it's because metals only use is crafting weapons which nobody does or crafting hats which nobody does because the craft hat pool is so limited and hasnt had a new hat added to it in a decade. meanwhile you have all these cool hats in the cases that are uncraftable.
There's no other use for metal than to trade or craft. If Valve made a way for people to burn their metal than it'd probably not change much given how it's been like 15 years of this happening but still cool for those with scrap to burn anyway.
pretty much ref became extremely plentiful while keys stayed around the same, it only started changing recently since with a bunch of people buying keys again more of them are in circulation, only time will tell if the prices will continue to decrease
People will say "supply and demand" but anyone who knows how backpack.tf operates would see the problem right away, which is basically people using the backpack.tf price as the base price that they then mark up for a few metals so that they make a profit out of trading, then someone at backpack.tf makes a request to increase the base price of the keys because everyone is selling them at the marked-up price, then it gets approved and the new higher backpack.tf price is the base price that people base their mark-up on and so on. This happened for years until it kinda plateau'd at around 70-80ref. It's not "oh there's a ton of metals in the community so obviously it's supply and demand" because the TF2 market does not operate by conventional economics. It's the result of everyone using a singular pricing site to determine item prices.
>spend an hour on loadout.tf piecing together my ideal cosmetics >buy cosmetics on the community market or mannco store >equip them in game >dont like it anymore >sell at a loss or trade them off for scrap
its a never ending cycle
yikes ive never spent that much on a cosmetic i think the most ive paid was like $8
i think the most valuable cosmetics i have is a team captain i crafted or a strange ttsy bitsy spyer with almost 9000 points on it
Why would you buy an unusual you won't like for long? This is the first one I traded for (others I got from that one time we could unlock old crates for a 100% chance at getting one) and even though it might not be top-tier, I love it to death. It's even named "Smoked Salmon"
Its nice you can go on steam market and just buy whatever cosmetic you want for way less than something like Overwatch would ask for
But then if you want a specific unusual or spelled item or something extra then you have to potentially deal with some rich guy marking up the price because the 1% have all the good shit
This summer update i am constantly seeing people buy and re-sell new unusuals because profit matters that much instead of buying an item to keep it
Yeah but no MMO ever had cross platform trading where CS players are buying up TF2 keys because their economy has no tradable keys or people selling items on steam market. There is no game still that has an interconnected economy like Valve's main games do.
>TF2 items could be worth way more than they actually are >Trader israelites shot themselves in the foot quadrupling the price of keys when the first Halloween unusual effects dropped and destroyed the value of all craftables and metal by insinuating there was actually an infinite amount of them >Nobody engages in low level trading because it's so inconvenient (two week wait if you don't want to install the mobile app) >Even if they tried their ass off they couldn't deflate the price of keys
The mobile app is a necessity because people to this day are still getting phished/hijacked
I got a community ban for saying the wrong thing on someones profile and had to get steam support to unlock my account because they thought my comment was a scam and it happens constantly in CSGO trading
What caused the drop?
it's because metals only use is crafting weapons which nobody does or crafting hats which nobody does because the craft hat pool is so limited and hasnt had a new hat added to it in a decade. meanwhile you have all these cool hats in the cases that are uncraftable.
I wish they'd start adding more cosmetics to the craft pool again. The initial rush to get <100 craft #s helps take metal out of the economy.
Spy mains are converting their metal and wanted a more fair exchange rate, expect it to go back up when gaben's chosen are done
Higher supply, less demand.
There's no other use for metal than to trade or craft. If Valve made a way for people to burn their metal than it'd probably not change much given how it's been like 15 years of this happening but still cool for those with scrap to burn anyway.
Lmao. What the frick is this price?
t. stopped playing years ago
pretty much ref became extremely plentiful while keys stayed around the same, it only started changing recently since with a bunch of people buying keys again more of them are in circulation, only time will tell if the prices will continue to decrease
it's cool honestly, you can buy a single key and get a full unique loadout for each of your mercs
wait really? buy one key from the store, wait a few days to trade it and then I can get that many cosmetics?
Yup, craftable items are EXTREMELY deflated in value so you can pick up like 9 loadouts of cosmetics.
do the math, craft hats are still 1.33 ref and one key is worth like 70 ref
People will say "supply and demand" but anyone who knows how backpack.tf operates would see the problem right away, which is basically people using the backpack.tf price as the base price that they then mark up for a few metals so that they make a profit out of trading, then someone at backpack.tf makes a request to increase the base price of the keys because everyone is selling them at the marked-up price, then it gets approved and the new higher backpack.tf price is the base price that people base their mark-up on and so on. This happened for years until it kinda plateau'd at around 70-80ref. It's not "oh there's a ton of metals in the community so obviously it's supply and demand" because the TF2 market does not operate by conventional economics. It's the result of everyone using a singular pricing site to determine item prices.
this shit happened even back when spreadsheet was a thing, people aren't lying when they say the economy is corrupt and run by israelites
>spend an hour on loadout.tf piecing together my ideal cosmetics
>buy cosmetics on the community market or mannco store
>equip them in game
>dont like it anymore
>sell at a loss or trade them off for scrap
its a never ending cycle
take the cosmeticless pill
but i like my mercs to have silly little cosmetics!
yeah and i hate it.
>spent a $25 on an unusual with le particles
>play for 3 hours total
>sell it
>rise and repeat
yikes ive never spent that much on a cosmetic i think the most ive paid was like $8
i think the most valuable cosmetics i have is a team captain i crafted or a strange ttsy bitsy spyer with almost 9000 points on it
if you use unusuals you have terminal shit taste
Why would you buy an unusual you won't like for long? This is the first one I traded for (others I got from that one time we could unlock old crates for a 100% chance at getting one) and even though it might not be top-tier, I love it to death. It's even named "Smoked Salmon"
mental illness
proof?
It happens to me often, why does it feel different in game?
loadout.tf is missing phong shading, which is what gives the mercs in-game that characteristic sheen that makes them look kinda like action figures
I wish I didn't
Same, after that I have a phase where I trade for profit only, then give up and don't play the game at all for several months
no monetization killed off any fun TF2 could have
I have social anxiety even with online trading
I used to have 20 idling accounts when it was still a thing
I just hoard items
Don't even give away shit when I quit playing
Its nice you can go on steam market and just buy whatever cosmetic you want for way less than something like Overwatch would ask for
But then if you want a specific unusual or spelled item or something extra then you have to potentially deal with some rich guy marking up the price because the 1% have all the good shit
This summer update i am constantly seeing people buy and re-sell new unusuals because profit matters that much instead of buying an item to keep it
Anything with an actual economy is like that. MMOs were like that before then and that is what TF2 was based on for loot crates.
Yeah but no MMO ever had cross platform trading where CS players are buying up TF2 keys because their economy has no tradable keys or people selling items on steam market. There is no game still that has an interconnected economy like Valve's main games do.
Mann conomy update killed gaming and it turned valve into the pathetic company they are today
>TF2 items could be worth way more than they actually are
>Trader israelites shot themselves in the foot quadrupling the price of keys when the first Halloween unusual effects dropped and destroyed the value of all craftables and metal by insinuating there was actually an infinite amount of them
>Nobody engages in low level trading because it's so inconvenient (two week wait if you don't want to install the mobile app)
>Even if they tried their ass off they couldn't deflate the price of keys
The mobile app is a necessity because people to this day are still getting phished/hijacked
I got a community ban for saying the wrong thing on someones profile and had to get steam support to unlock my account because they thought my comment was a scam and it happens constantly in CSGO trading
Escrows are entirely unnecessary for metal/weapon exchanges.