Spirit of the Law Question

[Stanley Kuppchaser]

I play three teams, with no players from the past decade, and no repeats across the rosters. I have a player on one team, Marquis Grissom, who has become a spare part. He was my centerfielder for 10 years in a Strat-O-Matic play by mail league back in the day and I'd like to "trade" him to another of my teams.



Would it violate the spirit of the TOS to put him up for auction at, say, twice the average auction price and then buy him for my other team? I will abide by the decision of the court.


Thanks.

[Dunzie]

If all three teams are on the same OOTP account I think you’ll find that the program will not allow your other teams to bid on it. It’s a safety mechanism in place to prevent more underhanded moves than what you are describing, which otherwise to me isn’t outside the spirit of the game. Trouble is... technically your selling team is benefitting by getting double the value. It’s a hard subject to come to fair terms all the time.

[Kushiel]

I think that you cannot do it because it opens a channel for the cheaters that exploit every crack that they can find already.

[Stanley Kuppchaser]

Thanks for the feedback. I'll just shop for a Grissom, then sell the other as I have in the past. I guess it was more about instant gratification on my part.

[<Pion>]

In one thread it was stated by one of the devs that you had to meet two criteria. The sale price had to be reasonable (not too high and not too low) and the player has to be left on the AH for an amount of time that gives others a reasonable chance to buy the player (I think 12 hours was mentioned, maybe less).

Selling him for twice the going rate could be a violation of the first guideline and considered funneling. My thought would be that setting a reasonable starting offer (around average last 5 or slightly below), and not having a BIN, you could then make a bid and hope to get him though someone might outbid you (which is the whole purpose of an equal and fair market).

EDIT - It was also said they didn't want it to happen often. But if the team you want to buy him with is on the same license, I don't think they'll be able to see the player anyway. It would have to be a 2nd license if what others have said is true.

[Matt Arnold]

Yes, if teams are on the same license you will likely get an error trying to bid on a player. If you're not on the same license, then setting it as a "fair" market price (ie. around the average all-time or last 5 assuming neither are crazy), and having it up for at least 12+ hours would be reasonable enough to not feel like you're funnelling points between the teams.

[zrog2000]

I didn't even think it was possible?

[Matt Arnold]

Originally Posted by zrog2000

I didn't even think it was possible?

As I said, if you signed up through the same license, then we do have guard in place that you should get an error. However some people may be running multiple teams, one of them created using a Steam license they used and one on a standalone version, for example, or other cases, where our checks to prevent auction house bidding fail. In those cases, as mentioned, then those recommendations seem fair to not trigger any alarms in our system

[Stanley Kuppchaser]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

Yes, if teams are on the same license you will likely get an error trying to bid on a player. If you're not on the same license, then setting it as a "fair" market price (ie. around the average all-time or last 5 assuming neither are crazy), and having it up for at least 12+ hours would be reasonable enough to not feel like you're funnelling points between the teams.

Thanks for the response, but, after thinking it over, I'll just keep an eye on the auction house. Who knows, Dom DiMaggio might change my mind, given a week.