Steam Holiday Sale and Holiday Auction coming soon

Keep in mind the huge bids are the top bid for that game for the first acution. There are 100 copies of each item to bid on, so after the first auction, another copy will be auctioned off every 45 minutes. I am (well was as of this morning) in the the top 30 on a game I had my eye on with a hefty bid of 173 gems so in theory I could win the 30th auction provided no one else increases their bids up and till that point.
 
Keep in mind the huge bids are the top bid for that game for the first acution. There are 100 copies of each item to bid on, so after the first auction, another copy will be auctioned off every 45 minutes. I am (well was as of this morning) in the the top 30 on a game I had my eye on with a hefty bid of 173 gems so in theory I could win the 30th auction provided no one else increases their bids up and till that point.

Erm question, how did you get the 30 number, or is that thumb suck?
 
Erm question, how did you get the 30 number, or is that thumb suck?

also curious about that, as i don't see any way to tell where i am in the bidding pool. I dumped 400 gems into Talos Principle, but i see that there are another 3,600 other people who bid. no idea if i'm in top 100 or not :(
 
I so almost got a game from my wishlist for really cheap in the auction but was outbid by 100 gems in the end. Just didn't have enough gems to compete.
 
I so almost got a game from my wishlist for really cheap in the auction but was outbid by 100 gems in the end. Just didn't have enough gems to compete.

I've noticed that in the last few minutes people push their bids a bit.
I think a good tactic would be this (just my own thoughts, don't yell at me if I'm wrong):
* Don't wait for the final day. I think the lowest bids will happen tomorrow morning and afternoon but I could be very wrong.
* When you bid, don't go for a round number like 400 or 550. I've placed a bid for 600 and I was on position 28. I upped it to 602 and now I'm on position 18.
* Check your wishlist and test the water by bidding about a quarter of the current highest bid. If you hit the top 20, wait a few hours and see where you are then to test the bid flow of the game. Outside top 20 at this stage, you may want to push it up a bit.
* If you want to buy gems, do it now. I don't think the price will go down until the auction is over. Then it will probably drop faster than your matric-farewell date's... uhm... bouquet.
* Spread your bids over a few games but identify the one or two you would most like to have. If your other bids start dropping in position, withdraw and push those gems into the ones you want most.
* You'll have better luck with older games and indie titles than the newest AAA releases. Rather wait for the sale proper to start and buy those at discount.

This is the tactic I'm going to follow. Don't know how succesful I'll be. I think I'll be pushing for auction win by about 4pm tomorrow.
 
My thoughts exactly Mister44.

I've got a certain game in my scope and I've been keeping an eye on the bids. I've put in a bid that's a bit less than the total amount of gems that I have. I will just leave it there and see if it's lucky and maybe get the game. Tomorrow I will try and snipe it towards the end of every auction. Lets see how it goes. :)
 
There a few games I think that is worth keeping an eye on. I haven't had time to check out the entire listing, but those that I've seen that looks worth bidding on:
(NP = normal price, HB = highest bid right now)

The Golf Club - NP $34.99: HB 7,800 gems.
MDK 2 HD - NP $14.99: HB 1,500 gems.
Cricket Captain 2014 - NP $24.99: HB 2,600 gems.
Leviathan: The Last Day of the Decade - NP $14.99: HB 2,100 gems.
Waking Mars - NP $9.99: HB 1,200 gems.
Real World Racing Bundle - NP $9.99: HB 979 gems.
 
Aaaaaah Crap!!! I accidentally bid on the wrong item.

PS: Word of warning, if you the top bid you can not cancel your bid :(


Edit: Aaaah crap x 2

faTdYUQ.jpg


I won it, and wasted 2000 gems on something I probably could have picked up for a $ on sale :(
 
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Oh FFS

Steam was giving me an error on my credit card (busy server)...no worries I'll jam it onto Paypal...

...except now I'm locked out of the market till the 21st completely until the funds clear/don't bounce. WTF!

Crunched the numbers on this a bit..waste of time anyway....the bids on the good items are within an inch of full sticker price. o_O

e.g. Beyond earth:
Full price: 49.99 USD
Implied gem price: 45.48 USD

10% discount...and you risk getting outbid.

Maybe its just a temporary frenzy but things would have to change dramatically before there is any value here. I did low-ball something I suspect won't get enough bids to fill all the slots. :D
 
Oh FFS

Steam was giving me an error on my credit card (busy server)...no worries I'll jam it onto Paypal...

...except now I'm locked out of the market till the 21st completely until the funds clear/don't bounce. WTF!

Crunched the numbers on this a bit..waste of time anyway....the bids on the good items are within an inch of full sticker price. o_O

e.g. Beyond earth:
Full price: 49.99 USD
Implied gem price: 45.48 USD

10% discount...and you risk getting outbid.

Maybe its just a temporary frenzy but things would have to change dramatically before there is any value here. I did low-ball something I suspect won't get enough bids to fill all the slots. :D

Yip. Keep an eye on the Indie titles and older games. As things stand right now you're better off waiting for the sale if you want to pick up the AAAs.
 
Here's a quick little way to make a very small profit but gain quite a bit of XP:
http://www.steamgifts.com/forum/CbAoV/do-you-want-to-get-some-steam-xp-and-a-few-cents-right-now

I accidentally made a mistake and actually lost money on the whole thing but I did gain 500XP. All of the cards you can get for 0.08c. Just place a buy order.

Neat trick... made $0.07 but that is because I was more interested in the XP (wanted my second account to be level 10) than making money so bought 5 sets for $2.25, converted the emoticons and wallpapers to gems sold the 1000 pack for $1.22 and sold the Holiday cards for 23c each.

Thanx
 
It's a pleasure. :)

And I'm also glad to say that I won an auction! I would probably have gotten it cheaper by tomorrow though but I think I will focus on another game tomorrow.

I got Gray Matter for 1600 gems. Where do you guys get the implied gem price? I suppose I can go find out what gems cost and then work it out.
 
Ah, I was hoping for some site that shows all the current bids plus the implied price. But yes, I know of the gem stacks.
 
Aaah I won.... finally got the games (DLC) I was trying to bid for. I had to finish my collection.

prS0Zci.jpg


Damn snipers did not make it easy either, its all about that last 5 seconds and glad to say that all of them was under $2.50 in gems so still better than sale prices.
 
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Nicely done! Hehe I was one of those snipers with the game that I won. There was this one guy who kept trying to win the auction for the game and people kept sniping it from under his nose. I ended up doing the same haha. I'm glad to say that with the auction win I also got the game much cheaper than the normal sale prices. There's really some great discounts to be had!
 
Nicely done! Hehe I was one of those snipers with the game that I won. There was this one guy who kept trying to win the auction for the game and people kept sniping it from under his nose. I ended up doing the same haha. I'm glad to say that with the auction win I also got the game much cheaper than the normal sale prices. There's really some great discounts to be had!

I just sniped a sniper. I bid 2200 on Cricket Captain 2014 and a guy bid 2201 with about a minute left. I was expecting it, however, so I bid 2202 with about 10 seconds to go :D

I won two auctions now.
Got Real World Racing bundle for 985 gems (no sniping involved). Working @ $1.20 per 1000 gems, I got it for ~ $0.82 (~92% discount).
And I got Cricket Captain for 2,202 gems, about 93% discount.
 
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