Armorsmith Archive
Thread: Discussion of vendor changes
As TH said yesterday, it sounds like the Devs are planning on raising the limits. Hopefully they'll push them up into somewhere around the 4-500 per vendor area, but we'll just have to wait and see.
JaatoWaals wrote:I'd like to start a single thread to consolidate the discussion on vendor changes. Please keep the discussion civil. The three major points are:1. Allowing only those that currently have merchant skills to actually have vendors (i.e.: if you want to have a vendor, other than the bulky box unit from the Business line, you have to have and retain merchant skills).2. Imposing item limits, dependant on business/merchant skills. My own thoughts on this are that the proposed limits are a bit too low, but I have little sympathy for those of you with 10k+ items spread across your vendors. Limits in the 2-3k range seem much more reasonable to me.3. The other features of the change- empty vendors not showing up on the map and being deleted after a period of time, etc.Just one note- currently on TC backpacks count as a single item against the limit, no matter how full they are. This should help alleviate the concerns of those of you who sell full suits in packs.
I think SOE wants most crafters to become pure manufacturers. Increasing specialization among smiths, reducing the volume of armor on the market and turning merchants into retailers as opposed to something you pick up to sell what you make. This update seems consistent in the "grouping vision" the devs want to encourage. I guess they see it as not just for combat. I can't speak for everyone else but there's no way I'm dropping combat to just concentrate on Selling what i make. If more people actually take up merchant just to resell this could actually be more efficient than being a one toon operation. I know most people hate the concept of not being in total control but I think it has promise.
Message Edited by Yoshiie on 08-10-2004 09:33 AM
- Hurts the customer that just needs 1 part , now they need to buy a full suit
- They will need to add a function to look into the bag, otherwise we will have those 1 or 2 merchants ripping customers off by selling a backpack that is empty but is labelled as a full suit.
I'd also like to be able to put a crate of something on my vendor and just have the customer choose how many they wish to purchase. A lot of other crafting types want this also.
I totally agree that people without any merchant skills shouldn't have vendors, if I drop TK, I won't have unarmed 3, though it would be nice.
While I currently only have around 100 items on each of my vendors, I think the new limits are absurd. Most Master AS's are making 3-4 different types of comp, stun, electric, etc. At 9 pieces per full set, it adds up quickly. And if they are making ubese, that adds even more
to the vendor. These numbers are unbelievable, it's almost as if Devs have no concept of what happens in the game. If these limits go into effect, prices are going to skyrocket, on everything, not just armor. It will destroy the economy, and ultimately, it will caue a lot of people to quit playing.
As far as deleting empty vendors, yes please. I am so tired of going on a hunt for food, or weapons or whatever and finding empty vendor, it frustrates me to no end.
Hopefully, the huge uproar will bring them to their senses.
All I got
My sole problem with this is the limits on the number of items for sale especially at master merchant level. I know these numbers will be raised by the time it goes live but I do hope dramatically. Due to the skill point requirement I’ve dropped smuggler altogether (pre sliced armor is a HUGE seller) in favor of mastering merchant, I also refuse to give up survey in the artisan tree in order to keep slicing 4. Currently on one vendor I’m loading up ~250 suits of composite in preparation for taking a 2 week vacation out of the country with no internet access which equates to roughly 2250 items on 1 vendor alone. I never liked the idea of bagged armor as I want the customer to be able to see what they are buying and not pray they are getting the proper items. I’ve tried bags before and people 6 times out of 10 will buy full suits in pieces rather then a mystery bag. Quite a great deal of my business is repeat customers and PA’s stocking up and have decided to stock crated composite for them, however not everyone is going to want to buy 5 or more of a single item at once. This only accounts for 1 vendor, I have another which I consistently try to keep stocked with around 1000 Imperial PSG’s of both base and energy flavors that sell very well and quickly (again PA use mostly) singles, 5’s 10’s 20’s you get the point. Several others as well.
With a drastic change such as this not only will I not be able to stock in this manner in the future but essentially will never be able to walk away from the game to take a vacation such as the one I’m preparing for. In the last few weeks since I’ve moved my shop I’ve sold anywhere from 5-20 full suits daily and am repeatedly thanked for keeping a large quantity on hand as some players chew up a suit in a day, some even less.
I do not wish to cater to the rich players or special orders only and am not trying to be the best smith with the best product, simply provide to the masses a quality product that is available 99.99% of the time. With this proposed change no crafter even with master merchant will be able to take an evening off for recreation of any kind. Personally, I do not wish the be tethered to SWG 24 hours a day in order to keep inventory available and I refuse to spam in star ports for business.
If the developers wish to create a real solution to this problem in the case of Armor smiths, Weapon smiths, and several other crafting professions (tailor is going to be very hard pressed no matter what) create an automatic restocking system wherein if an item is sold the vendor will restock itself from factory crates at a merchant set price.
Beyond this I have no problems with the merchant revamp; however I would suggest making the middle 2 skill trees more viable and useful. 3-0-0-4 should be all you need however out of fear of events to come I’m picking the rest of it up.
Just my thoughts, as long winded as they are.
Edited for typo
Message Edited by NiBorg on 08-10-2004 01:34 PM
Yoshiie wrote:
How about a Master crafting profession gets an additional +500 regardless of their mechant skill? If you were a Master Armosmith and had had say, Biz 4, who will say would have a 250 max item, you could hold +750 items. (picking random #s for example)This way it will give the serious crafter a bonus for sales and deter the use of storeroom for the randomn person who only uses it to hold their looted peices.
Just an idea. Talk amoung yourselves.,,
Tecar
good idea. numbers could use tweaking, but that would help.
JaatoWaals wrote:
Just one note- currently on TC backpacks count as a single item against the limit, no matter how full they are. This should help alleviate the concerns of those of you who sell full suits in packs.
How sure are we that this will remain so though? If the main reason to impose vendor limits is to stop people using vendors as storage then it doesn't make sense to let backpacks remain as it is, as it means that a person with Business 3 can still put 2500 items on their vendor, even if it is more trouble doing so. The only ones that will suffer are people who sell singles then, like weaponsmiths and tailors. A master merchant could store 33000 items, which while not infinite sure isn't a little.
If on the other hand backpacks don't count as just one item then it swings over the other way, and it becomes worst for armorsmiths who sell 9 pieces to sell one suit. It'd mean 10 suits of armor per vendor.
I just don't see how they can reconcile these two things; either people will still use vendors for storage or we can't sell armor much.
Message Edited by Tuanga on 08-10-2004 02:09 PM