An advanced guide for War Era players – how to organise an entire nation to take control of a market, crash its supply, and resell at inflated prices.
A market corner is a wartime economic strategy: a nation coordinates its citizens to systematically buy up all available supply of a given good on the Trading Market, emptying it entirely. Once the good has disappeared from the listings, players who need it are forced to buy it from the organising country's sellers, who in the meantime have relisted everything at double the original price or more.
It works in War Era because the market is completely player-driven: there are no fixed prices or NPCs that rebalance supply. If you buy all available Bread, Bread simply ceases to exist until someone produces more. And producing takes time.
The goal isn't just profit — it's to militarily and economically wear down the enemy country, depriving it of resources essential for fighting or expanding.
Not all markets are equally manipulable. The key is finding goods with low supply, high demand, and slow or difficult production. Here are the criteria to evaluate:
First of all, estimate how many items are currently listed. A market with 50,000 units of Grain requires enormous capital to empty. One with 200 Pills is far more attackable. Opening the Trading Market and looking at the sell order list immediately gives you an idea of the volume to buy out.
How quickly do producers put new stock back on sale? Goods with a long production chain (many raw materials required, many Production Points) reproduce slowly. Example: 1 Pill requires 200 Mysterious Plants and 200 PP — emptying the Pill market and waiting for it to refill takes hours, giving the corner operation all the time it needs.
The more a good is required for critical game functions, the more painful the corner is for the enemy. Bread and Steak are used to recover Health (fighting), ammunition is used to increase damage in battle, Oil is needed to keep military structures active. A corner on luxury goods scares no one; a corner on Bread during a war can be devastating.
If a good is produced by only a few companies on the server (producers concentrated in a handful of countries), the market empties quickly and refills slowly. If every nation has dozens of Grain companies, refilling the market is a matter of minutes.
Based on the game's mechanics, here are the goods ranked from easiest to hardest to manipulate:
Why it's the best: producing just 1 Pill costs 200 Mysterious Plants and 200 Production Points. Mysterious Plants are a rare raw material, not ubiquitous like Grain. The number of companies producing Pills on the server is usually very low. The Pill market tends to have few active sell orders, so the total cost to empty it is limited.
Impact on the enemy: Pills give +60% damage in battle for 8 hours. A country deprived of them in the middle of a war loses an enormous combat advantage.
Strategy: monitor the Pill market for a few days. If you see that there are never more than 50–100 units on sale at any one time, it's an attackable market. Coordinate with 5–10 players, each buying a share, and within minutes the market is empty.
Why it works: ammunition is produced from Lead (raw material) and Production Points at a 1:1 ratio. It seems easy to produce, but during war the demand for ammunition explodes, and supply struggles to keep up. A corner on ammunition during an active conflict is the most effective moment to strike.
Impact on the enemy: without ammunition, players cannot equip it in battle, losing +10% (Light), +20% (Ammo), or +30% (Heavy) to damage. In close battles it can make the difference between winning and losing.
Strategy: target Heavy Ammo preferably, as it is rarer and more expensive to produce. Empty the market 30–60 minutes before a planned battle against the enemy country.
Why it works: Oil is produced from Petroleum at a 1:1 ratio, making it relatively cheap. However, its consumption is continuous and mandatory to keep Bunkers and Military Bases active. If the enemy country can't buy Oil, its structures automatically deactivate, losing their defence (+5% to +25%) and attack (+5% to +25%) bonuses.
Strategy: this corner is more useful as long-term attrition rather than an instant strike. Buy all available Oil and relist it at 2–3x the price. The enemy government is forced to spend more to maintain its structures, draining the national treasury.
Why it's risky: Grain is produced by almost every country (every new player receives a free Grain company), so the market refills quickly. Emptying it requires a lot of capital and resupply is fast.
When it's worth it: if the enemy nation has no Grain deposits in its regions (no +30% production bonus), its production is slower. In that case, a Bread corner can work.
Impact: Bread restores 10 Health per unit. A country that can't find Bread has to slow its combat pace, because it can't regenerate health fast enough.
These materials are used for long-term upgrades (companies, buildings, military units). Demand is less urgent and predictable. A corner here creates no immediate pressure. It can make sense in preparation for an enemy expansion phase, blocking their industrial development, but it requires a large investment for slow results.
Open the Trading Market every day at the same time and record the available volume of the chosen good.
Calculate the average cost to fully empty the market (units available × average price).
Identify where the good is being produced: if most of the sellers belong to the target country, the corner will have a double effect (you deprive them of the goods AND the profit).
The government launches a coordinated call via Discord/chat: every citizen contributes a share of currency.
Ideally, raise funds slightly above the estimated cost to have a safety margin.
Designate 5–15 "buyer" players who will execute purchases simultaneously. It's better to spread purchases across multiple accounts to avoid alerting the enemy with a single massive buyer.
All buyers enter the Trading Market at the same moment (coordinated on Discord with a countdown).
They buy everything available at any price, starting from the lowest listings.
Once the raid is complete, nobody resells immediately: wait at least 1–2 hours for the enemy to notice the scarcity.
Players relist the good at 2x the original price (or more, depending on enemy urgency).
It's recommended not to put everything back on sale at once, but in batches, to prolong the pressure.
If the enemy doesn't buy, wait. Their need will grow over time, especially if a battle is underway.
As soon as new sell orders appear at normal prices (new producers entering the market), buy them immediately to maintain the monopoly.
This requires a "market watcher": a dedicated player who monitors the Trading Market and buys back every underpriced new listing.
The target country won't stand idle. Here are the typical counter-moves and how to neutralise them:
They increase internal production: the reaction time is still hours. If the corner is executed before a battle, the damage is already done.
They import from allied countries: monitor prices on the target's allies' markets too. If you see low prices there, expand the corner to those markets as well if you have enough funds.
They sell below your price: impossible if you've emptied the entire market. Only new production can do that, and it takes time.
They declare war to disrupt your trading: theoretically possible, but declaring war just to break a corner is politically costly for them.
The corner is reversible: if the target nation mobilises enough producers, the market refills. The effect is temporary, so it must be exploited at critical moments (during an active war, before a revolt, etc.).
Real returns: if the corner works, the resale profit often covers the entire cost of the operation, making it financially neutral or even positive for the national treasury.
This strategy is completely legal in the game — it is exactly the kind of economic warfare War Era was designed for.