Merchant Archive
Thread: Vendor Maintenance Fees coming – your input request
This is a feeble attempt at trying to balanace a game that actually only has 2 parts to it. Part #1 is people that make items and Part#2 is people that use the items that are made.
Merchants fall in the 1st group as their skill tree is part of the Artisan Profession. So by the Devs placing the Merchant Profession within the Crafting Section of the Game....that makes them part of the Crafing Section.
By adding this proposed fee, they are attempting to entice people into training the Merchant Profession so that they can receive a reduction in Vendor Fees. Much further in this thread there was a senario of how the system works...and it was all wrong. The following is how you balance the 2 sides of this game: (I know some folks may not like to see this, but this is for the game as a whole.)
- I've been trying to keep up with this....so here is my two credits.
Artisan Profession
Novice Artisan
- Grantsplayers 2 Building Lots for use of Mining and Harvesting Istallations. (Only the Artisan Profession can use Harvesters). Mining and Harvesting Installation Certifications.
- No other changes
Engineering
- No Changes
Domestic Arts
- No Changes
Business
- Level 1: Access Fees
- Level 2: Premium Sales
- Level 3: Reduced Bazaar Fees
- Level 4: Reduced Travel Fees
Surveying / Mining
- Each Level in this tree grants players 2 building lots for use of Mining and Harvesting Installations.
- No other changes
Master Artisan
- Grants players 2 building lots for use of Mining and Harvesting Installations
- No other changes
Merchant Profession
Novice Merchant
- Grants players 1 Vendor to place in any structure that the player owns.
Ad Campaign
- Level 1: Ability to place a waypoint in the description of an item for sale on the Bazaar. (Waypoint to shop)
- Level 2: Customizable Vocalization for vendors
- Level 3: Grants players the ability to place their shop locations on the Planetary Map. A terminal would need to be added near the Merchant trainers to give players access to the Planetary Ad System. Must be maintained.
- Level 4: Word of Mouth - Grants players the ability to hire NPC character for a fixed Weekly Rate for bark advertisement.
Efficiency
- Level 1: ReducedBazaar Fees
- Level 2: Reduced Maintenance on Structures
- Level 3: Reduced Travel Fees
- Level 4: Reduced Maintenance on Vendors
Management
- Level 1: Selective Hiring - Grants players the ability to select from a wide range of Vendors. Random Creation.
- Level 2: Advanced Hiring - Grants players the ability to select form a wider range of Vendors. Customizable
- Level 3: Vendor Placement - Grants players the ability to place a single Vendor on the Planetary Map. This vendor is placed under a tent like structure that must be purchased from an Architect and maintained, but does not count against the players building lot total.
- Level 4: Advanced Plancement - Grants players the ability to place a second Vendor on the Planetary Map. This vendor is placed under a tent like structure that must be purchased from an Architect and maintained, but does not count against the players building lot total.
Hiring
- Each level in this tree grants players an additional Vendor.
Master Merchant
- Reduced Vendor Maintenance. Grants an additional Vendor. Grants an additional Vendor Placement.
The thing here is an attempt to stay profession specific. Artisan: A skilled manual worker or craftperson. (From Yahoo Dictionary)
Without the Miner Profession....where would you place mining. Currently it is in the Artisan Professtion.
That being said....If I am a Master Artisan should I be able to kill a Rancor with a Scout Blaster? Hell, I can't even get the certification in that weapon unless I train some level of Marksman. Therefore, I don't see how anyone can argue that more than just a merchant would be able to own a vendor....unless they spend the Skill Points to train in merchant.
Also, I don't see the arguement as to how a bounty hunter should be able to harvest materials if he is not certified to run a harvester. Anyone should be able to do a simple survey and sample, but nothing more than that. The biggest point here is that there is a definite rift....those who make items and those who use them.
So basically there is NO arguement in my mind to have a Commando, Squad Leader, Creature Handler or Bounty Hunter (And all other professions that have nothing to do with Crafting) to need building lots (lots used for harvesters), but everyone is allowed 1 structure whether it is a small, medium, large house or PA Hall.
Where the real arguement resides is where is the line within the Crafting Professions. I still think that the only way to make the Merchant a Desired or even Viable profession is for it to be the only profession to have vendors. This would make it necessary for other players to make arrangements with merchants to sell their crafted items....unless of course that crafter spends the 6 skill points to train Novice Merchant. That would give a person that wanted to be a pure Merchant a foothold in the Market as it stands. Bazaar should still be capped at 3k. This would allow people to sell a great number of Items on the Bazaar, but would need to locate a merchant to find the really good quality items.
If a money sink needs to be placed into the game...then the only real place to put it is at the Vendor (Merchant Level) and it should be something that the Merchant must pay. A sales tax of sorts is the only real way to do it. Alot of game proplems can be addressed by implementing the above chart. Combat is a different animal and will be addressed accordingly.
Actually Q, this should help drive prices down and cool off the economy somewhat. Right now it's nothing to leave items on a vendor at a given price because right now it really doesn't cost anything to do that, but with the above formula would be merchants will have to consider more carefully their 'price point' to move goods to minimize the vendor maintenance.
However, there might be a problem as this will affect some professions more harshly than others as some professions work closer to the 'break-even' point than others do and some even work in the red to keep product moving.
Perhaps there should be a way to register a vendor, once dropped in the house but before it's initialized, to a partiular profesion or combination of professions or just a general and have somewhat varying maintenance costs based on the registered catagory(s) and only items from those catagories could be posted to that vendor? This way balancing the vendor maintenance could be done by profession rather than by trying to find a balance among disparate professions.
From a role-play perspective though, I can't saythatI'mvery happy with the level of service my vendors are giving me. I instruct them to be cordial with my customers and they'll do so when I tell them to, but they wont hear a word from me as to exactly what to say and they'll stop as soon as they think I'm not looking or paying attention. Every morning when they open up the shop, they always forget to register with the main database and it doesn't get done until I come in for second shift. They insist on wearing street garb and any attempts at getting them to wear a uniform are met with nothing more than smart remarks.
As we are forced to draw these people from the Imperial workforce and the Empire is apparently drawing these people off the street without any training whatsoever, what we pay now seems reasonable. If we are being asked to raise their wages, will their level of service also increase? If you're asking me to pay them something in the range of 10-15k per day rather than 1cr per day, will they now follow my instructions religiously?
I don't mind paying pocket change for street people. I won't mind paying serious credits for professionalisim. But please don't ask me to pay serious credits for lay-about otherwise-homeless street vermin. I can't even get my relatives Sessory and Armis to act like proper vendors due to the pervasive Imperial Labor Force mentality.
An Architect's Perspective:
As a Master Artisan/Architect (and almost Merchant) I can say without a doubt that I'd close my shop with the proposed changes. Until Player Cities are introduced (thus allowing for quick transit to my shop) I simply dont have the customer base / walkthrough to support the $/1000 per 45 mins fee.
Here's an example:
I buy most of my resources, I have a medium house + factory + Fusion (5 lots) leaving 5 lots for heavy extractors. I put all of these on metal, so that I only have to focus on purchasing Ore.
When I buy bulk, I usually pay 2-3cr a unit. So for every 20K of ore I purchase, lets call that 60Kcost.
Each 20K of ore makes exactly 100 structure modules. These can in turn produce 10 walls. Thats enough for 1 large house.
So, lets say I purchase 100K of ore, at 300K credits. I turn this into 500 structure modules, making 50 walls.
From this I produce5 large houses (Assuming I dont critfail, which does happen alot). Lets price these simply at resource cost (3cr a unit), for the sake of this demonstration. Since I harvest my own metal, I'll be making that as my profit (3cr a unit - .5 a unit cost = 2.5cr a unit profit).
A large house takes 37134 resources, at 3cr a unit we'll call that 112K.
So all said and done, my 300K purchase of ore (without calculating maint + power costs), turns into 570K worth of merchandise. Assuming I put all this on my vendor, that turns into a maintenance rate of 570 credits per 45 minutes.
Thats 18240 credits per day, 127680 credits per week to stock5 deeds. This is pricing only at COST 3cr a unit, most Architects sell for alot higher prices (130-250k), and keep a much much much larger stock. I know I've had quite a few items that sit around on my vendor (for weeks at a time) like PA halls, large houses, etc. Most players cannot afford to simply purchase a large house at the drop of a hat.
Most players see the items available, then go out and work toward getting the cash to pay for them. This process can take days (even weeks), during which an item can sit in stock. The player has more incentive to buy from me, because they know the item is there (in stock) and they can see the price in black and white.
I'm still making a profit, but you can see how this rate could affect the novice architect, who doesnt have the 20K credits to pay their vendor every day. What incentive do I have to pay 20K a day for items to sit on my vendor (which doesnt work half the time, and half the merchant skills for them arent implemented) when I can just offer a mail-order service and pocket that cost?
This will only drive many people to close their shops, which in turn will provide less diversity, and force more business to the established crafters who can afford to pay these fees. You'll only make the rich richer and the poor poorer.
Starrbuck,
An absolutely brilliant post. I would agree wholeheartedly that prices have gotten too high. Your rational solution makes sense. There's only one problem: economies aren't rational. The beings involved in a marketplace make decisions that are influenced by emotion. Therefore, when you have an excess money supply (as in SWG currently) inflation occurs. If we were starting from zero, your plan for pricing would work. But at this point, no one will be first to lower prices. If one person lowers prices, even if they have the whole supply chain operating at reasonable rates, there will be too much lag between the time his prices drop and the time the rest of the server begins to lower prices to compete. That first merchant will not be able to survivie because other things he'll want to buy will cost far more than the money he can generate with his reasonable prices.
The other problem with your model, is that you assume you'll sell all your guns right away. Yes, this is the risk that merchants take. We have to choose what stock to carry so that it will sell well and sell fast. Let's use your example of buying the guns from a weaponsmith for 544 and selling them for 999, and you can sell 25 of them each week.
Week 1
Costs of goods: 544*95 = 51,680
Cost of vendor maint.: ((999*95)/1000 * 32)*7 days = 21,258
25 guns sold: 999*25 = 24,975
Profit/(loss) week 1: (-47,963)
Week 2
Cost of vendor maint.: ((999*70)/1000*32)*7days = 15,664
25 guns sold : 999*25 = 24,975
Profit/(loss) week 2: 9,310
Total Profit/(loss): -47,963 + 9,310 = (-38,652)
Week 3
Cost of Vendor maint.: ((999*45)/1000*32)*7days = 10,069
25 guns sold: 999*25 = 24,975
Profit/(loss) week 3: 14,905
Total profit/(loss): -38,652 + 14,905 = (-23,746)
Week 4
Cost of vendor maint.: ((999*20)/1000*32)*7days = 4,475
25 guns sold: 999*25 = 24,975
Profit/(loss) week 4: 20,499
Total profit/(loss): -23,746 + 20,499 = (-3,246)
Week 5 - the merchant breaks even on the gun deal. Sells the last 20 guns and ends up +16,734 on the whole deal. Or does he? Did he travel at all during this time? Did he need to maintain any harvesters for new deals? Did she need to make arrangements to get more stock because she was running out of guns? Did maintenance on the house get paid?
Now let's look at the sales tax, VAT, whatever idea:
Week 1
Costs of goods: 544*95 = 51,680
25 guns sold: 999*25 = 24,975
Tax on sales: 24,975 *.05 = 1,248
Profit/(loss) week 1: 24,975 - 51,680 - 1,248 = (-27,953)
Week 2
25 guns sold : 999*25 = 24,975
Tax on sales: 24,975 *.05 = 1,248
Profit/(loss) week 2: 24,975 - 1,248 = 23,727
Total Profit/(loss): -27,953 +23,727 = (-4,226)
Week 3
25 guns sold: 999*25 = 24,975
Tax on sales: 24,975 *.05 = 1,248
Profit/(loss) week 3: 24,975 - 1,248 = 23,727
Total profit/(loss): -4,226+ 23,727 = 19,500
The maintenance on the house gets paid, the vendor travels, and they are able to feed the economy by buying other things instead of sitting on their hands and waiting for a profit to turn up.
In my opinion I think there should be a sales tax per sale and not a set % for placing items on the vendor. I am a droid engineer and I put plenty of droids on my vendor that do not sell very often. Plus you figure most DE droids are gonna be in excess of 10k. Why should we pay jus placing items that may not sell? If there is gonna be a charge for placing items on vendors, Ill jus drop my merchant line and do away with my vendor. I will sell port to port.
Hyla Crucifer
Droid Engineer, Radiant
My opinion on this is that IF you do this, do it right.
1) fix the vendors first
a) fix the "retrieve item" hang
b) fix the "vendor turns the other way and faces the wall" bug
2) Make sure you validate the Merchant skill rather than hosing an already near-worthless skill even more
a) Merchants should receive an immediate discout on vendors, and this discount should become greater the higher level they are
b) make merchant xp meaningful. The current system is rediculous. You simply place a vendor and xp start accumulating for doing nothing! you don't even need to sell anything! rediculous. Make merchant xp based only on sales. Simply placing a vendor and paying maintenence should earn you little or no xp.
3) I would suggest not making the fee based on the amount of $$$ in the vendor. This unfairly penalizes certain professions. One of the newest, biggest problems if people haven't noticed is SPAM in big cities. There are so many people yelling and hawking their wares its impossible to have a conversation and I think this contributes to lag as well. If you discourage the use of vendors even further, this problem gets much worse. I would suggest a flat fee for a vendor. My suggestion is a vendor should cost the same maintenence as for example a small harvester. Around 1k a day or so regardless of what you have in it.
Anyone still reading this? I am an Architect.. I made one large house that took a week to sell at 130k (not an outrageous price) - at your suggested rate I wouldn't even come close to making money on that house. If people were lined up then I might be able to raise prices but they simply aren't.
I would like to stay in business - seriously - make it a tax!
ALSO - if you decide to use a timed charge please use 30 mins or 60 mins - 45 mins is just annoying.
Avogadro
I don't mind an additional money sink, but the fact that it is based on time is what bothers me. Merchants/Crafters are already spending a ton of time surveying, checking and maintaining harvestors, crafting, and stocking/restocking their vendors. The vendor fees will force Merchants to limit their stock to reduce the vendor fee. This will result in constant inventory maintenance on our vendors for many of us. I understand that money sinks are needed, but time is just as valuable, if not more. I don't know about anybody else, but I would like to spend some time exploring these beautiful planets. I would like to be involved in the different story arcs. I would like to try the themeparks. But if I have to spend all my time just running a store, that makes this game one dimensional. As a suggestion, I would prefer a flat fee. A certain percentage between 5 and 10 percent of the listed cost of the item. This would provide a money sink, but not a time sink.
I have no slots I run a business large building cantina, 4 warehouses. I pay a lot of maintenance and I don't produce anything to offset that cost. I'm in a service industry.
I do have vendors and I need them for storage since the storage decision was very poorly made and hasn't been alleviated yet.
But making people pay daily maintenance on a building to store things, and then on a vendor to store things sounds like a double charge for the same thing. You pay twice for shelf space. Senseless.
Look at ways to deal with millionaire scouts and pistoleers that go to endor for 50k credits in a day and tax producers for sales to cover crafters of both raw and finished goods since you already tax us for maintaining all buildings and objects.
This vendor tax wouldn't fly in the real world doesn't seem to make sense here for a sustainable economy.
Friends,
I have to agree. I don't sell enough to keep harvesters running. All of the Weaponsmiths have much higher sales on our server and with more getting Master Weaponsmith every day, Weapon Costs are going to keep going down. I sell mainly Crates of Weapon Powerups and those are few and far between on sales, and those are mostly off the Bazaar.
If this Vendor Fee goes into place, I see a lot more hand selling, a lot less "merchants" and most items being sold on the Bazaar. We will definately not see people having multiple Vendors, which will completely invalidate the Vendor Tree.
Holo, reconsider this tax. I have no problem with "paying" my employees a fair wage. but more than I actually make?
A maintinence fee is fine, but what you propose is probably the stupidest thing Ive come across in a while.
A. The Merchant class is barely functional now. FIX before you NERF. How many lessons of mishandling classes do you need before it sinks in?
B. 1000 cr for 45minutes? Are you that insane? I propose you add a skill to the medic profession - Dev rectal cranial separation procedure.
Yes I am being harsh. Yes you are clearly not thinking ANY of this out to even begin to propose something so ludicrous. Yes you need to go back to the drawing board and rethink this A LOT. Yes you should FIX the class before you NERF it.