auction

Purpose: place an item on the public auction block; or find out the status of the current auction
Synonyms: none
NLP Enabled? yes

USE:

1. Use form one to learn the status of the current auction, or to see if there is one currently in progress.
2. Use form two to place an item on the public auction block. The <thing> you're auctioning must be in your inventory — that is, it has to be in your possession, but you can't be wearing or holding it. There's no need to set a start price for the bidding: the Auctioneer will handle that for you. NOTE that once you place an item on auction, there's no undoing that action: the item is automatically removed from your inventory as soon as it's accepted by the Auctioneer. Note also you may or may not be allowed to bid to retrieve it: this is up to the discretion of the Auctioneer, and different ones enforce different policies.
3. Use form three or four when you have many instances of <thing> in your inventory, and you want to auction one of them in particular. <thing> must be identifiable by <specifier>.
4. Use form three or four when you have many instances of <thing> in your inventory, and you want to auction one of them in particular. <thing> must be identifiable by <specifier>.
5. Use form five when you have many instances of <thing> in your inventory, and you want to auction one of them in particular.

The Auction command places your items onto the block in real time. That is, while you're online watching it happen. There's an alternative way to place items into long-term auctions, which can happen even when you're logged out. This MOTD explains.

Because the command is enabled for "natural language" parsing, you can use all kinds of variations and still be understood. "Auction the third ring", "auction my blue shirt", "auction a short sword", "auction an otter pop", "auction 2.ring" and many others will all do fine.