Hi Hunters!
There have been several important developments in Coin Hunt World since my last post, but I want to dedicate one of the game-changing features: the Auction House (AH). The AH allows hunters to sell and buy cubie blueprints, cubies, and other resources such as paint, resin, crafting items, etc. In this post I'm going to describe what the AH is and how it works, but more importantly, how to maximize your value from using it.
Auction House (AH) Basics
The AH is located inside your Headquarters (HQ), as seen in the image below. You have to be within range of your HQ to interact with the AH.
The AH interface is very simple. You have 3 categories to choose from:
- Buy Items
- Sell Items
- Active Auctions
Buy Items
For the Buy Item category, you need to use one green key to unlock this feature - this is a one-time cost and is not reimbursable. Once unlocked, you can scan through all the items available for sale, and place a bid one items you'd like to purchase. You can sort items based on price, popularity ('hot'), and by category (blueprint, cubie, or resource). You can also filter based on time remaining. At the moment, auctions last exactly 3 days from the time of posting. The time remaining in the auction is signified by clock icons:
- 3 clocks = between 48 and 72 hours remaining on auction item
- 2 clocks = between 24 and 48 hours remaining on auction item
- 1 clock = <24 hours remaining on auction item
If you're looking for a very specific item instead of browsing, I find it easier to search using the search bar at the top.
To place a bit on an item, click on the item you'd like to bid on, and drag the keys into the cash register until you reach your desired bid. Most veterans will know the key values by heart already, but for those that don't:
- 10 blue keys = 1 green key
- 10 green keys = 1 yellow key
- 10 yellow keys = 1 red key
- 10 red keys = 1 purple keys
All AH bids are denominated in blue keys. At the moment, to beat an existing bid, you have to beat it by at least 5 blue keys.
Let's say you're bidding on these 150 fire crystals shown above. I clearly don't have enough keys to bid on this item, but if I had 3 yellow keys I could transfer 3 yellow keys and 3 green keys into the register and bid 330 blue keys (equivalent). Alternatively, I could transfer 3 yellow keys, 2 green keys, and 5 blue keys and my bid would be 325 blue keys. It's up to you how much you want to go over the current bid. If you had one red key, you could transfer that but then your bid would be a minimum of 1000 blue keys, which might be way overkill depending on the item. Note: You can't 'break down' your keys into lower value keys (i.e. yellow into multiple greens or blues, red into multiple yellows, greens and blues, etc.).
Once you bid on an item, you can check on it in the 'Active Auctions' section of your AH. More on that later.
Sell Items
For the Sell Item category, you need to use one yellow key to unlock this feature - this is also a one-time non-reimbursable cost. I know, it's steep, but prior to the AH you would have been stuck with a lot of materials that you wouldn't have been able to use to forge a cubie. Now you can sell those materials and it doesn't take long before you can 'break even' on the cost to unlock the selling feature.
Once unlocked, you can sell any item in your inventory (cubie blueprints, cubies, resin, or crafting materials). There is no minimum or maximum to the number of items you can list in one listing, however you can only list one item type at a time (for example, you can't list resin and blueprint in one listing).
It costs 1 green key (non-reimbursable) to put an item up for sale and the minimum list price is 2 green keys (20 blue keys), so before you list, you should ask yourself whether the item you're listed will sell for AT LEAST 25 blue keys, otherwise there's a chance no one bids on your item and it gets returned to your inventory minus the 1 green key list fee. I would recommend checking other similar items in the AH first (especially the ones at 1 clock remaining), because that will give you a good idea what the current market rate might be for your item.
Once you list your item for sale, you can track it in the 'Active Auctions' section of your AH. More on that below.
Active Auctions
Once you've bid on an item or listed it for sale, it will show up here.
If you click on 'My Items', it will list the items you have for sale. The interface here is the same as the 'buy' interface - you can sort your items in the same way. This side isn't very interesting, other than the fact that you can keep track of how many keys you might be getting once the auction ends, which might be useful for you if you're planning to bid on an AH item but are currently short on keys. When someone puts a bid on your item, you will get a mail notification in the top right hand corner of your screen (when in the Coin Hunt World App). The notification will tell you who bid on your item. This community is quite tight-knit, so if you are an active player and active on the discord channel, you'll see the same names popping up over again and it's fun to banter a bit in the discord channel. Once the auction ends, you will receive a mail notification and a package in your HQ with the keys, -10% fee to paid to the game. The keys will be paid in the highest denomination possible (ex. if the winning bid was 160 blue keys, after the 10% fee, you would receive 144 keys in the form of 1 yellow key, 4 green keys, and 4 blue keys).
If you click on 'My Bids', you'll see all the active items (auctions that haven't already closed) that you've bid on. Again, you can sort these items in the same way as the buy screen. When someone outbids you on an item, you'll receive a mail notification in the app, indicating who outbid you, and you'll receive a package in your HQ returning your keys. Your keys are always returned in the same denomination as your bid. You'll also see a red indicator on the item saying 'Outbid'. If you have the highest bid at the time that the auction ends, you will receive a mail notification with a package in your HQ with the item you've won.
Auction House Strategies to Maximize your Returns
If you've already been playing Coin Hunt World for a while, the info above will not be news to you. After having played this game since early April, and having used the AH frequently since its launch, I've developed a few strategies that I feel will pay big dividends as the game grows:
Identifying/Targeting Blueprints or Cubies that either are confirmed never to return, or may never return
This is the most important strategy for me. After playing this game for a few months, I really do believe this game is in the beginning stages of a great game that will eventually be played worldwide by potentially millions of people. If it gets to that scale, I want to be the owner of items that are very rare. If you look at the collectibles industry (trading cards, art, etc.), it's always the rares pieces that accumulate the most value over time. At this stage in the game, there are very few blueprints or cubies that are confirmed never to return. Instead of listing all blueprints and cubies confirmed never to return, you can find the info on the wiki page, already neatly laid out at the bottom of this Coin Hunt Wiki Page: https://coinhuntworldwiki.com/Blueprint
Timing the auction end times for items you're REALLY interested in
This tip really depends on the person. I understand that we all have lives and no one has time to perfectly time every single listing in the AH, and that's not what I'm advocating for either. If there is an item that you've been wanting to get your hands on for a while, and you think you have enough keys to win it, I would recommend trying to time the auction end time to the minute, and putting in a winning bid in the last second. This avoids starting a bidding war and gives you the element of surprise. To time the bid to the last minute, I generally check the items (for me it's blueprints exclusively) with three clocks left every hour or two during the day. When I see the item listed, I note the possible time range in a spreadsheet, and the next day, I try to time the end time to within 15 minutes (going from 3 clocks to 2 clocks). On the next day, I try to time the end time to the minute (going from 2 clocks to 1 clock). This is a bit time intensive, but I promise there is nothing more satisfying than sliding a bid in on the last minute. I decided to implement this strategy after I lost a bit to someone else who had it timed to the last minute, and they snuck in while I and someone else were having a bidding war, and the auction was over before I knew it. Very time consuming but very effective technique for those items that you REALLY want to get.
Find yourself 'Money(or Crypto) Printers'
Firstly, it's important to note that most Cubie Blueprints can be used an infinite number of times to craft cubies. The only exception to this currently is the OG Cubie Blueprint, which is destroyed after you print a cubie once. With this in mind, blueprints have the capacity to be very valuable for perpetually printing new cubies with a single blueprint, and selling it in the AH. After all, there are several different epic blueprints which are scarce in number and their cubies command high prices in the auction house (often several hundred blue keys per cubie). However, the problem is that many of these blueprints also require relatively rare crafting materials to craft cubies, so if you don't already own lots of the corresponding crafting materials, it may not necessarily be profitable to purchase the crafting materials in the AH, craft the cubie, and sell the cubie on the AH with your blueprint.
There are however a few exceptional blueprints which require only common resources to craft cubies, and they are (relatively) scarce. Based on my knowledge, these include:
- Foreman cubie BP
- Construction cubie BP
- Leprechaun cubie BP
- Valentine cubie BP
All of these cubie blueprints require only resin and some combination of paint to form a cubie. The foreman cubies command the highest price in the AH - only 25 BP's were printed and no additional blueprints will ever be created. These blueprints were awarded to the hunters who contributed to the first completed crane (yellow vault) in Vancouver, BC. Construction cubie blueprints are awarded to anyone who contributed to a completed crane (aside from the very first crane in Vancouver). The Leprechaun and Valentine cubie blueprints were found by hunters during the St Patrick's Day and Valentine's day event in 2021 and far fewer hunters were playing at that time than exist today, so there aren't many currently in circulation; however, there is some debate and uncertainty as to whether these blueprints will return for future St. Patrick's Day or Valentine's Day events.
Because these blueprints are relatively scarce, you can often sell the cubies in the AH for more than you could sell the raw materials (resin and paint). Therefore it's relatively profitable to print these cubies perpetually and list them for sale in the AH. When I run out of the raw materials (paint and resin), I buy them in the AH because they're cheaper than the cubies, and I print more cubies and sell them at a profit. The only glaring problem with this approach is that eventually the demand for these cubies will dry up if many people apply the same approach; however, there are two elements working in our favour: 1) the market is growing continuously. New countries will be getting access to this game throughout 2022 and it can be expected that demand for rare cubies will grow over time, and 2) there's a possibility that these blueprints never return. The developers haven't confirmed whether the Leprechaun and Valentine's day blueprints will return in the future. These blueprints are currently priced around their floor (assuming that they will return), so there is a lot of upside if they are confirmed not to return.
Timing listings or purchases with other events
This is a phenomenon I've noticed particularly clearly during the current event (Elemental Invasion). During the events, which occur roughly every month, prices for existing blueprints, cubies, resources generally drop. For example, in the week before the Elemental Invasion, I was bidding on two separate Leprechaun blueprints which sold for between 400 and 500 blue keys. During the event, a single Leprechaun blueprint was posted and sold for around 250 blue keys. The reason? The number of listings on the AH exploded with all new materials now also listed in the AH, which drove down prices for two reasons: 1) buyers keys were spread out among more listings, leaving fewer bidders (or fewer keys to bid) on each individual item, and 2) the sheer number of listings made it difficult to track. As far as I'm aware, most people who use the AH track items manually (maybe some go to the extent of a spreadsheet, but most probably in their heads), which means many items just go unnoticed.
As a result, my approach is to stockpile keys leading up to events so that I can buy the valuable ones on the cheap during the event. Likewise, I would also hold on to resources that I plan to sell until we're weeks removed from an event (either before or after an event) so that the AH listings dry up and competition increases.
Timing your listings or purchases depending on what's available on the AH
This is a common error I see all the time: there will be a new resource, cubie/blueprint that becomes available and people will list it on the AH even though there are 50 other identical items expiring THE SAME DAY. I may be exaggerating with the 50 figure, but you get the point. Why would you list an item when you would be competing with so many other people? Chances are good that the demand can't support that kind of supply in a single day, so the sale prices will be very low. Before I list, I always check to see how many of that item are for sale with 1, 2 or 3 clocks remaining. If I see a big discrepancy between the number of items on any given day, I generally will wait until I see not many listed on a particular day and will list it then. On the flip side, if I'm buying a relatively common item, I will try to wait for many listings to happen on the same day, and I'll bid on one of those items because chances are they'll close at a lower price. This tip obviously doesn't apply to very rare or epic items because very few are ever listed in the AH.
Shameless Plug
That's all I've got for you today. If you've never heard of Coin Hunt World (CHW) and you'd like to try it out (and you somehow made it to the bottom of this post), you can download it via the referral link below and it will help us both out. We both get 2 green boxes (worth $2 USD in BTC or ETH) and it lets me know that these posts provide some value to newer players. The game is free to join, and you only need your email address to start playing. I know it sounds too good to be true, I felt the same way, but this game is legit. If you're hesitant at all, check out the official wiki page and discord channel, which I've linked at the bottom of the page, and I'm sure you'll be hooked.
Install Coin Hunt World Here
