Merchant Archive
Thread: Devs, Throw Merchants a Bone!!! ::: Merchant Wishlist December 2003 :::
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Being able to subcontract a vendor to another player.
Complete control over appearance.
Able to list buildings.
Custom order entries (although this will be difficult due to easy exploits.... ie infinite storage)
Addition list
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Able to list under multiple categories. Maybe just allow owner to register vendor multiple times with increasing maint costs.
Allow vendors to hold something other than weapons.
Allow vendors to use furniture if you drop them on it. (chairs)
Better vendor name to planetary ad control. Right now you have to name your vendor something that will show up on planetary map as useful (ie. Medical Supplies). This really is bad for RP. Better would be to allow a short descr for a vendor in addition to their name. (Name: Arwoof - Descr: Medical Supplies). Maybe have the descr show up as a title when you can actually see vendor.
If they are going to allow you to create vendor and destroy vendor over and over without cost, maybe just have a dialogue window show what they will get and a randomize button. Would cut down on item creation/deletion and make it less painful to "interview" hundreds of applicants till you found what you are looking for.
With ad barking we have greetings. How about being able to specify purchase, view, offer dialogues? ex. "Why thank you very much for your purchase. Please shop our other store in Theed!"
A way to see contents of containers. Complete outfits could be sold. Sets of medicine could be grouped. Droid could be "batteries included". As it is, you just have to trust the seller.
Able to sell tokens for services. Tokens for wound healing (each treatment would take a token from the patient). Tokens for ID. Tokens for Dancing. The tokens would be for specific actions like Health Wound Healing D, 5 minutes of Dancing, etc. This would allow merchants to be the broker for services between players.
My two cents,
It is an unfair trade policy to allow every nonprofessional access to a galaxywide bazaar while forcing professional Merchants into anonymity 1.5km from the nearest city. Player to Player secure trades should be the nonprofessionals only access to marketing. If that is too strong to stomach, then how about a single flea market per planet that lies no less than 2km from the largest starport. Bazaars could still be there and the merchant vendors could probably compete with it if an appropriate price cap were included.
Introduce a new resource called delivery droids, they could be to vendors what power is to harvesters. A Master DE could make them and a Master Merchant could use them.
Example:
The vendor must be "powered" with delivery droids.
The customer must have a declared residence.
Under the retrieve item options is "Droid Delivery Service" (the Merchant sets the amount to charge for this service) the customer selects this option and then the droid appears on his front steps much the way the signs do now. Doubleclicking the droid drops the item into the player's inventory.
This would only be useful, however, if Merchant vendors are granted galaxywide visibilty like the bazaar currently does for nonprofessionals.
The "offer to vendor" option is really lacking appeal. Steps should be taken to make this the desired method of selling. Merchants do not craft - they Buy/Sell. Crafters are and should be the manufacturers and wholesalers. Merchants should be the retailers..in short just about everything that is bought or sold should be through a player merchant. At the least the player Merchant should be more appealing than just about any other form of selling. Please, these are my ideas, you probably have different ones and even better ones...but fix my profession, don't eliminate it.
Barxalot Howler
Guild Merchant (Zen)
Tarquinas
I wish we could rename our vendors without having to destroy/replace them... 
- Tyl
- Vendor access rights ( including allowing someone else to sell directly from the vendor, with a predefined percentage cutgoing to the vendor owner
- Customer reservations : The ability to sell to specific customers, on a separate tab in the vendor interface, allowing us to fill orders and put them on our vendors witout fear of others buying them, also allowing personal price variations without displaying them to others.
- Interplanetary postal system, complete with mail order functionality
- Player city shop structures ( merchant requirement to place ) - from small store to mall size.
- Shop specific furniture
- Better control over vendor appearance when hiring
Hmm. That will do for a start 
Good Idea on the allow others the use vendor to sell after giving permission by the owner.
Heres one i think all will like.
Merchants should be able to craft stuff other perfessions can't just so that a person could increase there marketing by building something like a sign for the town, or just plain ol' stuff like furniture and weapons
Guild Merchant (DSB)
Weaponsmith/Architect/Merchant/Pikeman
Kauri
DocSavag wrote:
Dridstar wrote:
Have a way to show the names of multiple vendors in one spot on the overhead map. The merchant tents have turned this into a freekin nightmare. Really, I think this is top priority.
I turn off "show all waypoints" and then just click on the vendors I want to see on the map. If I want to go to one I create a waypoint to it. Seems to work for me.
I mean on the over head "city" map. Not the planetary map. Alot of times When in a new city, I'll through up the map to find the vendors. Most of the time it is just overlayed garbled names and such. Very frustrating.
Dridstar wrote:
I mean on the over head "city" map. Not the planetary map. Alot of times When in a new city, I'll through up the map to find the vendors. Most of the time it is just overlayed garbled names and such. Very frustrating.
Ahh..yea that is a problem, but it is a problem with trainers and structures in static cities too. The names get overlapped especially when you have the map zoomed out. Zooming into the map should help a little in these cases.
Instead of grouping all the names together in the centre of the building in a jumbled mess, I'd like to see the names made into a small list at the centre of the building.
DocSavag wrote:
Dridstar wrote:
I mean on the over head "city" map. Not the planetary map. Alot of times When in a new city, I'll through up the map to find the vendors. Most of the time it is just overlayed garbled names and such. Very frustrating.
Ahh..yea that is a problem, but it is a problem with trainers and structures in static cities too. The names get overlapped especially when you have the map zoomed out. Zooming into the map should help a little in these cases.
I really like that idea Xexo about allowing others to sell from your vendor. That would really help guild centralize their sales. It would have really come into play yesterday with the vehicle sales.
I would also like to see:
The ability to setup 2 for 1 deals, or track individuals to give them an item after a certain number of purchases, such as a coupon.
Thatcustomer could then give that coupon to the vendor for discounts. Stuff like that would be pretty sweet I feel.