Droid Engineer Archive
Thread: To DEs with thriving businesses
Gavvot wrote:
Merchant buy stuff from crafter and sell them for profit.
Simple way, works well.
Already works very well with loot, and current crafter/vendor btw.
This change doesn't force crafter to become Merchant.
This change give something to do to merchant : Manage stock.
Something nobody does for the moment because you can simply do a factory run of the maximum possible copy of the same item and then put them all on a vendor.
Main issue is that.
5% of the crafter making 95% of the business on a server.
Something is wrong there. At least that's what the dev think.
I don't see how the real issue is 5% of the crafters getting 95% of the business.
Other Masters have the same schematics, just as many exp tapes, and access to the same resources as I or anybody else does. NOTHING is stopping somebody else from making the same stuff.
You know why some crafters do better then others? They work. My droid vendor is popular because I spend far more time keeping it stocked then other DE's do. I offer a variety they don't.
The only thing seperating the successful crafter from the others is work and time. Should they be punished for that?
Gavvot wrote:
Straker_Atrella wrote:
Ok so let's say that I normally sell Combat Probots for 75k. I have 20 of them to sell. So now your suggesting that I should sell them to then Merchant for less then what I normally sell them for? Why would I do that? I have been selling them fine for 75k.
Because you don't wanna spent the skill points to go master merchant.
Because you don't have room anoymore and you need some
Because you want to buy some good resource and need the money fast...
Also the Merchant is going to shell out 1.5 million to buy those droids from me. So of course he wants to make a profit, so he tries to sell them for 85k.
Why would people pay 85k for a droid that the standard price is 75k for?
Because your vendor is empty and merchant vendor isn't.
Because your vendor is on the other side of the galaxy and merchant vendor is where the customer is...
Because there is no such thing as standard price.
Also what happens if the day after that Merchant spends 1.5 million, a new resource spawns. Now those Probots suck, ones that are much better can now be made.
The crafter whistles happily, as he makes more, looking for another sucker merchant.
If the same merchant have the room and is smart, he'll buy them, and sell them at higher price.
Some people only want the best, some people don't have the money for the best.
No Merhchant in their right mind will do that.
I don't see how the real issue is 5% of the crafters getting 95% of the business.
Other Masters have the same schematics, just as many exp tapes, and access to the same resources as I or anybody else does. NOTHING is stopping somebody else from making the same stuff.
Well, now there is something : Vendor stock.
You know why some crafters do better then others? They work. My droid vendor is popular because I spend far more time keeping it stocked then other DE's do. I offer a variety they don't.
The only thing seperating the successful crafter from the others is work and time. Should they be punished for that?
The purpose is not punishing hard workers, the purpose is increasing the number of hard workers, and the number of stuff to do for players.
Well, that's what I think.
Here is the problem with this "fix."
I think that "many" of your more succesfull crafters have more then one account. The are almsot forced too when you want to harvest resources and have storage and such. Now I'm not saying everybody, but whneI think of the top Armor, Weapon, Chef, Arch, and Droid people on my server, they all have more then one account.
So all this change is going to do is they will adjust and take Merchant. I already made my arrangements. My DE is dropping musician, to Master Merchant. My brother is giving me access to his musician/dancer andI still have my combat character. So I actually come out ahead now.
My business will not change at all.
Other of your "top" crafters will adjust as well. They have the accounts.
So now the people hurt by this most are the little guys, the ones with 1 account, for them to get Merchant, they need to drop their fighting half. So either they do that or they end up having to sell stuff to merchants who sell it. Yet the person with crafter/merchant will always have better prices.
So in the end, the little guy is the one who ends up getting hurt.
I probably won't be affected by that change at all.
It just doesn't change the way I deal with my stock, that's all.
Message Edited by ArdenStarmariner on 08-09-2004 12:04 PM
DarkRenown wrote:I am also one of the little guys, and in theory shouldn'd mind this as I run 2 Vendors, and keep (on average) about 100 items on each Vendor.The reason it will hurt, is because I am a casual gamer. I don;t play every night, and when I do I don;t always want to spend the 2 - 3 hours crafting my droids to keep my vendor stocked. So once every fortnight or so I will do a massive crafting session to stock my vendors.This means big runs of droid batteries, repair kits etc, which can easily take up 100 slots of a vendor, I then add about another 30 or so droids.So, as a casual gamer, it will force me to do crafting more often, and spend less time with my guild on hunts, and doing guild events. Which is sad.That is why I am against this change.
Personnaly, I rarely do big crafting session.
I go to my shop before I log, when I log I check the vendor, add the couple of stuff that are missing.
When I'm low on some component I do a run, bur rarely a full run, except for EMM and EGP.
I keep stock of component and comon modules in factory and house, and building a new droid take me about 2 minutes.
So restocking my vendor request about 10 to 20 minutes once or twice a week.
- DEs with a "thriving" business will still be able to be in business. Will it be different? Perhaps. It's likely you might have to reconsider your regular stock and make adjustment based on the new limits...
- TH has stated elsewhere that the item number limits will get looked at and/or possibly raised.
- This change is not:
- "game breaking"
- the end of a DEs livelihood
- a bad thing for us overall
See...here's the thing...
The new change will mean that a single DE won't be able to stock 8000 options of every droid in every color. This will, in my opinion, mean that our profession and other professions will be more specialized.
Joe DE will stock really good Med droid options but not Ent/Scount droids. Jane DE will stock combat, scout and a few Ent. models, etc.
However, what the DE market at large won't have to face is a situation where a few big guys can all but own every droid market segment. It'll get spread about more, since it will be that much more difficult to do it all oneself.
In that regard, I see this change actually making it easier for the smaller type DE to carve a place for him/herself in the marketplace.
That is == good for us
Note: the big time folk will always be 'big time' due to name recognition alone....so, their marketshare isn't likely to takea huge hit.
/bow
Respectfully,
TheRealTK421 wrote:
A few items....
- DEs with a "thriving" business will still be able to be in business. Will it be different? Perhaps. It's likely you might have to reconsider your regular stock and make adjustment based on the new limits...
- TH has stated elsewhere that the item number limits will get looked at and/or possibly raised.
- This change is not:
- "game breaking"
- the end of a DEs livelihood
- a bad thing for us overall
See...here's the thing...
The new change will mean that a single DE won't be able to stock 8000 options of every droid in every color. This will, in my opinion, mean that our profession and other professions will be more specialized.
Joe DE will stock really good Med droid options but not Ent/Scount droids. Jane DE will stock combat, scout and a few Ent. models, etc.
However, what the DE market at large won't have to face is a situation where a few big guys can all but own every droid market segment. It'll get spread about more, since it will be that much more difficult to do it all oneself.
In that regard, I see this change actually making it easier for the smaller type DE to carve a place for him/herself in the marketplace.
That is == good for us
Note: the big time folk will always be 'big time' due to name recognition alone....so, their marketshare isn't likely to takea huge hit.
/bow
Respectfully,
I disagree with you on nearly every value-based conclusion you make, TK. (not a flame)
Here's why. Newer DEcrafters, already burdened with the necessity of Master Artisan, will be forced to devote more skill points to Merchant in order to compete. I can ramp up all the way to master merchant in a matter of a day. It would take someone two weeks or more (depending on sales) to go up a few boxes. This is a barrier to entry for the newer crafters.
This is also a punitive move against good crafters with good supply and a well thought-out design of a store. Suddenly I cannot stock, nor even store, all of my current production.
I'm going to have to blow this stuff out for chump change IF I decide to even continue to sell anything.
Result: undercutting and dumping. Another barrier to entry. It is also the herald of an economic depression.
FORCING us to drop entire lines in some sort of hippy-dippy socialist engineering idea is absurd, nauseating, and insulting. This is a player-created economy, based on a free market model. It is NOT a control economy. I did not and will not pay to pretend that I'm in the Star Wars version of Berkeley California in the 1960's or Castro's Cuba. I should NOT be punished for being a hard worker and being creative, effective, and responsive.
Furthermore, we cannot DEPEND ononly one line of products to sell consistently. DE products are driven by the shifts of resources. Ours is a reactive market, much more than most. (Harvest droids, IPS droids, BH changes force demand changes, etc). Locking everyone into a TINY portion of our schem list is crippling. Your straw man of "8000 droids of all different colors" is just that - a straw man. I'm talking about a couple thousand items - not 8000. I'm talking about batteries, IPS droids, Seekers, arakyds, harv droids, trap flingers, bombs, nukes, combat droids, paint kits, stims and restoration kits. That's just for basics, TK. Basic stock. But under this idea, I have to give up consumables inorder to sell combat droids. (your own example). So no one is going to be able to even GET batteries from me. I will have no room. No paint kits either. No BH supplies. No bombs. No SUPPORT for my own friggin products nor for my own regular customers.
But - It would be worse for those starting. All they can do is sell a very few of one or two models. That's it. And you know, guess what? DEMAND will change, as it is extremely elastic. People generally do not NEED droids. Put a stumbling block in front of them and they stop buying because they don't need droids.
This is a bad idea. If you are gathering impressions to convey to the devs, I have to tell you to put me down in the "No to any item limit change " column. I do not accept that this is a fait accompli . I will not accept that this must go live. It, in my opinion, should be thrown completely out.
The rest of the merchant changes are great, don't misunderstand me. But no matter what the devs say to you, and they will try to justify it in many ways, I want you to be able to say "There are DE's who will not accept a vendor item nerf in any manner. They want you to kill it."
I know some don't have the same opinion here. But you represent me, and you should know that this goes too far for a lot of us. No more 'discussions' or 'working for a compromise'. No more "the devs said it is going in no matter what'. That is not acceptable. Let them know that for me and others who think the same way - Tell them that some of us say, "Hell No!"
Thanks for this opportunity to share my opinion with you.
Message Edited by Handsnake on 08-09-2004 07:33 PM
Message Edited by Handsnake on 08-09-2004 07:35 PM
/bow
Handsnake wrote:
I disagree with you on nearly every value-based conclusion you make, TK. (not a flame)
That's okay....it happens. It promotes healthy discourse.
Here's why. Newer DEcrafters, already burdened with the necessity of Master Artisan, will be forced to devote more skill points to Merchant in order to compete.
MA is not a "necessity". Helpful...most definitely. An out and out requirement? Not at all. Along with that, the Devs have stated in the past they we could expect interdependence among professions to go up. Now we may know morewhat they meant.
You won't be forced to pick up Merchant to compete. What a player would do to 'combat' a big time MM is go where the markets are....hit the streets. That's how I started. I'm sure that's how a lot of us started. People buy droids from those that sell them.
Keep in mind there that you did state these were "newer" crafters...just starting out. They wouldn't likely have a factory yet and such (well, maybe one). Anyway, the point is...they aren't at the level of a 'big time' crafter. They'd likely have enough going on to run 1 vendor at whatever new limit is imposed at Bus 3.
That is definitely enough to get things rolling.
I can ramp up all the way to master merchant in a matter of a day. It would take someone two weeks or more (depending on sales) to go up a few boxes. This is a barrier to entry for the newer crafters.
I don't see it as a barrier to entry. Even at 50 items, one could still get a good business going...and they ARE newer crafters. Most of them will be better off to work from a backpack (a la Jenden and others).
I mean...50ish droids at competitive prices? From there, you just need to sell...you can actually keep a stock going to get off the ground.
In addition, a crafters business will grow in direct proportion to the time and energy they expend into making it grow.
This is also a punitive move against good crafters with good supply and a well thought-out design of a store. Suddenly I cannot stock, nor even store, all of my current production.
Hmmm...don't take this the wrong way, but perhaps you stock too much?
I'm asking respectfully and in all honesty. I don't know how your numbers break down.
Also, vendors aren't really meant for mass storage. That's a lot of where the issue behind this change comes from in the first place.
I'm going to have to blow this stuff out for chump change IF I decide to even continue to sell anything.
Again...I mean no offense by this but I'd say you make/stock too much stuff. It's classic supply and demand.
If you overproduce vs. the market, you're gonna get stuck cutting prices to move inventory. It works the same way here. Wouldn't you still be able to run a "good" business with, say, 2/3 of your current inventory totals?
Or half? I mean...if you're like me, you can make a mint just sitting around with factory crates knocking out custom droids at any busy starport (or better, the closest bank).
Result: undercutting and dumping. Another barrier to entry. It is also the herald of an economic depression.
On this, you do have a point. I see inventory bloat (for a lot of items...not just ours) as one of the inevitable side effects of this change. If the numbers do change (likely) in a number that's less of a nerf that situation will abate some but how much? /sigh
If only I (or you) could know.
FORCING us to drop entire lines in some sort of hippy-dippy socialist engineering idea is absurd, nauseating, and insulting. This is a player-created economy, based on a free market model.
It's also SOE's multi-million dollar 'baby' and investment. Ultimately, if they see this as a good move to make, they will make it. Such is the way of a free market economy, 'eh?
And...you're not really actually forced to drop lines, per se. You might stock 4 of an item instead of 10, for example. That doesn't mean you can't have a good bit of product crated and stored off the vendor, right?
Furthermore, we cannot DEPEND ononly one line of products to sell consistently. DE products are driven by the shifts of resources. Ours is a reactive market, much more than most. (Harvest droids, IPS droids, BH changes force demand changes, etc). Locking everyone into a TINY portion of our schem list is crippling. Your straw man of "8000 droids of all different colors" is just that - a straw man. I'm talking about a couple thousand items - not 8000. I'm talking about batteries, IPS droids, Seekers, arakyds, harv droids, trap flingers, bombs, nukes, combat droids, paint kits, stims and restoration kits.
I have everything you listed there in good quantity on just 2 vendors. Maybe a few hundred items tops. Sure, I'll have to cut back on stock in a few places depending on how the numbers go down. If I want more stock, I'll have to spend some skill points. That's as it should be really.
In a way, I personally sort of disprove your point here that running a biz can't be done that way.
That's just for basics, TK. Basic stock. But under this idea, I have to give up consumables inorder to sell combat droids. (your own example). So no one is going to be able to even GET batteries from me. I will have no room. No paint kits either. No BH supplies. No bombs. No SUPPORT for my own friggin products nor for my own regular customers.
No free checkers...yea, I know.
But - It would be worse for those starting. All they can do is sell a very few of one or two models. That's it. And you know, guess what? DEMAND will change, as it is extremely elastic. People generally do not NEED droids. Put a stumbling block in front of them and they stop buying because they don't need droids.
They may not "need" them but they sure do use them..at least the smart player knows to use them. You really want to be saddled without a droid that has a crafting station? Or if you're a Medic/Doc are you really not going to "need" a Med droid?
Come on....
Players will usually pick up anything that gives them enhancement or moves them forward. From there, in the DE biz...it's in how you sell to clients.
If you want to convince a player they don't need a droid, you're most definitely guaranteed not to sell one. If you DO literally sell them on how droids can be used (cause many players don't know/get the benefits till we DEs explain them)....
This is a bad idea. If you are gathering impressions to convey to the devs, I have to tell you to put me down in the "No to any item limit change " column. I do not accept that this is a fait accompli . I will not accept that this must go live. It, in my opinion, should be thrown completely out.
Get used to disappointment. I'm telling you, straight up.
This'll happen (or something like it). It may not be fun to face...but it is gonna happen.
The rest of the merchant changes are great, don't misunderstand me. But no matter what the devs say to you, and they will try to justify it in many ways, I want you to be able to say "There are DE's who will not accept a vendor item nerf in any manner. They want you to kill it."
Believe me, this is already getting worked over (but good). I don't know how far things will move (or if they will move) but some kind of change is coming.
"Kill it"? ....not gonna happen.
I know some don't have the same opinion here. But you represent me, and you should know that this goes too far for a lot of us.
I understand. I've already posted some of my thoughts and the opposing viewpoints about it from our perspective.
No more 'discussions' or 'working for a compromise'. No more "the devs said it is going in no matter what'. That is not acceptable. Let them know that for me and others who think the same way - Tell them that some of us say, "Hell No!"
I'll tell them but you'll want to prepare yourself for the (likely) eventuality that this change won't just magically disappear. I suppose it's possible....about as possible as successfully navigating an asteroid field.
Thanks for this opportunity to share my opinion with you.
Always...it's good to see people speak up...
Respectfully,