Before you Start
Neverwinter is a completely unrestricted free market with the only “checks” being supply/ demand and the Zen exchange. Nearly everything in the market is saturated with the current AD to Zen exchange ratio not accurately representing in game demand or AD valuation, so making AD from AD is risky and requires constant vigilance. Most of the money made in this game requires patience, planning, understanding of market cycles/ events in Neverwinter, a bit of psychology, and of course… buy low sell high.
Short Version
Your safest bet for turning that AD into more AD is to Convert that AD to Zen, buy Pres wards and Sell those Pres Wards on the AH, this will give you the closest thing to a guaranteed return on investment (it’s like buying bonds, might be a lower return and it takes a long time but there is basically no risk), this will also work with some other always in demand Zen market items, but should be done carefully. For the longer discussion I will avoid items that can be profited on from grinding dungeons and trails, this are entirely RNG based and for most of the games history cannot be counted on for income because of the lottery like nature of drops.
Slightly Longer Version
In order to fully leverage economics in the game you need to understand the types of products and cycles. These Strategies are “bets” and always represent risk as we do not know what changes will be made to the game that could alter market dynamics. As such, you should plan to diversify and spread out your risk.
- Long Term Bets
- Items you will sit on for 3- 10 months before you expect to maximize your profit.
- Items in this category are generally items from seasonal/ annual events like food, companions, etc.
- These items tend to be stackable, or have a lower per piece value, and generally are not optimal for direct trades.
- Generally, these items are best not “purchased” but rather farmed and sat on.
- Only a fool or someone with no pre-planning sells an event item on the AH while the event is still running
- Summer event food is a great example here, it will generally sell for 500-1000% more February – May than any other time of the year
- Medium Range Bets
- Items you will sit on for 2 -8 weeks.
- These are generally items you have farmed from special events like Double Refining stones, or from big sales.
- Like the long term.. don’t be foolish and sell while the event is going on, but unlike the long some of these items can be a “no brainer” buy now and sell later.
- For example: refining stones very often dip considerably in price (sometimes by 50-60%) a day or two in double refining stone events, farming and buy these “could” double your money in 2-4 weeks (if you time it right, watch future events and know your market cycles)
- Short Term Gambles
- These are items that are posted well below the market price, that can be bought now, and re-posted for a higher value and a profit.
- These items can be in literally any category, and they represent the greatest risk.
- Before making any of these purchases you should understand the supply and demand for that item
- One test I use is “would I want this item for a character/class if I did not have it?” if the answer is no, I will generally skip the buy.
- Easy items to watch for here include Packs… stuff that are in packs almost always sell for more than the packs themselves, and sometimes that margin can be 30-40%..
- Buyer beware, don’t buy based on a single search of the end item, know that market and watch it for a while before investing… do not go after the big value items when first starting here, get a feel for things
Common Selling Strategies (and why)
Splitting Stacks
- Many players do not have the currency or the desire to buy an entire stack of 99 of refining stones/ or food
- RP is an exception here… but RP has not been truly profitable to farm and sell (farm and use yes) for sale for over 3 years
- Many players will pay the price premium for split stacks as they never needed 99 or something so the smaller total spend with no waste is preferable to paying less for each item with waste.
- Refining stones should be sold in singles, two’s, three’s, and 9’s. The price for each should be a markup… the stack of 99 should have the lowest price per item, but then the stack of 9 would be a say x% per piece markup, the 3’s a x% markup per piece over the 9’s.. etc. You will find as you experiment that certain sizes of stack have the highest demand, but again that is a cycle based on the time of the week, ongoing events, new items to upgrade, new content to run, the type of player buying your product, etc
Shotgun
- This is for when you are just getting into a market and are trying to determine supply and demand.
- This involves taking 3 items posting a single item price matched to the bottom price, 1 item at 5% more, and the last item at 10% more.
- Then wait a couple of hours… did they all sell? If yes, do the same thing again, if no wait.. this is an experiment and requires patience and is about you determining supply and demand.
- Tries to solve for a fundamental problem with the AH search.
- AH search is not a live stock market, and you only get a still frame snapshot each time a search result is returned… you don’t get to see what is happening between each search.
- The shotgun is a way to give you a sample of the market velocity for a product (measuring supply and demand)
Don’t mark down. Price match, or upsell
- Never undercut another seller in the market, unless you intend to start a war with another seller, and have the capital to drive them out of the market.
- Price cuts are contagious, and with the average seller having less common sense than a house plant, a single price cut/ serious of price cuts can lead to a panic sell off
- Remember time is a cost too, so try to avoid selling that item for less than the effort cost, and
- be patient! The game has been around for 8 years, you have plenty of time to sell that item.
Resetting Prices
- In cases where demand is reasonably high, but supply is steady but not completely unmanageable, one common practice is for a wealthy investor to buy out the entire market and reset prices higher.
- In some cases this is inline with market demand, and very healthy
- Fixes price drops from panic sellers undercutting the market
- Could be a collaborative event that leads to increased profits for nearly everyone.
- Beware here as sometime folks do this just to play “keep away” and the new prices don’t last because there is no demand.
- You can spot an amateur doing this if you go look up an item and there is a single person with 10+ of the same item posted, and they are 80% or more of the total items for sale.
- If you do this… never have any individual account post more than 3 of an item at any time to avoid the appearance of market saturation, and then start the panic all over.
Be Reasonable
- Do not price gouge or drive the market down, people will remember you and actively work against you.
- Remember than for most people 100k AD income a day should be the expected, and therefore price your items with that in mind:
- “How many days would I be willing to grind to then buy this item”
- Can use this for the lower and upper bounds
Anything but “99”
- Most consumers have been conditioned to round up a number that end in 9 or 9x to the next higher value, therefore the mind sees it as the same price, if you are going to set a price go with any number that does not end in 9, or 9x… it’s more likely to be viewed as a “deal”
Patience
- Be Patient!
- Plenty of folks fire sale stuff so they can make a quick bit of AD
- This happens often with high value items that at a reasonable price could take 3 -4 days or a week to sell…
- Think of it this way: how many times have you went to the AH and just automatically posted on the bottom, sold your thing in a few minutes/ hours.. and laughed to the bank? What if you had marked that up 20-40% and still sold it but instead sold it in 3-4 days… now multiple that by 4-5, 10 times… now look at your AD in the bank.. and imagine that being 20-40% more… you did that to yourself by not being patient
Trades
- Trades can be a great way of avoiding the AH commission cost, but you should only make trades for items that you want or believe you can sell quickly.
- Remember that trades are about what you value, so you should not feel pressured to trade for something you do not want/ cannot use.
- If someone is pressuring you to make a trade you do not want, you tell them no, and they continue to pressure you.. this is a sign that this trade is not in your best interest, and that that other person should probably go on ignore.. it’s not the end of the world, there will be other opportunities.