Market Discussions

So I made a post a while back about the massive drop in the price of intact armor plates (and regular armor plates but who cares about those), and was told that this was because the drop rate had been increased. I haven't been able to find the relevant dev blog entry, but rumour has it the drop rate was doubled.

The price of intact plates however, has now more than halved. In November, intact plates sold for 35M, today the Jita price has hit 15M. There has been a corresponding drop in the price of T2 armor rigs, from about 500M for a large trimark to about 380M.

Conventional wisdom is that the price will rebound at some point and begin to rise again, as the manufacture of T2 rigs becomes more lucrative. Logically, if there are suddenly a lot of sellers and not a lot of T2 rig manufacturers, the price is bound to become artificially low for a while. The question is, how low can you go? And what does all this means for me and my little pile of intact plates?

I have a smallish stash of plates that I've been hanging onto due to the current price instability, working under the theory that the price will eventually rebound and i'll be able to sell them for more than they're worth now. That, uh, hasn't worked very well so far. I've made a meagre profit from buying up all the ridiculously low-prices plates that have appeared on the market and reselling them, but meanwhile my own stash is slowly decreasing in value.

What worries me is that maybe the drop rate wasn't doubled, and was actually tripled or even quadrupled... in which case I should sell now before the price drops any lower! I'm hoping some more experienced market peoples can tell me what to expect here. My current plan is to just sit on my plates until they start to rise in price again, I may be falling into the sunk-cost fallacy here, but I'd feel awful stupid if they rebounded a week after I sold them all off.

Thoughts? Opinions? Insults?

I've been watching T2 Rigs for around 2 years and I needed to decide if
A: This was an exploit and
B: If I wanted to use it before I said anything but because it is more about player prices and will in fact correct itself I dont think A is the case.

The B aspect I just don't have the tools to do it so I will spill the beans.

The reason they continue to tumble is, any T2 frigate, Gallente and Amarr sold for less than 15 mill has a better use as a tool to farm these. In addition, Amarr get Cap Console salvage and right now the Crusader runs for around 10 mill.

I tested it on Test server and I put two T1 small trimark (not sure if it helped but it did seem to in a big way, why I dont know) on 100 Crusader ceptors, stuck them in an Archon, undocked and ejected them 5 at a time. Then went out and popped em with drones and salvaged the wrecks. Plat insurance allowed me to get 4 mill straight back and the T2 Cap console and intact armor plates I got allowed me to make 700 mill off the 100 if I were to sell back all the T2 salvage I got by doing this.

As I used in the test, I need an outpost to do that where I have security to dump the frigs from a carrier to make it time practical. The point being untill they drop in price more or the T2 frigs like the Crusader start to go over 15 mill people will farm these and end up forcing the price down to where it isnt practical to use the Crusader or Malediction for that purpose.

To any CCP who might read this, I don't see the need to change it. No I don't see me getting any benefit short term from it but it's self correcting and having a way to manufature T2 salvage isn't a serious game breaker. Even if it is unorthodox. I like the new drop rates on T2 salvage. It makes it a little more worth it to do what I do (the commander kill thing)

- Not tested but I am sure you could do it with raptors too. They run 9 mill but they drop intact shield emitters and enhanced ward consoles. Those sell right now for 10 mill console, 4 mill emitter. I won't be surprised if the Intact plates drop to as low as 4 mill as well and cap consoles fall to 10 mill. You are never going to get rich doing this but as a cap or super cap pilot if you want T2 rigs on your capital, this is viable option to you. 100 ceptors will make you around 5 or 6 large T2 rigs.

insurance was updated about a year ago. Pay 2m insurance and get 6m back is pretty standard for ceptors.

That wouldn't influence the salvage prices. It might influence the cost of the rig but your chances of getting a T2 Trimark or other core rig BPC is still pretty slim. More likely you will end up with a T2 EM armor resist BPC or something like that.