Second-Price DKP Bidding

Second-Price DKP Bidding

Back-and-forth bidding, while it can be entertaining on occasion, is too fucking slow to do mid-raid.  It took us 23 minutes to get from Geddon to Shazzrah, and we didn't have anything that many people are interested in, like Talisman of Ephemeral Power or Quick Strike Ring, drop.  Expecting that people will "become faster" is unrealistic; if they were capable of personal growth, they wouldn't be raiding Molten Core in 2019.

Thankfully, there is an easy solution to a slow DKP auction; second-price auction.  It does not, in any way, change the DKP system.  It only changes how bids work.

Consider two idiots bidding on a set piece. I just made up some random names:

[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: [Nightslayer Boots] 40
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 40
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 40
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 45
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 50
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 55
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 60
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 65
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 70
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 75
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 80
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 85
[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: Snkysnky wins with 85

In this example, "Dkhunter" knows that the most he wants to spend on these shitty set boots is 80 DKP.  But he will never bid higher than 5 more than "Snkysnky" because he is not an idiot and does not want to throw away DKP.  What if Snkysnky only wants to spend 60 DKP?  Dkhunter has no way to know.

If, instead, we chose to run a second-price auction, each participant would bid once: the most they are willing to spend on the piece.  The person with the highest bid wins, but is only charged how much it would have taken him to win through a normal auction.  In our case, that would be the second-place bid + 5.

The previous example, but with second-price bidding:

[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: [Nightslayer Boots] 40
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 80
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 160
[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: Snkysnky wins, pays 85

Magically, it's the same result, but the two rogues only have to figure out how to work in-game chat once!

If only one person bids, then the winning price is the minimum bid.  Let's pretend that Snkysnky really wants Nightslayer Boots, but no one else does:

[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: [Nightslayer Boots] 40
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 160
[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: Snkysnky wins, pays 40

And, for completeness, in the event of ties, there would just be a roll-off.  The winner of the roll would pay their bid price.

[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: [Nightslayer Boots] 40
[7. homloot] [Dkhunter]: 80
[7. homloot] [Snkysnky]: 80
[7. homloot] [Pyrrha]: Snkysnky and Dkhunter roll off.  Winner pays 80.