? But then I peronally would just buy it from another player already crafted :confused:
At your level, shot crafting will net you the most profit by far, if you can sit afk. there are prolly a lot of dwarfs at your level, who can only craft so much. i'm not sure what level craft you have, but do the popular stuff, like divine, BO's and the mats.
get a set of robes that give you mp like the banana suit or divine. and get a homunkulus with conversion.
your customers aren't your friends. your friends are your friends. of course, craft their stuff for free. but it is a crafters duty to make the game more expensive for ebayers. those who work hard for their stuff, will find a way to save money. but those who get their money so easily, I say make em keep going back to that hole in their pocket.
Nice reply, K-stick. Those who cheat should bear the punishment for their actions!
Re: prices. I often leave a WS up crafting while at work or sleeping. I have two catagories of things in the shop and price each differently. First are the high demand items, shots, BO and the like. For them, I price what the market will bear. Some other crafters will have shots really cheap, like 25a. I price dss 150, css 300, bss 350, *** 400 and a bit more on the bsps. I find that people will empty the mana on the cheap crafters then empty my mana too....since craft income is related to mana regen, why empty my mana for 25a each when I get just as much business at 400a each?
For the non-high demand crafts, I rotate rarer crafts thru every few nights, comp armor, shields, mid range jewels, and so forth. Often I don't craft any, but occasionally someone will craft a bunch or Protection jewels (or whatever) to crush for crystals and I'll come back with an extra 500k or so.
Well, Dwarfs are the ONLY people in the game, who will sometimes get ****** when you buy out their shop. something is wrong with that. It still blows my mind when i think that prolly 2-5 dozen WS's make a majority of the shots used in a day for an entire server. and it would only take only a couple dozen to be able to monopolize the markets. but dwarfs don't do that. so prices of shots could be a lot worse.
this is what you have to consider. how much do you make per mp bar. and you can get like 4 mp bars per hour. so pick an item you want to buy, and see how many hours of crafting till you can afford it. who is being fair to whom now.
Css is a nice example, if we just round up to 500 per batch. If you can make 40 bunches per mp bar, and charge 200 per hit. 40*200*4 =32000 per hour. 100 hours of non-stop crafting to buy a 3.2 kk item. :'( If you make Css at 2a per profit. then 500*40*2*4 = 160,000 per hour. at 3a adena 500*40*3*4 = 240,000 per hour.
Your time is valuable. I don't think if i charge a quarter million for an hour of work, that it is unfair. the reason i use ss in my example is that millions are used every day. the other mats and items are made, but not in the shear volume of shots. if you want to make money as a crafter, you will have to put shot making in that equation.
If you have a scavenger/bounty hunter also then they can spoil the key mats to make things to crush for the crystals to make these shots with. You can always buy things to crush in NPC stores, but then your profit margin is really thin. Occasionally you will get a good deal from a player or get a drop, but those won't be enough to fuel your shot crafting.
For example, if you have a well geared lvl 38-42 spoiler working the north end of Death Pass, you will get enough elven mats to keep making dss at a nice rate. I know some people who even delevel their spoilers to keep them at a sweet spot.
i dont really craft shots to speak of anymore unless i get a drop then i crush it and dust of the old ss recipe private creation is for the most part how my ws makes his $
check the other prices in the area and set down 5 or 10% cheaper... anyone who is worried enuff about cash to private create shot will usually check craft prices b4 they pick a dwarf making you choice #1 you wont be making a ton per craft but you will do more crafting =ing more $ throw some armor/weapon crafts in the shop jus for the heck of it
word of cheap crafting spreads quick so the whole time your at work,school,sleep your mp will be empty... remember if your afk then its 100% profit
also a good reputation does wonders... even if i can find Css for the same price or 1a cheaper ive been buying from wheeljack as much as possible since he helped my BH kill some bots 1 time
being a jerk on your main is 1 thing but on your shopkeeper make sure to keep in good standing... i dont buy from ppl i dont like no matter how good a deal thier stuff is (unless its a mistype)
the best price is always 1 adena less than the person sitting next to you. and 500 adena to craft mettalic thread.
edit: as H4T3MONG3R pointed out, reputation helps. i try to drain the mp of the dorfs i like, before looking at prices.
Overcharge by 200% on basic mats, 25% on soulshots. Basic mats tend to be crafted in "blow your load" methods and most people won't care if it's 20 or 60 adena per item. For weapons, do some math, figure out how much the rec costs, and craft at around 10-15% value. At low level, basic mats and shots are certainly the best route however, as nobody wants to craft D weapons...crafting a D weapon these days would probably result in a negative ROI.