Artisan Archive
Thread: PETITION! Trading Terminals in cities that list items on player owned vendors!
I am an artisan and just became a novice chef. I probably will never have the points to become a merchant and thus own a vendor. Many crafters do become merchants and run very fancy vending machines in their stores. The planatary map display does show me where vendors are. When I'm looking for something, I do check the map. However, there aren't a lot of merchants, and thus it very sporatic on what I might find on the map. As you mentioned, you don't know if that vendor is empty when you go out there and in some cases you dont' even know who runs the store.
Being a merchant does ofer some advantages, as a class however it needs to offer a lot more. I'm sure those on the merchant forum are brainstorming on how to do this. I don't think any profession should have a monopoly, but they should have advantages. The merchant profession should offer something substatial for the points you must spend. Whether the pure merchant model should prevail, or something more modest I don't know. I think merchants and crafters should work together in bringing goods to market.
By current precedence already established by the DEV's, merchant skill gives advantages over other players on the Bazaar but it does prohibit non-merchants from placing items up for sale.
Under this new precedence, only merchants would be able to sell things.
My proposal is completely in-line with current established precedences. A system where everyone's items on everyone's vendors get listed. But merchant skill gives an advantage in the order items are listed. EXACTLY according to the precedence established by how the bazaar currently operates.
I won't concede my position that this new terminal be open acccess to everyone. And the merchants wont concede their demand that only their items get listed. I am willing to listen to ideas on how to give merchants advantages on this terminal but they wont have it. They demand a monopoly and exclusive listings. Worse, they are lobbying to get the game changed so that everyone is forced to either be a merchant or use a merchant as a middle man. The majority of the merchant crowd wants the game system to do their work for them.
At this point, I'm ignoring anyone who proposes that the listings be merchant only. Just not open to negotiation on that. Period. If you want to propose how merchants can be given an advantage, then reply and lets have a look at the idea. If you believe that only merchants should get their items listed, then don't reply. Just go away....
First off, the Merchant class is badly designed. You just throw up a vendor and the effortless exps start rolling in. Progress up the additional vendor line and the effortless exps roll in even faster. It's a bad design that's drawn the wrong sort to the profession in droves. The loafers, the lazy, the ones that want everything handed to them for no effort.
It needs to be changed in a drastic way. First off, merchants should only get exps for items actually bought and sold. And very little exps for buying items on a planet and then selling them on the very same planet. It should be a distance function. Let's say, buying bulk amount of copper from a miner on dantoonie then selling it to craftsmen on Rori should be a big exps payoff. It needs to be a function of the number of planet hops. Also, merchants advancement should be raised up to a level comparable with droid engineering advancement. In other words, make it a profession you actually have to work to succeed in. The way I see it, the merchant that does something like set up a shopping mall between Anchorhead and Bestine then spends most of his/her time traveling the planets to meet and buy in bulk products and resources to sell at that shop is the one who should advance and eventually make Master Merchant. Right now on Eclipse, most of your fighters are on Tatoonie and most of the weaponsmiths are on Naboo. The nich for merchants is already there.
Do you think I dare post that suggestion in the Merchant forum with that boat load of loafers that hang out there? You only think they screamed loudly at my terminal proposal, wait till they hear about this idea. They will be roaring like an earthquake.
Now, lets go over what the loafers on the Merchant forum want. They want everyone to be forced to use them as middle men. To come from all over the galaxy to make offers to their vendors and also travel there to purchase. They don't want to actually have to do anything or go anywhere themselves. They just want to sit on their arses and get as fat as Jabba the Hutt. So any idea that comes up, they demand it be "Merchant Only" regardless if its good for the game or not.
Your right. My proposal will kill the Jabba the Hutt type merchants. But it will actually help the traveling and work his/her arse off type merchant. It will help the aggressive merchant find supplies quicker and compare prices to get better rates. I've gotten a few responses from those type of merchants. They love the idea and have no problem at all with the open access to all. Those kind of merchants see the shuttle and starport pads more than they do their own shops. That's the type of player I am trying to help. The Jabba the Hutt type merchant, I have no respect for nor do I respect their demands.
Do you guys really think that if the Jabba the Hutt's get their demands and force everyone to either be or go through merchants to buy and sell that they will then be happy? Absolutely not. Next they will start in on restricting merchants to being pure merchants only. They wont like it that all the craftsment pick up merchant skills as a secondary profession to get around the new restrictions. You see, until they have everyone forced to make offers on their vendors or buy from their vendors while they sit on their butts, they wont every be happy. So they will go on and on lobbying and demanding that everything in the game be merchant only until they get their way.
If my idea above for merchant exps went it, most of those lazy bumbs will abandon the merchant profession. They are just too lazy to make an effort to get ahead.
Arden do you even READ the posts? Your not making any sense, have you even tryed to become a merchant? If it was as easy as you say I would be a master by now. But I am not I am a master Artisan and a weaponsmith who has two shops one on tattione one on corellia I am not what YOU call a jabba the hutt type merchant. I spend more credits on shuttle and starport tickets then anyone I know. Why? so I can reach a broader market I worked my way up the merchant tree earning the right to place my vendors on a planetary map, which isnt all that worthwhile, what your proposing is people who take no effort to become a merchant who take no effort to learn anything about a market have the ability to market planet wide. If thats not lazy I dont know what is. Your proposing that all lazy jackoffs who dont want to spend skill points to learn a proper trade still have the abilities of that trade. Your twofaced you say you dont like lazy people but your enabling lazy people to do what others had to spend skill points to do. Why dont you just say I want to sell my stuff to a wider market but I want to save my skill points for something else I dont want to waste skill points to become a merchant.
Taylon Vatic
Master Artisan
Weaponsmith
Merchant
Arden, you are in no position to make these demands. You have no support, not even here on the artisan boards. Im sure you will continue to troll around the different craft boards denouncing in one breath the "Greedy Merchants", and in the next complaining that "Merchants are gimped so dont work for us". I think, however, you will find that 1. SWG tradesfolk for the most part understand and are sympathetic to the plight of their fellow tradesmen and women and want to work towards a better system...we dont as a whole engage in the sort of rabel rousing and turf conflicts you are trying to incite 2. You have no support for said reasons. Stop trying to steal from other classes and lets work on fixing/improving our class. (I really want vehicles and Starships to come from our class hehe).
Arden you have got to be the most closed minded person I have ever met. Think for a minute please. Your asking for a ability to place your vendor for view on a planetary scale like the bazaar, Yet you seem to think that this massive ability to market to an entire planet should be able to be used by anyone even if they have no training as a merchent period. Now think about that for a minute how does that make any sort of logical sense? Now all I suggested is to put it at the top of the advertising tree replacing the ad 4 skill with some thing that is actually useful. So that if you wanted this ability you would have to train up that skill tree and only that skill tree. Like some crafters do by just going up the enigneering tree to get to the elite professions. AndArden just because some people dont agree with you doesnt make them wrong or selfish it just means that they have a different view than yours, calling them names isnt going to get you much support and wont give you much in the way of street credit.
Taylon Vatic
Master Artisan
Weaponsmith
Merchant
I am a Master Artisan and am a novice Merchant. While the having the terminals in the cities might help items sell better, its not really needed. I set up a shop about a 5 days ago, selling various items, and i have had many people buy from my vender. I didn't have to list my items anywhere special, i just had to find a good location for my shop.
The idea of having a trading terminal in the the city would be a helpful one, but i don't think that everyone with a vender should be able to have thier items listed. As it has been stated, this would destroy the merchant class. Why would you become a merchant if you could just list your items in some terminal anywhere on the planet?
What could be done with this idea is to have it as a skill added to the merchant class. This would maintain the usefullnesss of the merchant class and also not allow for everyone and everything being listed there. I know you have said thing about the monopoly of the merchant class and how it shouldn't be allowed, but have you stopped to think about what you are saying. Its the MERCHANT class, thats what they do, sell things. Wouldn't it make sense that they had an adavantage over everyone else when it comes to vendering and advertising their items?
Please, let me know your thoughts
As a Architect/Weaponsmith, I see no reason why this should be granted to anyone other than Merchants. Advertising is their domain and this is essentially advertising.
As far as the idea, I like it. Possibly link a vendor to an increasing number of cities based on skill starting at closest.
1) Vocalization
Cute. Lets you have your NPC vendors say something when people cruise on past, maybe catch their attention. First time I had a vendor tell me "that weapon looks rusty, maybe you could use a new one!" I was astounded. I've seen it used for a master weaponsmith to let people know they'll be banned from the store if they buy a huge number of the same high-quality high-demand item for slicing. I could see it being used to announce specials. Only useful once you're at the store.
2) Advanced Vocalization
An improvement on #1.
3) Planetary Ad Campaign
This skill lets a merchant get greater exposure by making vendors visible on the world map. It means people spot it on Ctrl-M as they cruise past. It also means that if they're looking for, for example, weapons, they can go to world map, select weapons, see what vendors are listed as selling weapons, and then set a waypoint and go there. Useful. Doesn't work perfectly, from what I've heard, but I certainly use it to find vendors.
4) Word of Mouth
This doesn't work, I'm afraid. Supposedly it lets merchants have NPCs in cities talk about their shop so that people will know about it even more. Nice idea, if it worked.
Now--what Arden doesn't seem to understand, I guess, or perhaps what he doesn't care about, is that placing lists of items on any vendor on the planet on bazaar terminals makes this line of the merchant tree *completely and utterly worthless*. The entire idea here is that at the top end you can let people know about your shop as long as they're on the planet, and you can try to guarantee that it's your shop they look for.
If you could go to the bazaar and get a list of all weapons offered on planet, browse through the selections, and so on, don't you think that pretty much everything on this list would be pointless?
Arden suggests that "the loafers on the Merchant forum want ... everyone to be forced to use them as middle men." Well, I think the primary idea here is that *if* you want to have these abilities, you *must* make your way and choose to become a merchant yourself. If you don't have the skillpoints to do it, you're going to have to work with someone else or make sacrifices elsewhere: same as if you want to be a master teras kasi master pistoleer master docter master creature handler, you're going to have a bit of a problem.
Let us assume for the moment that the merchant profession shouldn't be completely removed from the game (which I think people would generally agree)--assuming that, there is absolutely no way that the features Arden so desperately desires should be given to anyone but that profession.
Again--you want to avoid having to deal with a middleman, fine, become a merchant. Kind of like if you want to avoid having to buy your weapons, you have to become a weaponsmith.
Heh. I don't know why I'm posting this, though. Everybody but everybody seems to agree with this analysis. Except Arden, and I don't see him changing his mind any time soon.