Sunset Express uses an open bid multi-unit reverse english auction system to peg prices on a monthly basis (every 10 RL days).
To make a bid, participants would post the following items:
- The commodity offered
- The price offered, in TM (Travel Minutes) per hour or in TM (Travel Minutes) per item
- The number of travel hours, or the quantity of goods, that are available at that price
- The avatar name - Sunset Express rank if any
- If there are any ties, the contract from the previous month will determine the order
Travel Time is accumulated at 1 Hour per TeppyHour when you are off-line. If you have your chores set for exclusively for Travel Time, you will accumulate 240 hours per game month. You can use it up much more quickly, of course, but 240 hours per month is our reference point. In a very real sense, the Sunset Express delivery service a means for tranferring wealth from hard core players to casual playsers and, conversely, delivers are a means by which hard core players can purchase more Travel Time.
For simplicity, we will show typical bids only for standard delivery services, and we'll pretend that folks made exactly the same bids both months.
Prices for Year 4, Shemu IV
| Commodity | Price in TM | Quantity | Avatar Name - Rank |
| Same Day Delivery | 40 | 70 | Member2 - Initiate |
| Same Day Delivery | 43 | 10 | Member4 - Kinsman |
| Same Day Delivery | 43 | 50 | Member1 - Kinsman |
| Same Day Delivery | 46 | 20 | Member3 - Initiate |
| Same Day Delivery | 48 | 80 | Seshat - Elder |
| Same Day Deliver | 48 | 175 | This is the Clearing Price and Quantity |
| Same Day Delivery | 58 | 25 | Balthazarr - Elder |
| Same Day Delivery | 65 | 20 | MarvL - Elder |
| Same Day Delivery | 120 | 10 | Quizzical - Elder |
Observations
- Every runner, even those who bid lower, will get 48 TM (Trade Minutes) per hour for their deliveries.
- Seshat will only get 25 of the 80 hours she has available, unless none of the lower bidders are around when a delivery is available. She was on a long business trip, so she has hours to burn, but her bid was a little too high.
- Quizzical is willing to make deliveries, but only if nobody else is available, so his offered price is very high.
- The price offered to customers will still be 60 TM (Travel Minutes) per hour (that's comfortably close to 48 TM), so the guild will be able to increase their raw material inventories next month.
Bids for Year 4, Shemu V
Egypt Time is currently:
| Commodity | Price in TM | Quantity | Avatar Name - Rank |
| Same Day Delivery | 65 | 20 | MarvL - Elder |
| Same Day Delivery | 120 | 10 | Quizzical - Elder |
| Same Day Delivery | 46 | 20 | Member3 - Initiate |
| Same Day Delivery | 43 | 10 | Member4 - Kinsman |
| Same Day Delivery | 58 | 25 | Balthazarr - Elder |
| Same Day Delivery | 48 | 80 | Seshat - Elder |
| Same Day Delivery | 43 | 50 | Member1 - Kinsman |
| Same Day Delivery | 40 | 70 | Member2 - Initiate |
Observations
The bids will be closed at some random time during the last 3 days of the month (24 RL hours), usually when we happen to get around to it, but we will attempt to trap you if it seems that you're posting artificial bids and then changing them at the last moment. Remember, the wiki logs all entries in sequence, so it's easy to decipher posting patterns.
Clearing Quantities for Year 4, Shemu V
| Procurement Commodity | Clearing Quantity |
| Charcoal | 4000 |
| Copper | 500 |
| Cuttable Amythest | 200 |
| Cuttable Garnet | 150 |
| Cuttable Lapis | 100 |
| Cuttable Turquoise | 300 |
| GoodScript | 0 |
| Iron | 2500 |
| Lime | 1500 |
| Potash | 3000 |
| Same Day Delivery | 175 |
| Urgent Delivery | 40 |
Related Pages
- Return to Sunset Express.
- Private Sunset Express wiki.