Merchant Archive
Thread: Merchant Item Limits Focus Thread: Please try to be constructive and rational (Pt 2)
Wolfbane9999
Thu Aug 12, 2004 4:09 pm
#209
Is this a joke? Why don'tYOU (devs) do something constructive and try to fix things instead of bringing grief to your paying customers trying toimprovethe poor design of the game economic system by limiting the economic activity. Database size??? If the database engines are too slow why don't you buy more servers and dedicate them to the economic system? After all the original concept of this game stressed the design of thecrafting economy and touted it as an alternative to the fighting contests that are 99% of most games. And now that there are thousands of thousands of people playing and paying $180 annually, the devs turn to the clients and say: "Gee, things in the database are too big and slow, we're going to have to remove the possiblity of you having so many items. Too bad if you craft 600 kinds of clothes or 300 different pieces of armour." What of the dozens of Vendors who have full vendors already, places where you can count on going to buy what you need. Will we all have to make do with the Mickey Mouse Bazaar, the spammers at Coronet,and offline Trade Forums, or the latest and greatest improvement to the economy, the wonderful online Trade Chat?? I laugh!
MadDog98
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:07 pm
#210
I am still trying to figure out the logic behind the Devs decision on a 110 item cap per vender at Master Merchant, and even lower at lower levels of merchant. I have been a Master Armorsmith since January and I can tell you right now, that 110 items IS NO WHERE NEAR ENOUGH to keep an armor vender well stocked. Now I am not a big time armorsmith either typically I have 15-30 suits of a single armor type on my ONE armor vender at a time. 15*9=135 and 30*9=270. And that's just suits of ONE TYPE OF ARMOR, not including Personal Shield Generators, Armor Repair Kits, OTHER ARMORS.
I have also started expanding into other crafting professions, I dropped Armorsmith on my main character and purchased a 2nd copy of the game and even took over my brothers account when he quit playing. As it stands now i have 1 pure crafting merchant character which is master artisan/armorsmith/chef with merchant 4/0/0/2 so I can have 4 with the proposed new limits on venders a grand total of 320 items spread over 4 venders. THIS DOES NOT MAKE SENSE.
I have recently started making and selling power ups which I've only been doing for a couple weeks and already have a vender with over 500 crates of power ups and spice. And then there is Chef which I havn't even starting selling on yet has another couple hundred items I can potentially sell. Currently I have over 900 items on my TWO venders I'm using now as pieces or crates. I have a 3rd vender set up for when I do start selling chef items and a 4th thatI use EXCLUSIVELY for special orders in a completely different location than my other 3 venders
I want to expand my armor and start selling Chitin and the new Wookie armors but with the proposed changes to venders THAT WILL BE IMPOSSIBLE. I bought a 2nd copy of the game to make an exclusive merchant/crafter and use my main character for hunting and dungeons. I love crafting and I love fighting in game. Thought i had a way to do both now in the game. And now I find out the Devs are going to take that away now.
Personally, I'm not opposed to having a limit set on the number of items individual venders,BUT IT HAS TO BE A RESONABLE AMOUNT. Honestly 1000 items per vender is the only acceptable minimum for ANYONE with any Merchant Skills. A 660 total item limit spread though 6 venders at Master Merchant is obsurd to me. All of the other vender emplements they have planned like deleting empty venders after 2 weeks, removing empty venders from planetary maps, email notifications of deletion, etc, etcI like and should have been emplemented months ago.
Thank you-
Mad-Dog Indacrib .................(Retired Master Armorsmith) Master Rifleman/Swordsman (Shadowfire)
Psyco Sheep.........................Master Smuggler (Shadowfire)
Shakuhachi Cheriblosum......Master Artisan/Armorsmith/Chef, Merchant 4/0/0/2 (Shadowfire)
Dinonio
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:50 pm
#211
here's my counterproposal: (since i like to sell on multiple planets)
link vendors: that way i could post on one vendor and sell from all 6 - and the 660 items would be ok, because you can see all 660 from 1 vendor - or more realistic all 500, since i prolly won't keep master merchant
the drawback: you couldn't have a lower priced vendor for guildies
otherwise, multiply the current proposed max by number of vendors and have that as max per vendor
Merchillon
Thu Aug 12, 2004 6:23 pm
#212
110 items at master merchant and less than that at lower levels is just crazy. The devs need to plug themselves into the game here.
I like having a staggered amount depending on skill level, and if they are saying +110 items at Master bringing it up to a total of like 500 per vendor, then that would be ok by me.
Be something more like:
Business 3: +50
Business 4: +50
Novice Merchant: +100
Management 1: +50
M2: +50
M3: +50
M4: +50
Master: +110
That's in items PER Vendor.
In my opinion, putting a cap on the number of items on a vendor does NOT help the game in any way that I can think of.
They need to fix people getting merchant skills, placing vendors, and then dropping the skills and still being able to use the vendor.
ShadyCanuck
Thu Aug 12, 2004 7:43 pm
#213
a minumum of 350 per vendor is what i could live with, preferably 500 to 600 but as Doc stated, they will probably not do that much.
oh, i have an idea: BUY MORE SERVERS
Shidevie
Thu Aug 12, 2004 8:35 pm
#214
Wow, even after the idea got shot down over 6 months ago they are going ahead with it again?
And Sony wonders why so many people have been/are quitting.
Maulragoth
Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:32 pm
#216
SeismicEdge wrote:
Where did the original thread go?
Your guess is likely correct as to where the thread went. "Don't bother us with being upset, cause we know better then gamers. We cannot tolerate outrage at our thoughts, and thus we must silence this building wave of discontent. Divided them and stifle communication and rid the ideas that spread rage. Trust us, your going to like getting screwed", and we'll call it a revamp - not a nerf 
((
((I am sure someone has stated it, the problem with devs is a couple: They don't actually play the game... they tinker around in it some and consider themselves avid players. This is evident from the impositions they make as changes. They are logical and well thought people, but the lack of actual experience generally creates a poor update/publish/solution to problems, thus leaving the state of the game pragmatically in the same disfunctional state as before a revamp, but with the disfuntion shifted to a different area of the game. This is similar to a person trying to balance a teeter-totter by stacking boxes one at a time from side to side -->i.e. never gonna happen. A good improvement would be that they have a rep or two that are hardcore players and average programers that work with the rest of the team......OR LISTEN TO THE PLAYERS (impliment the ideas) would work well too.
Secondly, and probably most importantly, the coding for this game has got to be shotty in many respects I can only imagine (not a programmer myself). Their data system must be having overwhelming problems, and thus their solution is not to create a new system, but rather to gank the current economy by killing vendors. If the coding were improved you would not see this kind of limit put on vendors at least at the master level, and you would not see them still rebooting the system on a daily basis. Great game and ideas, but the actual coding for it is killing what would be such an awesome game.
Then there is the bottom line: profits..... rather then invest in recoding the game or inputting much needed hardward and support teams, those costs are not incurred for sake of profit taking. Nothing against profit taking, but too much of it kills the market and the reputation for further business. If the net result of this all is that people make more accounts to add merchants, rather then mass exodus of players/accounts, then assuredly management will impose the proposed limits time and again.
For me, nerf after nerf pretty well has burned me out and having stayed in games for no less then 4 years at a time SWG has brought me to the realization that I will likely have to cut losses and either continue enjoying my older games or explore a new one that has better management and a stable game world.
Stratege
Fri Aug 13, 2004 12:12 am
#217
Well what can be constructive or rational in any of such Thread? Say not say but devs will never see that. Since they need to clear data bases from our vendors staffs. Sure any limits lover that 500 for master will kill such profession like Architect, Weaponsmith, Armorsmith and Tailors… Devs always non rational, we have good auction system on bazaars but still must use forums to sell stuffs since auction max 6k, now we will have vendor but wont able to use them on 100% since we cant put there all items we need to sell.
CaptainCloak
Fri Aug 13, 2004 12:16 am
#218
As originally posted in: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=merchant&message.id=37932#M37932
My plan called for the creation of a skill called "Storage" which was the total number of items you could have listed on vendors, removing a finite cap based on the number of vendors you had and instead allowing you to have a "pool" of items you could list and tying the number of items to skill blocks you could acquire on the way. It is all part of a larger overhaul - so you might want to check the link and read up accordingly.
--Mikka
ARTISAN SKILL BLOCKS:
Business 3: Vendors +1, Storage +25, Hiring +10, 100,000 price tag cap
Business 4: Storage +25, Hiring +10, 200,000 price tag cap
Master Artisan: Storage +50
Business 4: Storage +25, Hiring +10, 200,000 price tag cap
Master Artisan: Storage +50
MANAGEMENT TREE
- Management 1: +150 Storage
- Management 2: +200 Storage
- Management 3: +250 Storage
- Management 4: +300 Storage
- Management 1: +150 Storage
- Management 2: +200 Storage
- Management 3: +250 Storage
- Management 4: +300 Storage
MASTER MERCHANT
- +500 Storage at Master Merchant (1600 Total)
- +500 Storage at Master Merchant (1600 Total)
Message Edited by CaptainCloak on 08-12-2004 03:20 PM
Carrion1
Fri Aug 13, 2004 4:14 am
#219
Oh im just gonna toss my two cents worth in here, Im master merchant, master armorsmith and master tailor.. I only log in on the weekends and keep my vendors quite well stocked so that the business that i created on day 1 of this game and have enjoyed maintaining over time can stay up and running.. On usually stock my vendors with about 500 suits of armor and replace them as it sells out, not to mention PSG's and stuff like that.. so figure this 9*500 = 4500.. a 110 item limit is not gonna work for me at all and in fact will absolutely destroy my game play.. What i fail to understand is why exactly a cap is necessary.. seems like they should be spending more time working on the real issues and bugs with the game rather then thinking up ways to cripple the game play for us crafter types.
-Droideka-
Fri Aug 13, 2004 4:47 am
#220
This is an unrealistic amount unless skill point system is removed from merchant entirely. Since the big thread mysteriously disappeared, I'll say it again: we should not have to become merchants to sell our wares. 50 or 100 for business 3 and 4 respectively is an unrealistic number. I have no merchant, business 4 in artisan and I would feel cramped at 500 items/vendor.
This is just for master artisan. The AS/WS have posted and probably will not post again as to how this will ruin their prospective businesses. They stock a larger amount of quality items (that I buy I might add) according to the demand of the combat classes of the game. If a minimun number must be reached, I would say 700 items per vendor at business IV of Artisan and 50% increases for each level of merchant above that.
Limiting the vendors to merchant however was a bad idea. As stated many times in the vanished 'leave your flamethrower at the door' megathread, highend crafters should be able to achieve vendors at the top ends of their professions without having to dabble in merchant at all. You certainly see plenty of crafters irl that have never taken a whit of business and are doing extremely well due to the quality of the products they produce. I'm getting tired so I'll just sum up a bit:
- bus IV - 700 items
- consider adding 1 vendor to every master profession
- consider reducing or eliminating skill points for the merchant profession
- consider increasing resource stack size to 500k
- consider holding off the main part of this nerf until the results of the dead/empty vendor fix helps the mysterious database problem; this will give players enough time to sell off what they have now
- consider telling the players exactly why the database problem is a big issue in technical terms, ie will JTL not work with the system that is currently in place, lack of memory, or **edit** is going on, etc.
Thanks for your time. If this thread gets to be 60+ pages long again, please don't delete it. That was rather annoying. Not like losing all your items on your vendor annoying, but still.
-Droideka-
Fri Aug 13, 2004 4:55 am
#221
Oh yes I forgot - consider increasing the crate size to 100 