Auction Rules

[Polydamas]

Are there any published rules for auctions? Or other ways of finding rare products, where it is not certain that they are available, someone who has them is willing to sell, or that you will beat the other people who are eager to have it?

Auctions sometimes appear in adventure stories, and finding rare materials is a common obstacle to building and learning rare things.

[Anaraxes]

Social Engineering has rules for finding sellers, convincing them to sell or sell cheaper, haggling, and so on.

I don't know of any rules for auctions as an extended system of bidding rounds to generate suspense (as opposed to any number of methods for buying and selling that would be covered with Merchant and related or complementary skills like crafting skills, Politics, Streetwise, Intimidation, etc).

[hal]

In a way - an auction would be essentially an action between the seller (the auctioneer) and the buyers (the bidders).

As GM, what I'd probably do is roll a reaction roll against a given "item" the auctioneer is trying to sell. A high reaction roll means the item is popular and is likely going to have a few bidders, while a low reaction roll might represent the fact that few are interested in it, or don't have the cash on hand to bid (having bid on things they were really interested in, etc).

Then, assuming that it wasn't a really "bad reaction" item, I'd have two "contests" between the seller and the interested buyer (representing the max the first buyer is willing to go to) and a second buyer. The bidding war then gets done such that the first bid is usually low, increments by a given value, until it goes over what the second most interested buyer is willing to bid. Then the one who is willing to go higher will go up by 1 bid.

If you want to have fun? In order to simulate the buying frenzy that sometimes happens, have the secondary buyer make a will saving roll to avoid taking that extra bid higher than he was originally willing to go to. Factor in personal rivalries, extravagent spending, "quirks" that perhaps favor the item being sold, etc - and if the will saving roll is failed, the buyer bids despite wanting or knowing he should stop.

That's how I'd handle it if it came to it.

[SteamBub]

I would just do a contest to determine if the NPCs can keep bidding. If the PCs run out of money, than they automatically lose the contest.

[GWJ]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

Social Engineering has rules for finding sellers, convincing them to sell or sell cheaper, haggling, and so on.

I don't know of any rules for auctions as an extended system of bidding rounds to generate suspense (as opposed to any number of methods for buying and selling that would be covered with Merchant and related or complementary skills like crafting skills, Politics, Streetwise, Intimidation, etc).

Where are rules for convincing someone to sell? I can't find this.

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by GWJ

Where are rules for convincing someone to sell? I can't find this.

Rules for finding a buyer are in "Buyers", Social Engineering p. 23, while actually talking them into selling are in "Commercial Transactions", pp. 26-28.

[GWJ]

Oh, I thought there is rule for situation like "sell me item which you don't want to sell me"

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by GWJ

rule for situation like "sell me item which you don't want to sell me"

The classic cinematic example would be the buying of a movie role using your Intimidation skill. Make the seller an offer he can't refuse by using the Manipulation rules in Social Engineering on p37 (generalization of the Specious Intimidation rule on B202 to skills other than Fast Talk and Intimidation). Or, for a less extreme example, you might simply use Intimidation as a complementary skill (in SE on p26, but complementary skills are in Basic) for a smaller bonus, but with less risk. Or use a less hostile complement to persuade in other ways, like Diplomacy or Sex Appeal, which at least should less problematic should they fail. The best approach will depend on the character making the offer as well as the seller. (Iinterested PCs should be savvy enough to try and learn something about their reluctant target, the better to manpulate him.)

[Polydamas]

Originally Posted by hal

In a way - an auction would be essentially an action between the seller (the auctioneer) and the buyers (the bidders).

As GM, what I'd probably do is roll a reaction roll against a given "item" the auctioneer is trying to sell. A high reaction roll means the item is popular and is likely going to have a few bidders, while a low reaction roll might represent the fact that few are interested in it, or don't have the cash on hand to bid (having bid on things they were really interested in, etc).

Then, assuming that it wasn't a really "bad reaction" item, I'd have two "contests" between the seller and the interested buyer (representing the max the first buyer is willing to go to) and a second buyer. The bidding war then gets done such that the first bid is usually low, increments by a given value, until it goes over what the second most interested buyer is willing to bid. Then the one who is willing to go higher will go up by 1 bid.

If you want to have fun? In order to simulate the buying frenzy that sometimes happens, have the secondary buyer make a will saving roll to avoid taking that extra bid higher than he was originally willing to go to. Factor in personal rivalries, extravagent spending, "quirks" that perhaps favor the item being sold, etc - and if the will saving roll is failed, the buyer bids despite wanting or knowing he should stop.

That's how I'd handle it if it came to it.

I like the idea of a reaction roll to the item for sale. That is easy to ballpark ("eh, you are an American in Europe in 1919, everyone else at this auction has more antiques and less money than you, -2 for the crowd's reaction to lot 39"), which is important. And of course, you can use all kinds of complementary skills to assess the product before the auction or determine that Professor Feil is really interested in the Syriac manuscript, and Murasaka never sells once he has won an auction.

What kinds of skills are canonical for evaluating different kinds of goods for sale? You can use Merchant, or IQ-based version of a skill for making or using the goods, but what if the goods are not linked to a skill? I would probably allow Soldier for armour and LBE, Survival or Hiking for cold-weather gear ...

[Kelly Pedersen]

Originally Posted by Polydamas

What kinds of skills are canonical for evaluating different kinds of goods for sale?

Connoisseur is the go-to skill for this. Note that it's not limited to "artistic" objects by any means - several templates include things like Connoisseur (Weapons).

Originally Posted by Polydamas

You can use Merchant, or IQ-based version of a skill for making or using the goods, but what if the goods are not linked to a skill? I would probably allow Soldier for armour and LBE, Survival or Hiking for cold-weather gear ...

I'd allow an (IQ-based) roll against a skill to evaluate the pure practicality of an item intended for use with that skill; how well it would help that skill, basically. But that wouldn't cover a wide range of things that an adventurer might want to know about the item: how fashionable it was (i.e., any reaction bonuses or penalties associated with having or using it), its provenance (how likely an individual item is to be illegal, or things like the company that makes it having a history of making defective items), and so on. Those are all the province of the relevant Connoisseur speciality.