Quote Originally Posted by Bojay1997 View Post
Again, this is absolutely correct. People who claim sniping gets them cheaper wins or some other advantage seem to have some mental picture of either a bidder that is too stupid to bid what they really are willing to pay for something or not aware of sniping or last minute bids and who just bids once and only bids in response to getting outbid. In my experience at least in bidding on video games, neither bidder really exists or if they do, there's always several other people who outbid them anyway long before they become the deciding factor in the final auction price. Some people snipe and some people bid huge amounts from the get go. Either way, if someone bids more than I am willing to go, they win the item.

I recall trying to explain this to my dad the first time he used Ebay to bid on some coins last year and he just couldn't get over the fact that if "he had only bid another dollar", he could have won the item he was bidding on. Once I explained to him that you never can be sure what the other bidders or snipers maximum bid really is and that while they had technically only paid one more dollar than his maximum bid, if he had bid another dollar, he still probably wouldn't have won, he seemed to understand it a lot better. Unfortunately, it looks like some fellow collectors still don't get how Ebay auctions work if they believe that sniping somehow gives anyone an edge or results in paying less for everything. If you're winning with sniping, that's awesome, but you're still bidding and paying more than anyone else that bid on the item within the time limit of that particular auction, so you're not exactly getting away with anything.
Never said I was getting away with anything or that others don't know just giving others less time to react thus having a chance (not a safe bet but a chance) to get an action for less. It's not like I'm putting a $2K bid down on Super Mario in the last few seconds just to win, it's always a bid that I'm willing to pay if it's maxed out. If I put my absolute max bid down the first day there a chance someone like your Dad coming along and saying "just one more dollar and I'll win" till it happens, I'd rather just let them think they have it won and at the last few seconds put my bid in and not give them time to bid one more dollar. I don't see how its that hard to understand.