Merchant Archive

Jeebus are you guys STILL trying to give away our best and defining characteristic?

Look, it's simple. We're merchants. We sell things. To better enable selling things we have vendors which sell things for us when we're not playing the game or while we're doing OTHER things to help us sell things. Give that away and we might as well pack up the profession and go be Bounty Hunters.

The difference is that in your example, if you need a buff from a doctor, you see the doctor and say "Buff me please" ... if he does a poor job, you don't use him again.

With a vendor, it is not that simple because it is more of a long-term business relationship. If a merchant asked me to purchase 1,000 units of Muon Gold, I would give him a fair price that he could mark up ... but if I were to give him 1,000 units of Muon Gold to sell pending payment ... I would not consider it. However, the merchant would need to risk the possibility that he may not sell the items. I have not met a merchant that does that. Merchants that I have met sell their own goods.

That is why I have brought the idea of non-merchants 'buying' vendors ... Merchants would get all of the other abilities (and cost-savings) ... but non-merchants would continue to have the ability to sell items when they are not available.

As a Smuggler, it is a hybrid class, unlike Artisans ... we do have combat abilities built into our profession, however we do not have artisan skills within our crafting abilities. From what I understand we originally did have a requirement in Artisan of 4/0/4/0 ... but the Dev's removed it during Beta.

There are NO reasons why someone should be able to keep something after they drop the skill for it.

I really do understand your points, but if you look at a Smuggler as a hybrid (little bit of everything) ... then it does make sense.

We shoot.
We fight hand to hand.
We craft tools.
We craft Spice (drugs).
We sell a service (slicing).
We sell items (spice and factional items).

We don't do any of it exceptionally well (except for slicing) ... because we are not the 'experts' ...

Pistoleers (and combatants in general) fight better than we do.
Artisans, and all of the Artisan-based professions craft better than us.
Doctors make better drugs.
Entertainers provide a more needed service than us.
Merchants sell items better.

I personally think that they should have kept the Artisan 4/0/4/0 skill requirements on smuggler ... because we do use those abilities ... but in their *perfect* wisdom, they chose not to. This allows Smugglers to do thinks like the Triple Master (Smuggler/Pistoleer/TKA). The only reason I want TKA is because I die too puch in PVP ... and it will help me heal myself.

When I started my Smuggler ... I chose to do the Artisan 4/0/4/0 & I got the Novice Armorsmith, Novice Weaponsmith, and Novice Merchant ... It was nice ... but death byunethical PvPers when I was still overt from a faction deal ... made me go for more combat ... I hate PvP ... I have it for defense only ... but it is needed because of the nature of the game.

Oh, and I don't care about advertising ... I don't think smugglers should be able to advertise locations of their vendors ... if they do ... let the "contraband police" take it all.

If a CSR hears a Smuggler shouting "go to my vendor at" ... it should be followed by a raid.

You're right. We ARE a hybrid. But we do things OUR way. We craft. Weaponsmiths craft. So do Armorsmiths, Architects, Chefs, etc etc. We make our own tools, and we make other people's guns better, and we make buffs that stack with everyone else's buff. We do combat. We have pistol specials, but we dont' have any mods, or anything that in any way infringes on other professions. Having vendors is what we DO. We sell things and we sell them through vendors, which is what makes us better "salesmen" than joe-shmoe crafter. We have reach, so to speak. Giving smugglers a vendor COMPROMISES us in a way that the other hybrid skills of a smuggler does NOT compromise other profession. No one looks for a smuggler to BUY a gun. They look to us to IMPROVE it. They don't look to us to heal them. They look to us for quick fix buffs they can carry around with them for as long as they want. But if they start looking to smugglers for vendors, then what do merchants do? I mean, walk around and ask people how many merchants they know. We'll go from a rare breed to extinct kinda quick. If you want to be better at sales of ANYTHING you need merchant. I'd like special smuggler/merchant vendors, sure. But it wouldn't be good for the merchant profession.