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Read the new book all about Team Fortress 2 trading and the TF2 Spreadsheet.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Our methodology.

On occasion there are inquiries about who the heck makes this little spreadsheet full of pretty colors.  To satisfy curiosity without giving up too much about us we created this post.  We are a handful of experienced TF2 players and traders.  We have many thousands of hours of in-game play as well as trading (if we could only get that time back and use it to save the world, alas).  We also rely on you to tell us if we err.

Our actual methodology is using as many different, credible sources of information that are available.  With the changes in trade chats recently our job is even harder so we try to check, and re-check prices on as close to a daily basis as is possible.  What is credible?  Actual trades we do, actual agreements on prices we witness, specific offers on items, specific asking prices for items.  These all give us a range of buying/selling and we try to reflect that market in the spreadsheet.

How do users know that we aren't manipulating prices?  We take the integrity of the spreadsheet and our reputation seriously.  We have many players who rely that we are giving them accurate pricing.  The best way to answer is that if you are concerned then check a price out yourself.  If you think we're off, tell us.  We have no pride on the line.  Sometimes the market changes and a price changes before we witness it.

15 comments:

  1. Thank you for posting a response to my question. I think you do the team fortress 2 gaming community a good service. When can we expect to see prices on the mask of the shaman?

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  2. Thanks. Mask of the Shaman is still untradable. Valve needs to release an update to change this. Until then its all guessing.

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  3. If past experience is any indication, the g. shaman will start at a buds. With such a high ownership rate however, I wouldn't be surprised to see this go the genuine anger route and end up at about 2-3 keys eventually.

    As for the spreadsheet, yeah, it's remarkably accurate. Granted, I'd fine tune the v.hat rates and the solider metal prices, but overall its really good.

    -a tasty serving of ( http://www.tf2items.com/profiles/76561197992829835 )

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  4. I have some suggestions for the strange weapons: the RL would not go for 1 refined in a fair trade, I'd say +/- 1.66 refined for it, maybe more. Same goes for the minigun. The backburner is also more than .66 refined I've seen. I think +/- 1 refined would be fair for that one. In fact most of the items you put at 1-2 refined usually are off.

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  5. That would be so cool if there was a program that records all trades then makes the list depended on the trades made. Sadly, you would need valve's permission to look at such information, and the programming would be hell a hard. Its still an idea though. :3

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  6. Jalalipop: point taken on minigun/RL. The backburner we've seen at that 2 rec range quite a bit.

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  7. Hey, first I wanted to say that this is a great general pricing guide, and I wanted to mention that it seems the prices of all strange items are rather rapidly dropping.

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  8. Server trade chat is back! I bet you can get more accurate prices now that it has returned right?

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  9. Question: Why aren't Genuine Bisons worth more? I'd figure they would be because according to TF2 items there are only ~2793 of them.

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  10. Anadnu: It's a normal weapon instead of a misc. or hat so it's innately less sought after. Plus it's relatively easy to get its NG counterpart.

    Anyway I'm back with another suggestion. After a couple weeks I think the price of the G. Wingstick should be adjusted. It's fairly rare but not very sought after so the price has dropped to be 6-7 keys at the very most. At this point anyone who tries to sell their Wingstick for buds gets laughed at. I know because I went through hell to buy buds for the wingstick plus 3 keys.

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  11. Andanu: Yes, you are right the server chat is back, now it shows purchased items too! You can see all those little keys get born now.

    Also, TF2stats may list 2793 g. bisons however they only use a sample set of 20K or so players, there are on average 40K users playing TF2 at any moment, so there are many, many more than 2793 g. bisons.

    Jalalipop: G. Wingstick has slipped, you are right. Noted and corrected.

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  12. May I make a suggestion?
    Raise the price of the non-vintage non-Genuine Rift weapons. The only two ways to get those two items is preordering Rift (making it Genuine and expensive as hell) or crafting (the recipe is also fairly expensive). They don't randomly drop.
    I'd suggest that they should be roughly 2 rec each, since that's what I observed, but if you think a different price is better, that's fine.

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  13. Tnemec, point taken. We did a little digging and agree that a scrap is too low for either ng/nv Rift weaps. Though, they are not exactly hot properties they are worth a bit more. Thanks.

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  14. Hello. Great work on the spreadsheet.

    There's a problem however with the listed valued for the items which were only obtainable through purchase from the Mann Co Shop (Lucky No. 42, Flip-flops, Summer hat). They are listed as 7, 7 and 6 refined respectively. In reality the value of these items is closer to that number in keys than refined.

    If this could be resolved it would prevent a lot of confusion.

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  15. xeysz: the price of the summer items jumped very quickly from less than bills each to around 7 keys. We are hesitant to judge value based on TF2TP pricing because it is a highball-lowball system. However, in the absence of other pricing on these items we will up their price to reflect their limited status. We will keep a close eye on these items for price changes.

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