Question on rarity
Sun Apr 09, 2006 2:59 pm
What are the factors affecting the prices of items in users' shops?
I've been rather confused about the rarity factor since some items can be rarer than others but they are in fact cheaper. Also, I've seen higher rarity items showing up more often in shops than some of those with lower rarities.
Finally, quite a number of r91 items are actually unbuyable. Can someone please tell me why?
I've been rather confused about the rarity factor since some items can be rarer than others but they are in fact cheaper. Also, I've seen higher rarity items showing up more often in shops than some of those with lower rarities.
Finally, quite a number of r91 items are actually unbuyable. Can someone please tell me why?
Sun Apr 09, 2006 10:01 pm
Consumability (disappearing forever upon usage) is the #1 reason why items are priced how they are. If you have an r99 Toy, only giving it to Illusen/Jhudora, or the applies-to-any-item loss through discard, gallery, feed to Skeith/Grarrl/Jetsam? etc. This would mainly apply to Food, Paintbrushes, Stamps, and the like.
Other things that affect it are special-giftedness. Pink Paintbrushes are worth more than they 'ought' to be because there is an avatar associated with Pink pets. Being non-consumable can drop prices on these things, such as Icy Snowflakes and Kasuki Lu cards. Books and r90-r100 Foods can be in here as well, as they are both consumable and potentially give trophies.
Attractiveness can greatly affect price -- Phnards, a high-rarity digusting petpet, are worth very little, while Baby Blus, a lower-rarity cute petpet, are worth much more.
Lastly, I believe rarity does not reflect rarity as a whole upon the site, but is merely comparable to other items that are stocked in the same shop. Say, perhaps every restock there's a 0.01% chance of an r99 stocking in each individual shop, but if one shop has only 1 r99, then that's guaranteed to be picked by the stocker program, but in a shop with 10 r99s, each one has only a 10% chance of being picked. I'm not sure whether this is right or not, though.
Other things that affect it are special-giftedness. Pink Paintbrushes are worth more than they 'ought' to be because there is an avatar associated with Pink pets. Being non-consumable can drop prices on these things, such as Icy Snowflakes and Kasuki Lu cards. Books and r90-r100 Foods can be in here as well, as they are both consumable and potentially give trophies.
Attractiveness can greatly affect price -- Phnards, a high-rarity digusting petpet, are worth very little, while Baby Blus, a lower-rarity cute petpet, are worth much more.
Lastly, I believe rarity does not reflect rarity as a whole upon the site, but is merely comparable to other items that are stocked in the same shop. Say, perhaps every restock there's a 0.01% chance of an r99 stocking in each individual shop, but if one shop has only 1 r99, then that's guaranteed to be picked by the stocker program, but in a shop with 10 r99s, each one has only a 10% chance of being picked. I'm not sure whether this is right or not, though.
Sun Apr 09, 2006 11:13 pm
Plagatus wrote:Consumability (disappearing forever upon usage) is the #1 reason why items are priced how they are. If you have an r99 Toy, only giving it to Illusen/Jhudora, or the applies-to-any-item loss through discard, gallery, feed to Skeith/Grarrl/Jetsam? etc. This would mainly apply to Food, Paintbrushes, Stamps, and the like.
Other things that affect it are special-giftedness. Pink Paintbrushes are worth more than they 'ought' to be because there is an avatar associated with Pink pets. Being non-consumable can drop prices on these things, such as Icy Snowflakes and Kasuki Lu cards. Books and r90-r100 Foods can be in here as well, as they are both consumable and potentially give trophies.
Attractiveness can greatly affect price -- Phnards, a high-rarity digusting petpet, are worth very little, while Baby Blus, a lower-rarity cute petpet, are worth much more.
Lastly, I believe rarity does not reflect rarity as a whole upon the site, but is merely comparable to other items that are stocked in the same shop. Say, perhaps every restock there's a 0.01% chance of an r99 stocking in each individual shop, but if one shop has only 1 r99, then that's guaranteed to be picked by the stocker program, but in a shop with 10 r99s, each one has only a 10% chance of being picked. I'm not sure whether this is right or not, though.
I tihnk the R99 items stock more often than that--else they would be worth millions, all of them. You also have to take into consideration LC and MP prizes, Treasure Maps (I got a really terrible R97 from one a few weeks ago, a Pirate Cannon if anyone's interested), and the like. Some items are also popular gallery items, such as dung-related items, Usukis, and plushies (especially the Neoquest ones).
Mon Apr 10, 2006 12:39 pm
An object's rarity value reflects how often it restocks in one of the main Neopian Shops. The highest rarity that restocks is R99.
However, the shops aren't the only way that new items come into circulation. Random events, freebies, quests, prize codes and games introduce a lot of items into the Neo economy.
User shop prices are set by supply and demand - just like they are in real life. Generally speaking, the less frequently an item becomes available the higher the price, and the more commonly an item becomes available, the lower the price. The more people there are who want an item, the higher the price will be. The less who want the item, the lower the price will be.
Demand depends on a number of variables. Even if a pile of sludge suddenly became rare, I don't imagine that too many people would actually want one. However, if the Neopets team were to introduce a plot where solving it depended on carrying around a pile of sludge in your inventory, demand would increase.
Although there are a few people who want an item simply because it's rare, demand for an item is unrelated to supply. However, the price of an item will affect the demand. As the price increases, less people want that item - for that price. The prices set in the user shops reflect the point where the demand for an item balances out the rate at which that item becomes available.
However, the shops aren't the only way that new items come into circulation. Random events, freebies, quests, prize codes and games introduce a lot of items into the Neo economy.
User shop prices are set by supply and demand - just like they are in real life. Generally speaking, the less frequently an item becomes available the higher the price, and the more commonly an item becomes available, the lower the price. The more people there are who want an item, the higher the price will be. The less who want the item, the lower the price will be.
Demand depends on a number of variables. Even if a pile of sludge suddenly became rare, I don't imagine that too many people would actually want one. However, if the Neopets team were to introduce a plot where solving it depended on carrying around a pile of sludge in your inventory, demand would increase.
Although there are a few people who want an item simply because it's rare, demand for an item is unrelated to supply. However, the price of an item will affect the demand. As the price increases, less people want that item - for that price. The prices set in the user shops reflect the point where the demand for an item balances out the rate at which that item becomes available.
Wed Apr 12, 2006 3:44 am
Now, I know that anything of rarity 101 or greater is given out only through special events (or the Hidden Tower). At one point, it can even be called "super mega-rare". At 180, it is labelled "retired." But what I want to know is, how do you find R100 items? I know that Zeenanas are out there and R100, but no idea how to find them aside from user shops. Are these restocked in shops, or no?
Wed Apr 12, 2006 5:17 am
R100s stock in the main shops but even more rarely than the r99s do.
Wed Apr 12, 2006 5:25 am
atomicblonde wrote:R100s stock in the main shops but even more rarely than the r99s do.
5 times as rarely, to be exact. Most R100s are food items, that are game prizes or special things but rated as such so that they are Gourmet Foods too. All of the Golden Dubloon foods are rated that way, and I believe the Kelp ones are too. Leaf Taco, given out by Illusen, is also a R100. The most famous R100 weapon is the Glittery Scorchstone, but there is another one too (like Battle Quill or something, not even worth looking into). I'm not even sure why there are a few that stock in shops, but it is really a select few. If you ever manage to get a hold of one, it's probably the luckiest thing that can ever happen to you on Neopets.
Sat May 06, 2006 7:08 pm
*revives thread* Roughly, in every how many restocks does a given R99 item appear?