Merchant Archive
Thread: Merchant Top Issues List (as of May 2005)
sciguyCO wrote:
Elyssa wrote:
#24 Bugfix Building Signs Behaving Improperly...
Along with the other stuff you had there, maybe you could also include the weirdness some sign types show with some building types.
For example, I've got a medium generic house. If I set the sign type to style 2 (or whatever the pyramidal style is) it ends up about 5-10m in front of the "porch" by the entrance. Since my shop is on a small hill, it's also floating 2-3m off the ground.
I have the same issue with my showroom, but I use that to my advantage and put up an advertisement to my shop
hahahahaha I knew that was coming. Follow the link in my sig to the tailor forum and read Pappi's post there.
Ani_cul wrote:
and who are you?
Elyssa wrote:
You're new here, aren't you?
Only half the time.and then I remember to log in. 
Trying to remove banned players and guilds from my tent but they keep re-appearing.
Not sure if this has been going on for awhile but I only noticed it a few days ago.
I need to re-remove them everyday.
Any ideas? naturally I sent in a ticket.
The merchant skill tree including the ability to add other players to admin, the maximum number of other administrators increasing as they progress, with a large jump at master merchant.
The merchant would have to pay a higher venndor maintanance cost, based on the number of administrators.
Only the person who lists an item would have access to it (ie withdrawing the sale).
At a certain level, a merchant could add a use tax, that operates like a sales tax.
Superb work on the Merchant Issues List, Elyssa. Issues are described clearly and calmly, and the formatting makes them easy to read -- well done!
Other professions would be lucky to have a Correspondent of your ability. Thanks for taking the time to help out the folks who like this Merchant thing.
With respect tospecific issues, I think you hit the main points. I wouldn't even quibble much with the ordering. There are just three things I can think of to suggest.
1. COLLECTION CONTAINERS
I like the idea ofletting Merchants usesome kind of containerto sell related items... but why require that such a container be craftable by Merchants? If there's a good reason for doing so (other than "so we don't need other players"), I hope someone can clue me in. Otherwise, I'd suggest that it would be more appropriate for Artisans to make this container.
2. PLAYER CONTRACTS (AKA PLAYER MISSIONS)
I'd love to see aPlayer Contracts system implemented that would allow Merchants to set up long-term and repeatable business arrangements with other players.I think ofthis as being something every player should be able to do, but perhaps there are some special features in aPlayer Contractssystem that only Merchants would have.
3. "ACTIVE" MERCHANT SKILLS
It would be great to get some of the bugs and irritants addressed, but what about theBig Picture? You touch on this in Issue #5: Profession Devaluation, andI'd encourage pushing hard onit because this is where you'll get the most bang for your Correspondent buck.
Most professions in SWG have "active" skills -- you actually get to do interesting things. But most Merchant skills are "passive" -- after activation, you just sort of wait for things to happen. What a waste!
Merchants need active abilities; they need to be able to do Merchant-y things. Although there are any number of such abilities possible, one that seems pretty interesting (and useful) to me would be market analysis skills. How about a line of ever-more-powerful abilities to view market statistics? I don't know about you, but I'd love a relatively simple wayto be able to see which items were selling well (which also touches on your Issue #4: Vendor Email System Overhaul).
You could even break this up into Personal (all your own vendors), Planetary (all Bazaarterminals per planet, or on one selected planet),Galactic (all Bazaar terminals on all planets), and Individual (specific Bazaar terminal locations). What Merchant wouldn't want to be able to see sales trends on a per-location basis?
Yet another worthwhile ability would be a skill allowing the placement of "want ads" on Bazaar terminals. Merchants would be able to offer a specific price for a given quantity of some item. In conjunction withour newability to view prices on both Bazaar terminals and player vendors, this would enable a true "buy low, sell high" financial subgame for Merchants.
You get the idea. Merchants ought to have active abilities to find and make business deals, and to sniff out where the best profits might be. Such abilities would make the Merchant profession worth playing as more than a mere offlinealt.
Thanks for considering these suggestions, and thanks again for all your efforts on behalf of SWG's Merchant community.
--Flatfingers
Message Edited by Flatfingers on 05-25-2005 01:47 PM