18.3.2 Auctions

Read HELP AUCTIONHOUSE for information on how to interact with the auction house.

It is important to note that Aetolia's auction house uses a 'second price' or 'Vickrey auction' system. As such you can 'secretly' bid the highest you are willing to pay for an item, but you will only spend what the second highest bidder is willing to spend.

This sounds complicated, but in reality it is not. It will allow players to participate in the auction without a strong need to be there for the last few minutes, and they can minimize how much they will spend to acquire items.

Let me give an example of how a second price system works.

Player A bids 100 credits, Player B bids 200 credits, Player C bids 500 credits. Player C will win the auction, and will pay 201 credits. 

When making a bid it is done secretly. Your max bid is not listed anywhere another player can see it. Only the current second price is listed.

Auctions, like most elections, ends at the point where the next in-game time period starts (dawn, noon, dusk, midnight) when the number of hours left is displayed as "0". Placing a bid on the final RL hour, however, will extend the item's auction for another RL hour. 

If you are still confused about how the process works, you can read more about 'second bids' on the following website; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickrey_auction