Is this a Marketplace bug, a bot, or something else?

A couple of days after the start of the Bestiary League, I bid on a decent weapon. It was a "deal", compared to other listings, with good rolls on it. The filter was set for only "online" sellers, so I was pretty happy, thinking it would soon be mine!

It's still up, the "seller", according to the filter setting, has been online every time I logged in, which is every day at all sorts of hours. (I'm an adult and can play whenever I want for as long as I want! Apparently, so can this... person.)

In short - I've never received a response from this "seller." My bid just sits there, waiting.. Twice, now, it has shown a "Resubmit" message and, dutifully, I did so. I assume that's some sort of way to take care of problems like this by automatically expiring the transaction.

So, many levels later, I've bid on another weapon. Again, a good deal, just one Chaos, like the other, and... am waiting for a response. (Here it goes again...)

This doesn't appear to be anything logical that a human would do. I can understand people dumping items in a "1 Chaos" bin and not paying attention to that, but to not accept transactions or not even refuse them, just leave them sitting?

After reading up a bit on past bugs, corrupted (digitally) transactions resulting in freaky items and overflow issues, and the like, I'm starting to think this is some sort of transaction bug. It's either that or a broken bot situation.

However, the server was reset yesterday and, as expected, there's that transaction, just sitting there, dutifully holding onto my little 1 Chaos bid, waiting for "response.." I checked minutes before the reset and as soon as I could log in after the account situation was fixed. No normal bot would be able to have done that... Superbot? Doubtful.

I'm thinking this is some sort of transaction error where multiple bids end up coming so close together that an item gets sold while pending bids/transactions are being processed for that item. BUT, that does not explain, fully, why the item still shows up in a search. It's easy to single out individual items because there are so many stats to track. This item always shows up in my search for the same item, so that information has to be coming from somewhere, either a bad cache/hash/something/whoknows...


There are some long-time PC PoE players here, so maybe they know what's going on or can clue me in as to why this thing happens. I'd really appreciate it!

(I don't know that it's a "bug" or I'd post there. Also, I don't know what the bot environment is, so I can't claim that, either. Given that things can get corrupted during the transaction process in the PC version, I'm assuming that's the easiest place to look, first. And, I'm "retired" so play at all sorts of weird hours - It's not a live person, or at least just one individual, that's been on for all that time and just ignoring buy requests.)

Thats what everybody complains about, price fixing. They put one item in cheap, are always online, hope someone else, will see this, offer their items for a price in the same range and then buy that way under market price.

This is why everyone is asking for instant buyout, if the offer matches the requested price, so this kind of stuff would stop. Now they just get all the offers and just ignore it and you have to suffer as your currency is "busy"...

Ahh! Thanks for that PoEconmics lesson!

So, they "price fix" by attempting to lower the trend of prices by keeping public low-price bids as visible as possible, but up stuff that gets lowballed in response, then... eventually readjust the market and sell higher.

But, the only thing here is it may have been someone who just didn't know what they were doing. This particular item had "decent", but not outstanding rolls for its Unique type, but other items, some arguably better, were just one more Chaos in price. /shrug

If they want to fix that, they could just limit the number of "active open bids" on an item. Or, the system could auto-sell, after 24-36hrs, the item if there is an active bid that meets or exceeds the "asking price." Actually, that would be best for all, really. It allows the seller some freedom and ensures the bidder's currency isn't held up. And, it keeps this crap from happening easily. (Though, the fixers could just re-submit the item before the 24hrs is up, or their bots could. Not sure of the bot situation on Xbox.)

Thanks a bunch for explaining that! I'm now a bit wiser in the ways of the PoE marketplace because of it!

PS - I'm not, necessarily, in favor of forcing a "immediate buyout price" as that just encourages people to not list buyout prices... And, if they're forced to, they'll probably complain. It has to be a system favorable for both PC and XBox "in general." It doesn't have to be exactly the same mechanics, but it needs to try to stay as close to the spirit of the mechanics as possible. (Auto-delivery is a great boon for Xbox and I don't think the game would be playable without it. The PC may not need that mechanic.