• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

Last second bids on eBay!

Mr Allen

Mr Allen

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
So I had a bid on eBay for Soul Calibur VI on Xbox tonight, £32 with just short of 3 hours left on the Auction! Anyway right up until literally 5 seconds left I was winning, I was about to increase my bid by a quid and I got outbid and lost the Auction!

Proper annoying when that happens!

Has anyone else had it?
 
Yes, but it's nice when you're the one that swooped in last minute and won the auction! Ya win some, ya lose some. C'est la vie ;)
 
In the early stages of ebay i was able to buy some interesting items last minute for a low price. However so much has changed now. It's not really a genuine auction site because of bots and such.
 
I don't use Ebay but one of my sisters does. It can get quite entertaining watching her get annoyed when she misses out, but at the same time I can understand her frustration.

Me personally, I prefer to buy my stuff from the shops or - if necessary - from Amazon.
Also, didn't know you were a Soulcalibur fan, Rich.
 
I use the local online auctions more than E-Bay, which have a fraction of the people bidding against you. Even with these auctions, if you really want something, you had better be ready at the end of the auction. It is like a gun fight, sometimes you win and sometimes you get shot down.
 
You have to imagine the planned strategies of others who are interested in getting something for a really cheap price. If they see your bid, they plan how much to offer to see that you don't get it. I think you need a gambler's mind to play this way, but it makes sense to me. Maybe try to hold your bid until the very last moment next time. The vultures won't even know you are ready to pounce. Be ready with a reasonable winning number. Just be aware that there is a lot of trickery in these online bid purchasing sites. The item you lost may have been purchased by the seller's friend, simply because the bids were not high enough. The same item can appear for a second, or third round in the hopes of getting higher bids. The thrill of gambling has many facets. You didn't get the item, but you got the gambling thrill for free.
 
I used to bid early on hobby items that started at a low price, but shill bidders would come in and drive the bids up. Now, I just watch those items. If there are no bids or the bids are still low, I will snipe them at the last few seconds.

This always works when there are no bids. It only works part of the time, otherwise.
 
I used to get an unpleasant adrenaline rush when attempting to snipe items I really want. I don't get it too badly anymore unless it's something that I really really want to win.
I always decide what I'm willing to pay days in advance and write it on a whiteboard, then I set an alarm for a couple of minutes before the auction ends.
I only bid once, in the last few seconds. The speed of my connection makes a difference. Anyone who has a fast connection has an advantage, just like the stock market where the land closest to the exchange is now extremely valuable. I can usually estimate the speed of my connection so that my bid happens only a second or so before the auction ends, but sometimes a rival will get a notification and a chance to increase their bid if my connection is a bit faster than usual, and sometimes I miss the deadline if my connection is slower than usual. That's unfortunate for me because I could never raise my bid in the last second, as it takes around eight seconds to get through.
I have become more relaxed about the auctions these days, being more confident that whatever the item was there will probably be others sooner or later; but I still don't like the adrenaline "rush".
I do enjoy sometimes getting the item for less than the maximum bid I entered. :)
 
This is why I prefer buy it now. Although sniping is quite exhilarating. In my opinion sniping is the only way to do an auction if you really want the item.
 
I only ever participated in an auction once, and the price of the item went astronomical, far more than what I was prepared to pay for it, especially when there are identical items on Buy It Now for a third of the price. I only ever use Buy it Now and never use the auctions.
 
I belong to a cigar website that if someone bids at the last second it automatically adds 15 minutes. You would think that they would just keep last second bidding over and over but it doesn’t. So here is what has happened. At first it just drive prices up. In most instances the winning bit was higher than retail. After a few rounds regular bidders learned that last second bidding just didn’t pay. Now every time and again a new bidder try’s to pull a fast one but learns otherwise. It’s big fun.
 
AGXStarseed said:
I don't use Ebay but one of my sisters does. It can get quite entertaining watching her get annoyed when she misses out, but at the same time I can understand her frustration.

Me personally, I prefer to buy my stuff from the shops or - if necessary - from Amazon.
Also, didn't know you were a Soulcalibur fan, Rich.
Click to expand...

Yeah, in 1995 I played the first one on the PS1, and I had a crush on 2 of the female characters, Seung Mina and Taki.

Same when I had a crush on Chun Li from Street Fighter 2 when I was about 15.
 
Yep, been through it already (along with a lost package that I got a refund for), but that's the name of the game. Highest bidder wins, and you better believe you're not the only one in town. Proper annoying it is, but what did you expect?
 
Mr Allen said:
Yeah, in 1995 I played the first one on the PS1, and I had a crush on 2 of the female characters, Seung Mina and Taki.

Same when I had a crush on Chun Li from Street Fighter 2 when I was about 15.
Click to expand...

You seem to have crushes on a lot of people and/or have a lot of people who "you would" despite their age - be they real or not. Not that I'm complaining, I've just noticed it a lot.

As for myself in regards to the games, I've played Soulcalibur II (which came 6th in Cybernet's top games of 2003) and Soulcalibur III for PS2. I preferred the second one personally.
 
AGXStarseed said:
You seem to have crushes on a lot of people and/or have a lot of people who "you would" despite their age - be they real or not. Not that I'm complaining, I've just noticed it a lot.

As for myself in regards to the games, I've played Soulcalibur II (which came 6th in Cybernet's top games of 2003) and Soulcalibur III for PS2. I preferred the second one personally.
Click to expand...

I've got Soul Calibur 5 backward compatible from Xbox 360 on the 'One.

Easy achievements because I've always been good at fighting games.
 
I remember 15-20 years ago a coworker talking about an ebay snipe program he used on his computer, called snipe hunter or something. It's nothing new.

I typically do the strategy of waiting until the last minute to place a bid. In my mind, an item with zero bids is not so desirable and gets left alone. When bids starting getting placed, people wonder what's desirable about it and start to drive the price up. Maybe it's because of that, or because I buy off the wall things that nobody else sees value in and I'm willing to pay a fair price for, but I've never been sniped and rarely even had other bids for that matter. Have gotten some amazing deals like a newly rebuilt engine for $50 with free pickup, no other bids there either.

I did have to bid early on a van once, and with a couple other bids I still won it for a good price. I personally had gone and checked it out first and knew it was worthwhile.

One time I really wanted this catalog of measurements of decades worth of brake parts measurements. Couldn't get it anywhere else at the time. Listed for $4. I bid $20, then $25, and was still outbid. Guess what, after the seller sold that one at $25, he listed another identical catalog which I won for $4 with no competition.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

New Threads

Top Bottom