Artisan Archive

Right now it seems most people value the artisan business branch only for getting a vendor or getting master artisan. I have a suggestion to add more functionality and appeal to the branch.

Allow players to craft and use "street shops" via business branch skills. These would work a lot like a camp. You craft an item, then you use that item to put down the shop. You would be able to place these in city streets, and they would only last as long as you stayed in the shop. It would be the swg equivalent of say, a hot dog stand. You could have a little sign advertising your wares/prices, or maybe you could even have a vendor or something with you where you could set prices and people could just treat it like a personal vendor in a house. Maybe you could allow droid engineers to create high-end droids which could run a street shop by themselves, maybe you could save the skillsto use those droidsfor the merchant profession.

Put schematics for the shops in the business branch. Say, one at business II and an improved one at business IV. You could add elite shops to the merchant profession. Improved shops could be flashier, have bigger signs, etc.

You could restrict the shops via some kind of zoning so they couldn't be placed in the middle of the road, or in the middle of the starport entryway. Maybe you just restrict the shops to being placed in a few specific vendor areas in the city.

This could do really good things for the community... have people milling about in the streets browsing vendors and socializing. Plus, it's very"Star Warsy"... Phantom Menace definitely shows vendors in the streets with wares displayed. It doesn't necessarily trivialize the bazaar, because people couldn't search for items in street shops. It givesa marketing edge to that guy who goes out of his way to be there at his shop in the city, instead of just running through the streets hitting his advertisement macro.

I apologize if this is not a new idea.

/brace for flamepact

I really like your idea. Adds a social aspect, and allows us unknown artisans who can't afford our own vendors to compete. It also gives some added valuetoBusiness.And it sounds like a lot of fun.

You should post this in the SWG discussion forum, since it might not get alot of attention here.

I too think this is a good idea. Remove vendors from the business line alltogether I say, give artisans rough tent shops to sell stuff (not a permanent fixture). Then to get vendors, you have to move into the merchent tree. I know alot of crafters would not like this too much because it would take away vendors from every tom, **edit**, and harry that makes something, but serious crafters who are business people would still move into merchant anyways. Plus, if people didn't want to take up the merchant tree, they could go to merchants to sell they're wares thus making the merchant profession a bit more exclusive and desirable. Now if they could just fix planetary advertising and implement something like this ...Then it would be a good start in the right direction

lol, you can't use **edit** in a sentence. **edit** is a name.

Thanks... I reposted in swg discussion.

Well i like your idea. But quite bluntly improvements to merchants should be made first and foremeost in the merchant profesion. And seeing how SOE doesnt give a ratts rear about this aspect of the game ATM, i wouldnt hold my breath. Besides, the business line is a "teaser" of what a merchant can do, not supposed to be a particularly viable way for crafters to end run around an entire player class. Maybe if Merchants get city shops in the player city expansion...and bugs fixed, street vendors would be a neat way for Artisans to get a foot in the door...like those guys who sell oranges on road side stands hehe.

Another great idea I've read today. This would also be truer to the Lucas' Star Wars story. Remember, there were several street vendors on Tatooine in the movie.

the difference with the "droid shop" is that you can go on your way crafting & mining and people can access your droid like a mobile vendor

it might be that this droid would count against both the number of droids you control (1 unless someone reads that suggestion I made for artisants) and the number of vendors you control

Also a droid is somewhat versetile, but not supremely. You can have it patrol (and with vocalization training & speaking droids you can have it say things) or sit in one spot and sell things.


There are a lot of vendor tents in cities, maybe it would be possible to rent these tents in the future or place vendors in them?

How about this....

Business 1: Premium Auctions (currently Business 2) and make them stand out better somehow.

Business 2: Street Tent (much like the junk dealers & such) with limitations on where you can set it up. Also, make this a craftable item with a maximum duration that requires the players presence inside it's radius (much like tents for Scouts).

Business 3: NPC Vendor (Coke Machine style), usable in permanent structures only. (Same as present.)

Business 4: Improved Street Tent (allows the use ofa vendor in the tent that would link to a permanent vendor allowing your wares to be sold from 2 locations at once. Would still require your presence and would have a time limit.)

Master Artisan: 2nd Vendor type (robo-bartender) & +1 vendor (currently Business 4)

Novice Merchant: Additional vendor types, +1 vendor (both as presently exist) PLUS the ability to join a weekly bid for "PERMANENT" shop space in cities. (Players would be limited to only 1 stall galaxy wide in one of the current vacant city buildings. They would then be able to place a vendor in that location for the week and stock it as if it were their home. At the end of the week, any unsold items would be placed in the player's bank unless they sucessfully bid to keep the location.)

These are all good ideas, except one little thing I saw that would be absolutely horrendous in a large city...

Droid vendors barking adds in the streets. Imagine, if you will, a dozen droids barking their adds every... 15 seconds perhaps? I mean, come on, the chat box is crowded enough in big cities where people run around yelling "Selling X item pst" (I am guilty of this too ). Vendor droids would only make it worse, it's already hard to hold a conversation in such a place. I'm all for vendor kiosks and such in cities, as long as there isn't obscene amounts of chat spam

how about vendor droids that follow you around and you can place in the middle of town unattended?

This actually sounds similar to something that a Dev mentioned may happen. He mentioned that they were playing with the idea of "Merchant Tents," much like the ones you sometimes see NPC's in. (This was from the Merchant Forum). Although, it was not clear whether or not they meant being able to place them in town or only make them outside of town, or what.

The Droid Shop is a good idea as well, though you might as well allow them to be NPC's, since we can make droid and NPC vendors anyway.