Merchant Archive
Thread: Out of all the professions to fall for a low ball... And then cheer for the nerf? DocSavag?
Instead of actually fixing Merchant they nerfed it. I am sick and tired of watching each profession shoot itself in the foot and then cheer in glee as if something good had happened.
Now everyone that has to use a vendor to deal with the asinine non-stacking components and resources, crate size limits and non-stacking same serial numbered loot is going to be frustrated further. Why can't players store items on a vendor? I am sure it's easy to add code that prevents uncertified sales and allow uncertified storage at least until they add to house and bank limits. With empty vendors and uncertified vendors being removed from the global map, isn't that enough? How do storage vendors hurt the Merchant profession, I am not asking how they hurt the database, I am asking how do they hurt the profession? I have spent 13 months playing this game and the petty bickering back and forth between unfinished/broken professions makes me sick. The developers screwed Merchants over from the start, and now Merchants want to screw everyone else in revenge? The only things thatwere fixed in this update that hurt Merchantswere empty vendors on the global map and uncertified vendors on the global map. You still can't advertise all that well. You still have to travel to each vendor to see what is really for sale. You still can't offer discounts to high volume customers. You still can't really do much that is related to being a Merchant. Instead of adding to Merchant the developerstied Merchants to their vendors. WAKE UP!
This update is going to cause grief. Personally I will lose items I spent 13 months collecting, but more importantly I lose the NPC vendors I have in my Laboratory as decoration. I do not sell or store anything on the NPC vendors. My storage vendor is an ugly bulky vendor tucked away in one of my other houses. Without my NPC vendors I lose my Laboratory I spent hours upon hours decorating. Making the changes as they are now will cause massive grief while not really fixing anything about the Merchant profession. I was starting to finally enjoy this game, now I will probably quit. I don't need to micro manage every item I pickup trying to save space every time I log in. That is not fun. This is a game; it is suppose to be fun. Why are Merchants taking delight in making things so difficult?
Bellow is part of my original post. I predicted what was going to happen and I was right.
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=merchant&message.id=43311
Why not add to the Profession?
Removing is easier then actually fixing the profession by adding to it. Does anyone think Master Merchant should revolve solely around the limit you can place on a vendor? To me a Master Merchant is someone that knows how to sell, how to advertise and how to keep customers long term.
The limit of 110 per vendor at master is an obvious low ball; a limit of 3 to 5 times 110 was the original target the dev team wanted. What will happen is a developer will post, "We are raising the value to 500 per vendor at master" and players will cheer for what is still a huge nerf to the profession and that solves none of the professions real problems. If you were around at launch you might remember houses all having 250 item limits, this was reduce to 25 items per lot used:
Holocron- "I am trying to ascertain what the limits are supposed to be. It's based on a formula based on how many lots the house takes up. It should be 25 items per lot."
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=Development&message.id=306226&page=9
Then the player base screamed and the limit was changed:
Holocron- " OK, here's what we are going to do in tomorrow's update:
-You will get 75 items per lot, instead of 25, up to a max of 250 items per house.
-No vendors nor their contents will count against the house limit.
-Factory crates will count as 1 volume, not 5.
We realize this doesn't get you all the way back to where you were, but it should improve the situation. A fuller solution cannot be accomplished by the morning, which is why we're only going this far. We want to do as much as we can as quickly as we can.
There are other things that we can and will be doing, but they will take longer.
(Since I am sure someone will ask: why not just roll back the code? Because it was multiple integrations and changelists, and it'd be somewhat hairy. This is safer)."
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=Development&message.id=308396
A majority of the player base cheered for what was actually a huge nerf.
Do we want limits? No..we were getting them one way or the other however and this is better than it could have been. If you are trying to suggest that there was no real work involved in getting the limits from 660 to 4k aggregate you are wrong..there were a LOT of emails a lot of discussions and all of the posts on this forum and others.
And this isn't even our revamp..that is still to come. This is just the final piece of their bazaar/vendor backend code that they've been working on for months.
o we want limits? No..we were getting them one way or the other however and this is better than it could have been. If you are trying to suggest that there was no real work involved in getting the limits from 660 to 4k aggregate you are wrong..there were a LOT of emails a lot of discussions and all of the posts on this forum and others. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
DocSavag wrote:
They have told us for nearly 6 months that we were going to have limits. The original limit was set to 150 per vendor. They changd that to 110 and we worked them until they agreed to spend extra hours to get aggregate limits which they told us they couldn't do and to give us a 4k limit. Plus which we got the vendors that are empty off the map, deleted if they are left empty for 2 weeks and prevented people from taking vendors and not keeping the skills.
Do we want limits? No..we were getting them one way or the other however and this is better than it could have been. If you are trying to suggest that there was no real work involved in getting the limits from 660 to 4k aggregate you are wrong..there were a LOT of emails a lot of discussions and all of the posts on this forum and others.
And this isn't even our revamp..that is still to come. This is just the final piece of their bazaar/vendor backend code that they've been working on for months.
So where is the rest of the revamp? If they had done this as part of the revamp instead of 6 months before it appears there may have been a lot less screaming.
Message Edited by Fred75 on 08-18-2004 05:34 AM
1. I don't believe that prior to mid week last week there was any intention on the part of the dev team to have the numbers we have been given as of yesterday. I just don't. I wasn't seeing them prior to that. It would imply they were playing me for 6 months of low ball numbers to pull off some dramatic victory..they really don't work that way. Thunderheart is a very direct and blunt person especially when you deal with him privately. He gave me the numberes they had at the time. The change happened because you guys kept up the pressure of FACTS and constructive posts about how you run your businesses and the Devs read it.
2. My own part in getting these changes isn't all that great. Mostly I tried to keep the flames down and the constructive posts up and I added my voice where it was necessary. I pushed on a certain topic (aggregate lmits vs per vendor lmits) and perhaps I had some effect there. The effect was to keep it at the top of the discussion when it was far easier from a resource stantpoint for the devs to come back to it later.
3. The Revamp. I agree that doing this change before the revamp is wrong. I said as much months ago when it was proposed. I said it again two weeks ago when this change went to test and I said it in email yesterday to TH reguarding this final proposal. Without the tools we desparately need to be retailers in this game, to be the distribution point we will endure months of difficult times that aren't necessary. The reality is that they don't have the resources and time to complete the revamp right now and undoubtedly won't until after the JTL team has been re-integrated and the combat balance has been completed.
4. This is not a battle of us (players) against them (devs) There is no upside for the devs to annoy everyone when they don't have to and they have proved time and time again in this game that if a change is wildly unpopular they do everything they can to mitigate against it. They do have to make decisions that aren't popular sometimes for what they think is for the good of the game. We can disagree with them on their vision but it is their vision and we have to deal with it.
DarkDeathDude wrote:
since limits were a DEFINITE, Im happy with the new proposal, and as Master Merchant , I cant wait til the patch so i can flip the bird to all them vendor exploiters!!
Do you understand supply and demand?
Combat players will be dumping items on the public bazaar for 6000 then when everyone sees everything for 6000 items will show up at 5000 then 4000 until players can sell all 20 items they put up in one day. I personally hate deleting good items and would rather give them away for free then delete them. This will result in a flood on the public bazaar which will mean that Merchants will have to drastically drop their prices or begin buying up every half decent item on the bazaar to control the market.
You think using a vendor as a storage device is an exploit, and you want to give those owners the bird?
Go ahead. Merchants will not control the economy in the future. Combat players will dictate the prices. Then Merchants like you will scream to nerf loot. Combat players will just quit the game. I am so close to quitting right now, 13 months and all therehas been iswhaa, whaa, whaa, nerf them we are better, nerf them they can't have any ability that compares to our [insert profession ability], from each and every profession. You are not the only player and professionin this game, think of what problems this causes for players that do not abuse vendors, players that will not or can not buy a second account, and players that just refuse to micro manage their items because of the terrible inventory system in this game. I guarantee it will come back to you in the future. 13 months of professions taking delight in nerfing one another back and forth. Bounty Hunter vs. Jedi, Rifleman vs. Pistoleer, Combat Medic vs. PvPer and now Merchant vs. Combat Players/Crafters/Doctors/Bio-Engineer/everyone else. You have managed to pick the biggest profession nerf war yet. Bunker down, it is going to be another 13 months of accomplishing nothing.
Sevardos wrote:
The tin-foil hat crowd is coming out of the woodwork now aren't they.
The one thing I will fault SOE is how they communicated the change. Removing the feedback post and then letting customers stew for days on it was a bonehead move in my opinion and caused just as much anger as the proposed change itself.
The vast majority of the player base wanted a compromise that most can live with and be happy with and based on recent actions, that happened.
And don't bother trying to debate with conspiracy theorists (the tin-foil hat crowd), you'll get farther ahead debating with a wall.
This is a repeating patern that accomplishes nothing in the end. As long as the player base excepts half fixes andreducing the severity of a nerfas being "a good compromise."
In the end it's still a nerf. Nothing has been added and things only work a little better then they did 6 months ago. I am not wearing tin-foil hat, I have played since launch and I seen what has happened over and over and over and over. I am sick of it.