So, the basic idea is this. It starts at 1 cent, or 1 rupee, in this case. Bids may ONLY be raised by one rupee, but the bidder must pay the auction holder, say, 50 rupees every bid in order for the bid to be valid. Items could go much cheaper, and I think the community would like doing this. It would be a sub forum for it, and not be rejected. Thoughts? Example: http://empireminecraft.com/threads/penny-auction-dc-of-stone.21450/#post-394415
It can be hard enough to get the winner of the auction to pay you. I think it would be a pain to receive the correct number of rupees from each person who bids. Besides, it artificially changes the value of the good(s). That's not necessarily bad, but this just doesn't seem like something that would add to the community. Now, you may be thinking that this would only affect those who participate in penny auctions. But that's not really true. If penny auctions were an option, a significant percentage of auctions would switch to this type. Obviously, it takes more skill/discretion to bid in a penny auction than a regular one. But we don't want to make it harder for people to buy goods, we want to make it easier. Also, it would make it more difficult to find auctions for a given item, since you'd have to search both the regular and the penny auction forums. Still, the effect wouldn't be very big. If a large number of people want penny auctions, I wouldn't mind.
Since we can make our own rules about starting bids, bid increases, and end times, I don't see a problem with it theoretically. Unless it was automated, we would have to rely on the Auctioneer or Staff to verify whether a bid is valid or not, while simutaneously having new people bid. A valid/invalid bid could affect a whole chain of bids after it, leaving the Auctioneer or Staff to clean up by refunding a Rupees to everyone afterwards. Some people have a hard time just running a basic auction properly, so I suspect that the potential headaches for the Staff that an Auction like this might cause is enough reason for them to not allow them.
