Hogfather [330973] —
Original article
Lawyers, give em' an inch and they'll bring a city to it's knees. With the release of Ranked Warring, they've taken that inch and turned it into a country mile. I hear you need a spy?
"View another player’s battle stats.”
Spies are one of the oldest abilities in the game. Back in Torn's early days, the ability to discover your opponent's battle stats was a really powerful tool. But over much of the past decade, spies have become less of a necessity, as there are few situations where you need to know the precise value of someone's dexterity, defense, strength, and speed.
As a result, the demand for stat spies diminished, as did the value of this service. And then Ranked Warring went live, and suddenly, spies were in demand again… Big demand.
I, Spy
For those who haven't purchased them before, Spies cost 10-15 job points a time, and while they can be performed by 5* TV Network employees for 15 points, most are provided by 3* Law Firm workers for a lower cost of 10 points. There are far more employees within TV Networks than Law Firms at the time of writing (2,065 to 339), but TV employees benefit more from spending their job points on faction respect and special privileges, whereas Spies are the only job point special available at the Law Firm.
The use of a spy against a player does not guarantee that you will obtain a full list of their battle stats - far from it, in fact. The exact chance of success is not known to the public, but it is commonly accepted that sometimes you'll only receive one or two stat results per spy. On some occasions, players whose luck has run out have had to use five spies to get the full list!
Because spies can be unreliable, those who provide them charge a flat fee for a full set, rather than charging per attempt like some revivers do. Before Ranked Warring, a spy would cost $1m or 1 Xanax, but this price was often discounted for bulk orders, further driving down the price of this service. For a time, spies were one of the worst things to sell in the game, and my last bulk set of spy sales offers a useful (if somewhat small scale) example of the numbers involved:
Total spies ordered: 27
Total attempts required: 44
Full reports on first attempt: 12
Total job points used: 440
Time to earn job points: 44 days
By selling spies at 1 Xanax per full report, I would have received 27 Xanax for this work, which works out at 0.61 Xanax per player - potentially less if I was giving my buyer a bulk discount. These job points were earned by working for 44 days in a 10* Law Firm, effectively earning me a bonus of 0.61 Xanax per day. Now can you see why nobody joins a Law Firm to sell spies?
Until now.
The Price of Demand
For the past decade, it's been hard for players to sell spies above the typical asking price, and the reasons for this are twofold. First, unlike other skills such as Hunting, Racing, and Reviving, the art of the spy does not rely on a personal stat score. This means that every player has the same chance of getting a full set of stat results, hence the lack of variation in spy prices.
The second reason prices have remained steady is that there haven't been any developments to justify factions keeping regular, updated records of their opponents. Other than the Insurgency war, I struggle to think of an example of a time when multiple factions needed to know the precise stats of their rivals to gain a tactical advantage, especially one where the number of factions involved hit double digits.
Ranked Warring has changed that, with some factions now needing such information on an almost weekly basis. The result is that many law firms are running out of job points, and for the first time in years, spies almost ran out!
Pictured: Most spies in Torn look like this, except with more stains and holes in their jackets.
After placing a freedom of information request to Lord Chedburn, I was able to discover the total number of spies performed by citizens working in the Army, Law, and TV Companies on a weekly basis from January 11th, 2021 to March 7th, 2022.
Larger Link
If that date-based graph isn't easy to digest, let's label in some key events to try and work out what's going on.
Larger Link
At the start of 2021, there's an early spike caused by the Valentine's Day event, a time when most Factions are chaining heavily. Outside of one or two anomalous weeks (feel free to mail in your explanations if you have them), the number of spies being performed is quite constant, and it's not until we get to the end of the year that the data gets really interesting.
The week beginning October 25th saw the biggest demand of 2021 up to that point, with 5,205 spies performed over a seven-day period. This week marked the beginning of the Halloween event, during which we also saw combat records broken, hence why a lot of spies were performed during this time.
During the week beginning December 6th, Ranked Warring was released, and Torn's demand for information returned with 5,730 spies performed. But the following week saw this total annihilated, as when the restrictions were lifted and more factions were matched we saw a phenomenal 9,430 total spies used! This remains a record according to the dataset we have going back to the beginning of 2021.
While the number of spies does drop considerably over Christmas - a time when most factions ease up off war modes - the arrival of January sees spy demand return to the levels we saw during Halloween. This is also the first period where we are able to compare the number of spies committed in 2022 against those committed in the same time period for 2021, and while the data set is quite small, it does give us an indication of where things are heading.
Week 1 is actually Week beginning January 11th, as due to the nature of the data sets provided it is hard to match up the numbers perfectly. What we have here are the first 8 weeks of the year beginning January 11th, 2021, and I've matched up as best I can the numbers from the same period in 2022. In terms of dates, it's off by 1 day. Here's a weekly comparison of the raw numbers.
In the first eight weeks of the year, demand for spies has risen by almost 55% compared to 2021. The average number of spies performed per week was 2,898 during 2021. This year, the average is 5,345.
How the Market Responded
Within the first couple of days of Ranked Warring, those of us working in Law Firms began to notice that something was up. Whereas we'd usually receive one or two spy requests per fortnight, now we were being inundated with 3-5 requests per day!
It wasn't uncommon for a faction leader to contact someone in a law firm asking us to spy on their ranked warring opponents, only for those same opponents to send us an identical request soon after. Most firms were quite slow to realise what was happening, and many of the trade threads advertising spies at $1m or 1 Xanax were suddenly edited to say they were sold out.
However, as is the way with lawyers, a few did catch on pretty quickly, and their rates increased by an incredible level. At the peak of demand, several players were able to sell full stat reports for an unprecedented $5m per report, and one went as high as $5.5m. If you managed to sell one for even more, please let me know!
Pictured: Supply and Demand in 5.5m reasons.
The price then stabilised at around 4 Xanax per full report, but this is still four times the old price. Remember my earlier example of how much I would have been paid under the old pricing? At 4 Xanax per report, that equates to 2.45 Xanax per full spy, compared to 0.61 before. And yet despite this huge price leap, it seems that everyone found buyers, judging by how quickly the sellers closed their threads.
Pictured: "4m for Spies? I'll take the lot!"
Suddenly, the spy special doesn't look that bad anymore.
Who is Buying and Why?
As is the case with most commodities, it is commonly thought that the demand and price of spies have been driven upwards by HOF factions with huge war chests. We've already seen that careful planning and early activity during a ranked war is vital to achieving victory, and a well-prepared underdog can sometimes cause an upset if their fighters are sufficiently well-informed.
Being able to show your entire roster who they can potentially defeat before the fight starts gives factions a crucial tactical advantage. But it's not just the rich kids who are buying up data, as many factions outside of the upper echelons are also willing to spend a small fortune to obtain the battle stats of their opponents.
Some of these factions have less than half the stats of a top 10 HoF faction and have probably chained as if their lives depended on it without ever being able to achieve a 10k. They also likely have few players (if any) with a 60 Natural Nerve Bar, and can only dream of one day being able to pull off a successful PA. In most respects, their ambitions are a lot lower than those who occupy the top of the HoF.
But thanks to the return of Ranked Warring, these factions now have an opportunity to fight a team of their own level and earn big. Even if they lose, so long as they turn up and make a reasonable effort, factions can at least take home several hundred million dollars worth of rewards - and that prize can potentially quadruple depending on the cache type.
The rewards on offer make it more than worthwhile for factions of any level to spend that extra money on a set of stat spies. And for those factions whose leadership thinks "There's a chance we could actually win this ranked war" that initial asking price of 3 or 4 Xanax for a full set of battle stats no longer seems like such a terrible deal. Not when the top prize is a potential $1-4 billion.
The Era of Expensive Spies?
I think it's safe to say that, barring an unprecedented change to Ranked Warring, the highs of $5m per spy are unlikely to return. But unless you find someone who is desperate for cash, I don't think we're likely to see spies as low as $1m per full report for a long time.
The early indications are that the demand for spies is much higher than it was prior to ranked warring going live. But now that the initial excitement and buzz has died down, the going rate for a spy appears to be 2 or 3 Xanax per full set, depending on how busy the seller is, how much they like you, and whether or not you're getting a bulk discount.
This demand is likely to increase in the short term, as more factions enter Silver and Gold ranks, and some choose to artificially extend their war periods to try and corner the market on top-tier items. This, in turn, is going to create small pockets of demand, with Ranked Warring activity ebbing and flowing throughout the year, causing the price of spies to fluctuate in the way that other Torn commodities are influenced during periods of war or special events.
Another reason that prices will likely remain high is the increased power held by spy sellers now that their services are in heavy demand. I predict that you might see some Law Firm employees holding off selling until clearly identifiable war periods are in full swing, in order to gain the best price during a period of heightened demand. It may even come to the point that the spy ability joins reviving, and we see an individual skill on profiles to potentially create a market and competition from sellers.
Eventually, when the contents of ranked warring caches become more readily available, the demand for spies will decrease along with participation in ranked wars. But this isn't predicted to happen for a long, long time - if it ever actually does - as top-tier weapons will always be in demand so long as there are people playing Torn.
And yet, if you've made it to the end of this and are considering joining a law firm to try and sell spies, I still wouldn't advise it. Spying, even with the increase in fees, remains a poor source of income, and this will only become truer as more people enter the profession. Those of us who have worked in Law Firms for a long time are glad for the increased profits, but we all know that things can change quickly in Torn City.
Because if they didn't, people wouldn't need spies in the first place.
Spies are one of the oldest abilities in the game. Back in Torn's early days, the ability to discover your opponent's battle stats was a really powerful tool. But over much of the past decade, spies have become less of a necessity, as there are few situations where you need to know the precise value of someone's dexterity, defense, strength, and speed.
As a result, the demand for stat spies diminished, as did the value of this service. And then Ranked Warring went live, and suddenly, spies were in demand again… Big demand.
I, Spy
For those who haven't purchased them before, Spies cost 10-15 job points a time, and while they can be performed by 5* TV Network employees for 15 points, most are provided by 3* Law Firm workers for a lower cost of 10 points. There are far more employees within TV Networks than Law Firms at the time of writing (2,065 to 339), but TV employees benefit more from spending their job points on faction respect and special privileges, whereas Spies are the only job point special available at the Law Firm.
The use of a spy against a player does not guarantee that you will obtain a full list of their battle stats - far from it, in fact. The exact chance of success is not known to the public, but it is commonly accepted that sometimes you'll only receive one or two stat results per spy. On some occasions, players whose luck has run out have had to use five spies to get the full list!
Because spies can be unreliable, those who provide them charge a flat fee for a full set, rather than charging per attempt like some revivers do. Before Ranked Warring, a spy would cost $1m or 1 Xanax, but this price was often discounted for bulk orders, further driving down the price of this service. For a time, spies were one of the worst things to sell in the game, and my last bulk set of spy sales offers a useful (if somewhat small scale) example of the numbers involved:
Total spies ordered: 27
Total attempts required: 44
Full reports on first attempt: 12
Total job points used: 440
Time to earn job points: 44 days
By selling spies at 1 Xanax per full report, I would have received 27 Xanax for this work, which works out at 0.61 Xanax per player - potentially less if I was giving my buyer a bulk discount. These job points were earned by working for 44 days in a 10* Law Firm, effectively earning me a bonus of 0.61 Xanax per day. Now can you see why nobody joins a Law Firm to sell spies?
Until now.
The Price of Demand
For the past decade, it's been hard for players to sell spies above the typical asking price, and the reasons for this are twofold. First, unlike other skills such as Hunting, Racing, and Reviving, the art of the spy does not rely on a personal stat score. This means that every player has the same chance of getting a full set of stat results, hence the lack of variation in spy prices.
The second reason prices have remained steady is that there haven't been any developments to justify factions keeping regular, updated records of their opponents. Other than the Insurgency war, I struggle to think of an example of a time when multiple factions needed to know the precise stats of their rivals to gain a tactical advantage, especially one where the number of factions involved hit double digits.
Ranked Warring has changed that, with some factions now needing such information on an almost weekly basis. The result is that many law firms are running out of job points, and for the first time in years, spies almost ran out!
Pictured: Most spies in Torn look like this, except with more stains and holes in their jackets.
After placing a freedom of information request to Lord Chedburn, I was able to discover the total number of spies performed by citizens working in the Army, Law, and TV Companies on a weekly basis from January 11th, 2021 to March 7th, 2022.
If that date-based graph isn't easy to digest, let's label in some key events to try and work out what's going on.
Larger Link
At the start of 2021, there's an early spike caused by the Valentine's Day event, a time when most Factions are chaining heavily. Outside of one or two anomalous weeks (feel free to mail in your explanations if you have them), the number of spies being performed is quite constant, and it's not until we get to the end of the year that the data gets really interesting.
The week beginning October 25th saw the biggest demand of 2021 up to that point, with 5,205 spies performed over a seven-day period. This week marked the beginning of the Halloween event, during which we also saw combat records broken, hence why a lot of spies were performed during this time.
During the week beginning December 6th, Ranked Warring was released, and Torn's demand for information returned with 5,730 spies performed. But the following week saw this total annihilated, as when the restrictions were lifted and more factions were matched we saw a phenomenal 9,430 total spies used! This remains a record according to the dataset we have going back to the beginning of 2021.
While the number of spies does drop considerably over Christmas - a time when most factions ease up off war modes - the arrival of January sees spy demand return to the levels we saw during Halloween. This is also the first period where we are able to compare the number of spies committed in 2022 against those committed in the same time period for 2021, and while the data set is quite small, it does give us an indication of where things are heading.
Week 1 is actually Week beginning January 11th, as due to the nature of the data sets provided it is hard to match up the numbers perfectly. What we have here are the first 8 weeks of the year beginning January 11th, 2021, and I've matched up as best I can the numbers from the same period in 2022. In terms of dates, it's off by 1 day. Here's a weekly comparison of the raw numbers.
In the first eight weeks of the year, demand for spies has risen by almost 55% compared to 2021. The average number of spies performed per week was 2,898 during 2021. This year, the average is 5,345.
How the Market Responded
Within the first couple of days of Ranked Warring, those of us working in Law Firms began to notice that something was up. Whereas we'd usually receive one or two spy requests per fortnight, now we were being inundated with 3-5 requests per day!
It wasn't uncommon for a faction leader to contact someone in a law firm asking us to spy on their ranked warring opponents, only for those same opponents to send us an identical request soon after. Most firms were quite slow to realise what was happening, and many of the trade threads advertising spies at $1m or 1 Xanax were suddenly edited to say they were sold out.
However, as is the way with lawyers, a few did catch on pretty quickly, and their rates increased by an incredible level. At the peak of demand, several players were able to sell full stat reports for an unprecedented $5m per report, and one went as high as $5.5m. If you managed to sell one for even more, please let me know!
Pictured: Supply and Demand in 5.5m reasons.
Pictured: "4m for Spies? I'll take the lot!"
Suddenly, the spy special doesn't look that bad anymore.
As is the case with most commodities, it is commonly thought that the demand and price of spies have been driven upwards by HOF factions with huge war chests. We've already seen that careful planning and early activity during a ranked war is vital to achieving victory, and a well-prepared underdog can sometimes cause an upset if their fighters are sufficiently well-informed.
Pictured: One of the many clients I've had since R.W.
Some of these factions have less than half the stats of a top 10 HoF faction and have probably chained as if their lives depended on it without ever being able to achieve a 10k. They also likely have few players (if any) with a 60 Natural Nerve Bar, and can only dream of one day being able to pull off a successful PA. In most respects, their ambitions are a lot lower than those who occupy the top of the HoF.
But thanks to the return of Ranked Warring, these factions now have an opportunity to fight a team of their own level and earn big. Even if they lose, so long as they turn up and make a reasonable effort, factions can at least take home several hundred million dollars worth of rewards - and that prize can potentially quadruple depending on the cache type.
The rewards on offer make it more than worthwhile for factions of any level to spend that extra money on a set of stat spies. And for those factions whose leadership thinks "There's a chance we could actually win this ranked war" that initial asking price of 3 or 4 Xanax for a full set of battle stats no longer seems like such a terrible deal. Not when the top prize is a potential $1-4 billion.
The Era of Expensive Spies?
I think it's safe to say that, barring an unprecedented change to Ranked Warring, the highs of $5m per spy are unlikely to return. But unless you find someone who is desperate for cash, I don't think we're likely to see spies as low as $1m per full report for a long time.
The early indications are that the demand for spies is much higher than it was prior to ranked warring going live. But now that the initial excitement and buzz has died down, the going rate for a spy appears to be 2 or 3 Xanax per full set, depending on how busy the seller is, how much they like you, and whether or not you're getting a bulk discount.
This demand is likely to increase in the short term, as more factions enter Silver and Gold ranks, and some choose to artificially extend their war periods to try and corner the market on top-tier items. This, in turn, is going to create small pockets of demand, with Ranked Warring activity ebbing and flowing throughout the year, causing the price of spies to fluctuate in the way that other Torn commodities are influenced during periods of war or special events.
Another reason that prices will likely remain high is the increased power held by spy sellers now that their services are in heavy demand. I predict that you might see some Law Firm employees holding off selling until clearly identifiable war periods are in full swing, in order to gain the best price during a period of heightened demand. It may even come to the point that the spy ability joins reviving, and we see an individual skill on profiles to potentially create a market and competition from sellers.
Eventually, when the contents of ranked warring caches become more readily available, the demand for spies will decrease along with participation in ranked wars. But this isn't predicted to happen for a long, long time - if it ever actually does - as top-tier weapons will always be in demand so long as there are people playing Torn.
And yet, if you've made it to the end of this and are considering joining a law firm to try and sell spies, I still wouldn't advise it. Spying, even with the increase in fees, remains a poor source of income, and this will only become truer as more people enter the profession. Those of us who have worked in Law Firms for a long time are glad for the increased profits, but we all know that things can change quickly in Torn City.
Because if they didn't, people wouldn't need spies in the first place.
Original article
Comments
Post a Comment