Advanced strategies

I am starting series on this blog that looks at the advanced strategies i have come across in my time in the Inscription market.  The format of the posts will be to look at the strategy itself, what its aim is and how to spot it.  And then a follow up post the next day will look at how to combat the strategy - and i will hope to show that by correctly identifying a competitor's strategy then the counter strategy is quite simple to explain, and perhaps quite obvious too!

The aim is to post an advanced strategy, and how to combat it the next day, every 10 days or so.

I will cover the strategies we all have heard of such as the Glyph Wall and the Auction House Camper but I will start with some lesser known strategies that are perhaps less fully covered.  And the first post is tomorrow.



However, it is worth taking a top down view to start and laying some basic ground work that is the foundation of the analysis of a competitor's strategy and how to combat it.


The starting point

When a competitor puts a new (often aggressive) strategy into play at all times the starting point is to stand back and consider what the aim of this competitor is.

Assuming the view is that the competitor is trying to strengthen their position in the market then the end aim is almost always for that competitor to increase their profits on an ongoing basis.  They key question you must answer is whether the competitor is trying to strengthen their position whilst maintaining the current market environment or whether the competitor is trying to permanently alter the current structure of the market for their benefit - i.e. by reset prices lower permenantly.

The former aim would suggest that the competitor is trying to displace an existing market participant through their aggressive actions but that the aggressive actions will eventually end once the competitor feels their aim is fulfilled or they give up.

The latter aim would suggest that the aggressive actions may become the norm or at least will not entirely cease once the competitor feels that their aim is achieved – though if the competitor gives up then the former market structure will return.

If the competitor is undertaking an action for a short term gain then it is likely that they are trying their luck with an opportunistic strategy that is designed to hoodwink market participants into making losses for the benefit of the competitor that deployed the strategy– normally over a short term.

In any event, it is very hard to devise a counter strategy without the answer to that question.  Furthermore, once the competitor's strategy is identified the counter strategy is often a lot more simpler to enact.

(Alternative views may be that the competitor is leaving the market hence dumping stock or merely going through an intellectual experiment.  These are often low probabilities and the best strategy is to let them run their course.)

Furthermore, market participants must be aware that when a competitor deploys a strategy then all participants will receive lower profits from the glyph market during this time.  There are no free rides here and very rarely is there a silver bullet.

for further ideas on the glyph market read my free guide at Croda's Inscription Gold Guide