About Kittycats and their prices.

[Bernhard McIntyre]

You know everything, the value of the Kittycats decreases each day. It goes steeply downward. If it continues to go so, the Kittycats will have to live no longer for a long time. There are much too many different sorts. Each new sort decreases the value of the old. An inflation.

The general weariness is clearly noticeable with auctions. And all cats are soon nothing at all more worth. At the most still the completely new eyes and ears and skins.

Each buyer that today 70,000 L paid for a Kittycat, threw his money out to the window, because in three month this cat will be only worth 500.

That is like that, as if you buy a new car for 20,000 dollar in RL, and it is after one month only dollar worth 1000.

What can we do against this madness.

[Deer Thistle]

My only issue with the construction of this post: "Each buyer that today 71,000 L paid for a Balinese, threw his money out to the window, because in one month this cat is only worth 500." I don't believe this person should have been publicly outed in this post and used as an example of what you deem was a buyer throwing his or her money out the window at Ifoni's auction. Beyond the price paid, you can't be sure of the details behind his or her purchase to begin with.

For instance, is it therefore a waste for me to spend money on my beloved (and notorious) collection of 60+ Chateau Cream & White 1 kitties I hoard because I love and adore this fur so much, just because I don't make any profit off of this favorite breeding project? I don't sell these kitties and even if I did, I'd be "throwing my money out the window" through your perspective because there's no way I'd make the money back on the kitty food and milk spent to groom and tend to my lovely army of cream & white 1 that don't fiscally benefit me whatsoever - they only bring me happiness and I'm content with the price I pay to keep them (no matter what price paid on food and milk, I'd keep these kitties over any others), so you have to understand why that segment of your post slightly irked me as someone who spends money "thrown out the window" in terms of not receiving any profit back and the kitties' values going down as days go by in your eyes.

Individuals can do with their money as they may like, just as you can with yours. Regardless of the market incentive to purchase the cat in question (I don't want to debate estimates on how much that kitty may be worth in a month, as this is neither what this post is really about nor can we accurately predict the value), perhaps the Balinese Seal Lynx held a special place in that person's heart and reminded them of a childhood pet, or maybe they wished to have lovely traits on it and this Balinese proved priceless because it matched their criteria for getting started with a project, perhaps they were impatient and it sated their anxiety to get in on the Balinese craze. Perhaps they're a prominent shopkeeper who doesn't see 71k as the same lofty number you do, 71k is merely petty Lindens. I know if I personally saw a kitty that looked exactly like my real-life one, I'd jump all over it and pay any price to have my virtual kitty, because it's worth it to me and the market has nothing over my sentiment toward the kitty so I'd be willing to spend the money for it. Everyone has different reasons for making purchases and thus kitties may hold different values in different people's eyes as a result, not everyone buys an expensive kitty (or any kitty at all) for sheer investment and future profit purposes. Even if so, you shouldn't out someone like this in a post and dub their purchase basically a waste, that's really unfair to both the breeders of the Balinese witnessing the craze over this breed and to the buyers who wish to obtain one and have to offer with others, thus reaching this current market price.

----

Back to my thoughts on your proposal as a fellow breeder and player in the secondary marketplace we rely so heavily on:

As far as your suggestion, I don't believe your proposal will mend the issue in the long run, the same issue will appear and appear again. Everyone wishes to have recessive kitties, how else would furs be pulled so easily among other traits? It's lucrative and the recessiveness/rarity of a kitty sparks allurement in every individual, it's human nature. Of course, aesthetics play a role in kitties too and kitties with fun, pretty traits will always hold a place in people's hearts.

It is and will always be the buyer's right to pay any price they agree to and shouldn't be critiqued for it "threw his money out the window," I don't think it was right to add this silhouette of a person to your post, including a subjective viewpoint with loaded words to express your discontent with the price and what you predict will be the market value in a month. (The 500L price you deem the Balinese in a month is quite a stretch too in my opinion, even blacksilvers which came out around ~240 days ago are still worth 5,000L at worst to my knowledge) I also don't believe that the market can be predicted as you really don't know what will happen, nor do I believe a new slate of starter KittyCats while making the ones we currently have projects with unable to breed, is the wisest idea. While it may cause heavy hearts for breeders attached to their projects to be stripped of their ability to breed the current kitties and temporarily fix the situation with the wide array of new starters, it's no solution for the KittyCat's market in the long term with the same issues of recessiveness/rarity being in higher demand over and over again.

A re-introduction of KittyCats with a fresh slate of starters won't fix any problems - it's much like a MMORPG, plenty of MMORPGs (especially F2P ones) have server wipes because the economy was out of control with rare items from boss drops, everyone wanted the rare items so everyone farmed for these rares or tried to get it by any means they could. By wiping the servers and stripping the players of their characters and objects obtained, sure there wasn't as many rare items at first, but eventually over time they will add up and the MMORPG's servers' economies will be in the same rut as before. Something else, something new and innovative needs to be done to change the market and starting over with a new line of KittyCats that are incompatible with the current ones won't do anything for the KittyCats long-term. Rarity and recessive traits seem to prevail in the market (among every other market I can draw parallels to in any way) price-wise although there are exceptions such as aesthetics and this won't change unless something else changes with the KittyCats mechanics or with human nature to desire what isn't normally obtainable.

From what I've heard around the community when asking seasoned breeders and an auctioneer who happened to be here at this very time last year, there too was a market issue and it fixed over time. Markets will continue to rise and fall with the introduction of new traits (And yes, the rarest and most recessive will always be the most alluring, as upsetting as it may be to those like myself who are unlucky at discovering new traits. It's merely of our nature to want what not many others can have/discover/afford, among any other reasons to wish for these kitties that may cost a pretty penny.) and I've been given advice by the individuals who were here during this time to not worry as I specifically asked them this question about this very issue. Hopefully this proves to be the case again.

(Sorry for the long wall of text, this was an interesting suggestion and allowed me to reminisce on parallel suggestions that turned into reality on other platforms I've played market minigames on. )

Edit: The beginning of my response reflects a segment of the OP's post that is now omitted, so I apologize for any confusion. Nonetheless, it still ties into the issue regarding the market and the prices individuals are willing to pay per KittyCat, so I'll keep it here. Kitty hugs!

[Tashi Core]

Errr, if the current cats cannot breed anymore and become extinct, then the money we have already put into the cats will definitely "throw out of the window". If we start again with new starter cats, it will be just a repeat cycle making the money loss twice as much. Slowing down the release of new traits or introducing lesser new traits each round is enough to make me a perfectly happy crazy woman.

[Bernhard McIntyre]

Hallo deerylou,

many thanks for your long wall of text. I will give you one example out of my own experience:

My Abyssinians (Blue, Cinnamon, Fawn, Lilac, Ruddy) - each - was worth 2 month before 5000 L ? 25 000 L- and today only 100-600 L! Therefore on this cats only I lost ca.. 100 000 L. and more.

The Kittycats are very nice and wonderfull, but - with the food and milk - they make you poor and more poor. And not only me, but many many other owners also.

[anna Acanthus]

Well i don't often step in to post very positive comments about KittyCatS as i'm more interested in the negative points being taken care of than the positive ( which largely counterbalance negative i think ) and there's plenty of others who regularly send give kudos to the team anyhow.
The fact is that group membership increases slowly but surely and most newcomers, perplexed by breeding principles don't buy many starters, they buy cheap kitties then after having understood a bit start investing in better stock.

The market is a funny thing ; i sell mostly mid-range kitties, and i've had weeks when i didn't sell a thing , then weeks like over a month ago when to my surprise i made 50K + in 1 week, and from nothing higher than siamese flames, and i can only be bothered to advertise roughly something like once per month ^^ This was just a couple of weeks after the Valentine collection release when i thought that the market would be totally dead. Some much older breeds like the Black Russian Porcelain 9T with platinum or rainbow seem to make a quiet comeback and i'm so glad i kept a few good porcelain/gerbera orange boxes and i'll be getting them out pretty soon to re-release that line.

Its obvious that prices can't hold eternally as more and more of a new trait becomes available on the market.
But then take the Aby B&S for example, over 5 months after the first appeared they are still selling upwards of 10K for even for an averagely traited one, and the same will happen for at least one of the Balinese. The time span for big market success is from the apparition of a great new fur or trait until the a new batch of trait releases but some furs do manage to override even this quite well.
I personally would never fork out 75K for a new fur even if i could afford it as unless one has a pair in order to hit the ground running then theres not much chance of recuperating the investment, except in the case of already having a good turnover from other sales in which case i'd just be investing profit, and gambling on the prices holding high for a few weeks.

I haven't auctioned for a while now but when i did one could never tell when an auction would ninja or not, no-one knows when the cosmo-telluric conditions will be favorable
Each time theres a slump for a while people think it's the end then it takes off again. The only week to really avoid i found was the end of the month when people don't have their pay yet but even then, some buyers realize this and go looking for bargains and bid wars can take off.
Apart from that, the worst thing that happens, as i said recently in another thread is that a very few irresponsible breeders start dumping prices on a great fur as soon as they get their hands on a brand new fur and this really isn't cool to their customers who have provided them with the means to obtain this very fur.

As for introducing a whole new line of kitties, i don't really see the benefit especially as so many unique features are already introduced to the present ones, and each update and release is full of surprises and new features.

Having said this, we all, and i myself get thoroughly fed up from time to time and feel like posting a thread like this one or giving up, but for the moment i'm still in there, although obviously not as enthralled as i was a year ago but then thats quite normal.

[Bernhard McIntyre]

Look at the fate of the Krazy Kittys: One year before, they was very high developed, and many many people sell and buy them. Today they are totally dead. I hope this was not also the fate of the Kittycats - one year later....

[anna Acanthus]

(03-30-2012 01:48 AM)Bernhard McIntyre Wrote:  Look at the fate of the Krazy Kittys: One year before, they was very high developed, and many many people sell and buy them. Today they are totally dead. I hope this was not also the fate of the Kittycats - one year later....

Well i think that the design and scripting skills of the team are really vastly superior to other bredables, i had taken a look at all the kitties available just to have one nice kitty around and not one even vaguely tempted me before KCs.
This coupled with a top notch customer service, constant innovation and an extremely cool group with friendly creators often online to chat i think guarantees that they'll be around for quite a while longer. Now of course i realize this is also smart marketing procedure but it's obvious from their personal investment that it's not only about that. They all make pretty good money from it but not exactly a small fortune once divided up, and really are proud of their product and the success it's had so far.
The only limits to the innovation will be the scripting and creating tools of sl but when you have creative, intelligent people there who encourage and listen carefully to customer feedback you know they have plenty more cards up their sleeves.
I often disagree with them and not afraid to say so on certain points but give credit where it's due sometimes ... ok now i can get back to my criticizing

PS. i think one good very good piece of advice advice i've heard is to breed and develop the kitty you would like the most, you will be more inclined to keep at it and will enjoy it much more than just running after traits in a new fur that you don't really like that much. It won't please everyone but it's sure to please some and they'll want to buy it.

[Brandon Dawson]

You guys aren't accounting for that the Balinese is the most recessive known fur as of now - having that kind of trait makes it a premium breed no matter what the cost. I am offended that you think it'll be worth 500L a month from now, when reality it'll probably be like Aby B&S when the market price for that cat went from like 50k to 5k since November. That's a 4-5 month decline. I think you'll see roughly a 15% depreciation per month on this breed considering it's placeholder on the recessive scale.

The issue with the market is frankly unless you have the most recessive of traits on your kitties, your cats won't be valued as much. A shorty tail, ody ear no. 1, ilume shade, rounded ear cat would be much more valued than a cat that's 9T myst/curious. The most "rare" or "unobtainable" objects in life are always considered the most premium, that's just how the market mechanics for kittycats works and there doesn't seem to be a change happening any time soon.

My only gripe with traits is the over-saturation of eyes, there's so many different recessive eye traits now that unless the eyes are on a recessive fur, especially with the release of the fruit/valentines eyes, it's hard to label what's considered valuable versus mediocre. But aesthetically eyes obviously give KittyCats plenty of character which is valued among collectors.

It's a tough game, trying to play the secondary market - however if you love KittyCats and you enjoy this game, you'll find a way to keep costs even.

[Bernhard McIntyre]

Dear Brandon,
another example. One month ago about I bought on an auction a Snowshoe Red for 15,000 L. yesterday wanted I it on an auction to again sell. No interested itself more for it. I lost thereby 15,000 L and the food + milk. That is only one example of completely many, many, which I could enumerate. The market is mouse-dead.

[Nocshadue Balbozar]

Ok, gonna throw in my 2L$ on this one.
We are never going to be able to go back to 'Vanilla' kittycats. Those of you who play WoW know what I'm talking about. As things evolve, some things get easier in general. A WoW example: in the 'good ol days' Molten Core was a huge deal 40 man raid. Now you can almost solo and I think some have lol. A kittycats example: its easier than ever to be a new breeder to make some totally awesome cats. When I started in kittycats, a gen fur with rainbow prism eyes sold for 30k+. So it was out of my reach to get one to pull out those new and exciting Gerbera eyes. Compare that release with the V-days...how many fruit eyes do you see in markets now? Lots right? Cuz anyone can go pick up some prism or ody rainbow eyes on a nicely traited cat for a few hundred L$.
And yet, there are still undiscovered traits as far as I know. Maybe the answer lies in our own perspective and how we are breeding. Another difference between KittyCatS community and others is that we tend to help one another and share information. I believe that will serve in the long run to strengthen us and keep interest peaked.
You gave an example of how the price has dropped on your Abys. I know..I paid 5k for a three trait fawn about two months ago. I am breeding him still and love the fur. I would not today try to ask 5k for one of his fawn babies though. But perhaps once I get them traited out the way I hope to, they will do well enough.
The market will always be fickle. Starting all over won't change that. Occasionally retiring a trait may help some but not at first. I didn't see the value of red tabbies, white russians, or gerbera eyes skyrocket or anything.
The one suggestion I have made before and will make again now is to somehow reward long time breeders. Either increase the K$ for menagaie, give a percentage back as K$ for purchases at the main store, maybe a nice gift of K$ on the anniversary of your first kibble purchase lol, or offer mega packs of food and milk at a steep discount. I think that would help the most to keep some of us old timers that remember the good ol' days going.
Anyway, I know it can be frustrating. It kinda hurts to see something you've worked hard to breed go no sale at an auction etc. I think I cried the first time no one wanted one of my cherished pink and whites lol. But its just how it is. How I handled that, when I realized that the craze had died down on the pink and whites, I let some retire..kept a pair..kept working other traits in, but didn't bother to try to sell much unless I was asked for one. But I have a couple cuz I still love them. And I have a hoard of boxes hehe. But I moved on to other projects. I manage to sell enough to supplement my kibble fund, but not cover it completely.
And well, I dunno if my post was helpful at all lol. But take heart, the market will come back as more and more discover KittyCatS and start to get involved with markets/auctions etc. And just breed what you love and hang in there

Noc