his is a simple cred-making guide and might help some newer members to get a better start.Chaper 1:I have read pages and pages on credits-making on the forums and I tried quite a few of them. However, I found that most of them require you to have some kind of luck (i.e. find teams, win rolls, get drops, etc.) for them to be profitable - no luck, no profits.
Since I'm not Verp, I decided to approach this from a different angle. Just like RL, AO has a living, breathing and constantly changing economy. In RL, we can take advantage of this by selling goods that are in demand or by investing in long-term values - same goes for AO. The first million is the hardest - with AO inflation, the first 100M are the hardest. So how to start?
1. Get a toon to TL5 ASAP (any toon will do, but fixers are probably best, agents and calmer profs will work well too). Don't worry if the toon is gimpy, runs around in medsuit or carb armor...it does not matter, you don't really have to play him, just use him for cred making.
2. Get a Yalm/Bike/Fgrid, blitz nanos and sell them in your shops
Easy enough right? Not quite...you need to sell the RIGHT nanos for the RIGHT price at the RIGHT time. And this is where you have to do the real work (I will only give a few examples here, you will have to do your own research)
RIGHT NANOS
The right nanos are those that sell for a good price, sell quickly and often:
- The best nanos are ql125-ql175 (that's why you need a TL5 toon, both to roll these and to blitz them sucessfully)
- The best nanos will sell for 2M or more (i.e. Calia's Form)
- The best nanos will sell several times a week (i.e. RRFE)
You have to skip:
- Any nano that does not sell at all
- Any nano that can be bought in a shop/garden (i.e. nanos ql120 or less)
- Any nano Ql200+ (almost)
- Any nano that sells for less then 1M (i.e. Keeper nanos)
- Any nano that sells for more then 1M but very rarely (i.e. Epsilon Purge)
RIGHT PRICE
The right price is somewhat tricky - ofc, you don't want to sell your nanos (or any item) for much less then market value, but you also don't want to overprice it so much that it takes months to sell, if at all.
- First, check the gms (and keep a note of that price in an excel sheet)
- Set a price close to the low end (disregard "dumpers" for now, we deal with them later)
- Keep track of how quickly the nano sold (if it has not sold in a week, lower the price a little)
- Keep checking the gms frequently...prices change all the time..and update your records/excel sheet
RIGHT TIME
This one is easy. I stuff my shops always before the weekend, usually Thursday nights. It is also a good idea to have some nanos stored away for the times when FC releases a new update - usually after every patch, there are lots more people playing for a few days = more potential customers.
Of course, you will need to practice blitzing. You will need to streamline your clicksaver lists (i.e. all mish in one location with no dungeons, only buildings, only kill/find person or item, etc.) and you will need to get an idea which nanos sell and for what price - that will take some time. But using just this system, I can now make 150+M in one week using 3 player shops filled with 63 nanos. Rolling and blitzing 63 nanos will take about 8-12 hours total (rolling takes most of that time).
Ok, now you say: Gee Tailor, you wrote a whole book and I already know all that stuff! Indeed, but if you stop here, it will take you a very long time to get that full ql300 CC set you want.
This is just the easiest way to create the necessary captial, which you will need for the next chapter of Tailor's Guide to Incredible Wealth!
Intermission:
Before I start Chapter 2, let me give you a few pointers on how to make the nano business more efficient.
- Group your nanos by profession (Disco has many nano shops dedicated to each profession)
Why? Here is an example: Player X searches the gms for "Essence of Behemoth". He finds that you have the lowest price and Kindred City is in a convenient location (more on the importance of location later). He goes to your shop, buys Essence and finds that you also sell Mongo Crush and Prodigious Strength. Now he is already here and knows that you had the best price for Essence on gms. He can be pretty certain that your prices for the other Enfo nanos are also very good. Instead of going back to the gms for another search, he will just buy all the other Enfo nanos he needs!
- Stagger your nano pricing
Let's say you have 3 RRFE nanos for sale. Price them in 250K intervals, the cheapest will be 3.5M, the next 3.75M and the last 4M. The market for this (and any other nano) fluctuates. Sometimes there are more nanos for sale, sometimes less. If you stagger the prices, you remain the lowest seller, even though your prices are actually going up.
- Check, check and check the gms...then check it again
If you find that you are competing with 20 other sellers at the moment, you will not get a good price for your nano (or any other item). Watch if this is temporay or permanent. If it is temporay, don't sell the nano at all until the market is depleted. If it is permanent, drop the nano from your list, it will never be worth a whole lot.
- Understand the importance of location
You are fortunate that Kindred City is easily accessable by Grid and even Whompah. Sellers in DAV or PW are not that lucky. Hence, when you check the gms, find where your competitors are located. You don't have to match or beat a low price, if the seller is in a bad location. Example: You want to sell "Baton of Command" for 3M, but you find that 2 people already offer it for 2.5M, one from Leet (DAV) and one from Storm (PW). You can safely go ahead with 3M and chances are you will still sell your nano much faster then they do - people are lazy and what instant gratification, not yalm for 15 mins just to save 500K. We will come back to this later on.
- Keep track of trends
When I started, almost 10% of all toons where agents. Agent nanos sold well back then. Nowadays, most new toons are Advy's or Soljas with more and more of them created everyday. Therefore, there is a lot of demand for nanos of these professions, while it has become hard and not very profitable to sell agent nanos today. In the future, that might change again and you will need to be aware of it and adjust your sales.
This is by no means a complete list of all the possible factors that can affect your sales, but I think it is complete enough to give you a good start.
This "intermission" was longer then I thought - without further delay, lets get into Chapter 2....
Chapter 2:Thanks to your nano business, you have now accumulated some captial, lets say 100-200M. What to do with it? You could just buy some phatz for your toons until its gone or you could reinvest and multiply your credz.
How would you go about that?
Essentially, all you have to do is search the gms, find something valuable yet cheap, buy it and sell it for a higher price in your own shops - ok, that's it now you know all my secrets, good luck and bye-bye!
Yes, it is that easy but only if you know what you are doing. So first some basic stuff to remember:
- Dumpers: You already know them from your nano business. These are the annoying guys that price everything 25-50% below market value just to make a quick sale. You hated their competition, because your own nanos would sell much slower. Now you really like those guys - you can buy their entire sales inventory and sell it at market value in your own shops for a 25-50% profit - and all you have to do is fly to their city - 10 mins work, for an entire shop full of nanos, since they already did all the rolling and blitzing for you.
- Scatterbrains: You may already seen them on the gms too. That idiot who is selling Boil Blood for 500K, instead of 5M market value. Now, these guys don't intend to sell it that low, they just forgot to add a digit. His sloppiness is your gain - in your yalm you hop and race out to buy that nano asap, then you put it into your own shop and make a cool 4.5M for 10 mins work (much faster then you could roll/blitz for it).
- Clueless People: These just don't really know the value of an item/nano. For example, you might find someone who just prices every nano at 1M. 10 of the nanos are overpriced, 3 won't sell at all, 3 can be bought at Jobe, but 5 are well below market value. Naturally, those 5 you buy and resell in your own shop with a good profit.
- Bad Location Sellers: These poor guys are stuck in PW, EFP or DAV. They know they have to give the buyer a real incentive to come out to their shops. Usually they sell 10-25% lower then sellers in a good location (i.e. Kindred, yay!). Ofc, it makes no sense for you to go all the way to EFP just to buy a 2M nano for 1.5M. However, it does make sense to buy a piece of CC for 200M there if you can sell it for 250M in your Kindred shop (more about that in the last chapter)!
So, what is true for nanos, is also true for much more valuable items. But before you go into the really high-end market, you still need to make more captial. From nanos, you can move up to symbiants. Because there are so many different symbiants, it can be quite confusing. First, you need to get a good idea which symbiants are valuable and which are not. I will give you some general pointers:
- Generally, symbiants that only drop from a specific Pande mob are worth more then those dropping from Scheol spirits (duh) - but check
http://aopocket.tngk.com/ for PB boss loot or simply use !pb <name> in our Kindredbot (but use it in tells please if you do a lot of checking)
- Symbiants below ql100 are usually worthless, EXCEPT for those that give %xp bonus.
- Left Wrist Symbiants are generally worthless at any ql, because of that annoying damage shield bonus.
- Head symbiants are tricky to sell ever since the Ado Brain quest. Better to ignore them until you really know the market.
- Be aware that the gms is flooded with certain types of symbiants, so you won't be able to sell them quickly or for a good price because of all that competition.
Buying and selling symbiants really requires you to study the market AND keep track of it in your excel sheet. But because it is complex, sellers make plenty of big mistakes. Here is an example to show you that not all symbiants are equal (actual market value):
- QL200 Thigh Extermination 2M
- QL200 Thigh Support 5M
- QL200 Thigh Control 12M
- QL200 Thigh Artillery 35M
- QL200 Thigh Infantry (does not exist)
Ok, now you search the gms for the valuable symbiants. Whenever someone sells too low, you buy it. Often, your profit margin will exceed 50%. For example, I can fill a shop with 21 symbiants that I have purchased for 150M total and get 350M in return. Symbiant business generates credz much faster then nanos, however it requires a substancial initial investment.
Now that you have decent captial, lets say 400-600M, you are ready for the high-end market. The last Chapter of Tailor's Guide to Incredible Wealth will deal with that.
Chapter 3:Ok, you got some credz now but you know its not enough yet to make all your dreams come true. What's next?
Now you enter the high-end market. There are quite a few high-end items that sell well, and you certainly can make a good profit with many of them (i.e. Spirit Infused NCUs, Alptraum Bracer parts, Inf Key patterns, bots, Aruls, etc.). But in my experience, nothing is more profitable then AI Combined Armor, because it's very good and almost everyone wants at least a few pieces (high demand, large market).
Now is also the time to look beyond the gms. You will want to screen the shopping channels, check mrshop (/tell mrshop) and look at sales on the forums
http://forums.anarchy-online.com/forumdisplay.php?s=fabd2df95032f3e18cea11e20dc017ae&f=152 and on sales websites like
http://arpa3.net/ao/mw1/pub/livetest.htmlBut before you dive in, there are a few things you must consider:
- Because you will have to make a huge inital investment, you must be careful and study the market well and over at least a few weeks before you buy anything. Only 6 months ago, a ql200 piece of CC sold for 200M, today the same piece will sell for 350M - 6 months from now, it might be back at 200M or sells for even more then today. Be prepared to hold on to the item for a while, especially if there are many other sellers - keep some cash in reserve. It is crucial to watch the market trends, please remember that!
- AI Combined Armor is not all the same. For example, a ql200 Paramedic Sleeve will sell for only 30M, while Sharpshooter Sleeve of the same ql can sell for 300M.
1. Combined Commando
2. Combined Sharpshooter
3. Combined Mercenary
4. Combined Officer (note that plain Arithmetic is worth almost as much)
5. Combined Scout (higher price then Officer but smaller market)
6. Combined Paramedic (very small market, especially at higher QL)
- Helmets (ugly?) and especially Boots sell for less (Inf Boots!) then the other parts
- Remember the ATE requirements. A ql230 armor piece is usually worth LESS then a ql225 armor piece (ATE3 vs ATE2) - luckily this only matters in that narrow range.
- You will notice that there are no more Scatterbrains and Clueless Sellers (at this level, people are usually very careful and experienced). However, there are still Dumpers (people who need cash badly) and Sellers in bad locations. At this level, even just a 10% difference on a single item can equal 50M for you.
- Start with ql150ish armor (150M) and work your way up to ql300 CC (600+M) as you generate more and more creds.
Tip:
A "safe" way to start with the AI business is to actually buy items you can use - I have done some "laddering" for Tailor's and Maussi's CSS and Officer's parts - I bought the initial items at a low ql (what they could equip at that time). Over time, I replaced the items with higher ql bargains and sold the older, lower ql item for at least as much (usually more). That way, my toons got better and better armor and I still made a decent profit. Tailor's chest piece, for example, was sold at least 6 times so far, going from a ql87 CSS to a ql180ish CSS - with a considerable gain ofc!
So, now you do the same thing as with the nanos and symbiants. Buy low, sell high - by now, you are an expert at it!
That concludes Chapter 3 of Tailor's Guide to Incredible Wealth - I will make a few more remarks in the Epilogue (yeah, he's still not done...)
Epilogue:
First, lets add Smurf's good additions - these will help with really everything you want to sell in your shops, not just nanos, symbiants or ai armor.
- Set your prices to an odd number (for easier checking from gms)
- Set your prices just below a round sum (i.e. 4,999,999 instead of 5.000.000). If it looks cheaper, they will come faster!
- Have a low-level trader toon for the convenient portable terminal: with this you can check gms and adjust your prices while filling your shop (also, Trader comes always handy when selling regular loot at higher prices).
Okay, lets summarize:
1. Level a toon to TL5
2. Blitz nanos and create capital
3. Invest in symbiants and create more capital
4. Invest in AI Combined Armor
Just 4 simple steps and you can do them all on your own:
- no begging
- no tradeskills needed (Z and Smurf will thank you)
- no luck-of-the-roll
- no boss teams
- no lousy monster parts from pocket bosses (right Astra?)
- no cloak control
- no dual accounts
- but complete control of your finances
Yes, you will have set-backs once in a while (I sure did), but if you stick with it, you will be able to buy anything you want in the shortest time possible!
I hope this helps a little all of those who are low on credz - don't worry, I don't fear the competition.
"I think in Billions!" Tailor
