Merchant Archive
Thread: Keep merchant as a profession, but not required to have vendors.
So what you need to do is take advantage of the game mechanic that gives you a better outlet for your merchandise at the cost of skill points.
ofim wrote:
Unfortunalty the bazaar is gimped with an unrealistic price cap, if it were not for that insanely low cap I would most definitly use it,as it's the best mass distribution system the game has.
The game is built around this trade-off.
Balancing your desire to be able to do something (soloing krayts, killing jedi, building weapons, or running a business) with the skill points you have been allocated.
The game gives you enough points to do more than ONE thing, but you are not meant to be able to do EVERY thing.
Wire3k wrote:
#1 - That would be the profession that was based on splitting the natural 'payoff' of crafting, i.e., selling into another profession - right?
No its the merchant profession we have right now.
It would have made FAR more sense to have kept miner and farmer around - than merchant as a class.
Maybe. But they didn't and this is what we are left with.
And other professions DO allow it, indeed - with factories - you could produce anything at all your little heart desires with NO skill - EVER.
WRONG. You have to have the crafting skills to make the appropriate schematics to feed the factory OR you can get someone with the proper skills to make that schematic for you.
This is like saying - oh - you can kill that Krayt dragon - but you better have someone with a looter profession to actually open the corpse and get the goodies.
No you actually have to have the appropriate combat skills to take part in those types of activites or youcould settling for meatlump loot.
Scout for skinning is bad enough - but at least that isn't something everyone wants or expects to do.
You need to challenge this on the scout forum. People actually do want to have this skill. They make tons of money doing it. Its their right to protect that skill by limiting its use to those that are qualified to use it. If you prefer to use a real-life arguement, I dare say that if I were to throw down a rabbit carcass and ask to see everyone skin it, most would fail miserably.
Believe me - everyone that produces items wants to have reasonable means of having a chance to distribute them.
Nothing is stopping them. They can aquire the necessary skills it takes to get a vendor or they can use the bazaar or they can spam or they can use the trade forum.
Merchant is NOT a profession, it's a natural and integral part of other activies.
Yes it is. There is an appropriateskill tree that says so.
You CAN play merchant if you like - but believe me, it was never intended to be anything other than a skillpoint sink.
I can and I do. I can't help that its was never intended for this or that. Just as much as I can't help that vendors were never intended to be used as someone's basement.
Anyone not 'serious' isn't a threat to your business anyway, you are simply removing potential buying opportunities for resale to YOURSELF.
But they do inconvience the player base who want to do some shopping and clutter the planet with junk. Those that aren't serious about having vendors already come to me with their wares to offer me or my vendor.
#2 - Empty vendors are being addressed (only good part of this mess) so this is a moot point. And so what if someone wants to toss their loot on a vendor - as a MERCHANT - that gives you buyng opportunities you'd probably get no other way.
People who are "serious" about making money with their loot will continue to do so. They will take any of the options I have mentioned above. I don't believe there will be a shortage of looters in the near future. However, the extinction of the looter/casual vendor operator is a needed change IMO.
Message Edited by MaDuece on 08-14-2004 02:49 PM
Elyssa wrote:
So what you need to do is take advantage of the game mechanic that gives you a better outlet for your merchandise at the cost of skill points.
ofim wrote:
Unfortunalty the bazaar is gimped with an unrealistic price cap, if it were not for that insanely low cap I would most definitly use it,as it's the best mass distribution system the game has.
The game is built around this trade-off.
Balancing your desire to be able to do something (soloing krayts, killing jedi, building weapons, or running a business) with the skill points you have been allocated.
The game gives you enough points to do more than ONE thing, but you are not meant to be able to do EVERY thing.
I fail to see why I should have to when I can loot a corpse with out wasting extra skill points. They could atleast make merchant a "novice" profession there for reducing the SP cost to acuire it.
Again... game mechanic.
ofim wrote:
I fail to see why I should have to when I can loot a corpse with out wasting extra skill points. They could atleast make merchant a "novice" profession there for reducing the SP cost to acuire it.
It requires more skill points so that access to it is limited.
If vendors were easy to have, everyone would have them (after the fix).
MaDuece wrote:
ofim wrote:
I fail to see why I should have to when I can loot a corpse with out wasting extra skill points. They could atleast make merchant a "novice" profession there for reducing the SP cost to acuire it.
Lets see you give up TKM and go loot a Borvo thug or one of Nym's Elite. The more combat skill you have, the better the loot you get.
So, the less merchant skills you have, the fewer options you should have to sell your stuff, i.e. the bazaar or trade forum.
I do have less options IE I can no longer chance the vendor location or do any of the other merchant profession "special" abilities. But I still mantain the use of my vendor, just like I can use a T-21 without rifleman without the "special" abilties, I can do it, I'm just not as effective at it.
ofim wrote:
I do have less options IE I can no longer chance the vendor location or do any of the other merchant profession "special" abilities. But I still mantain the use of my vendor, just like I can use a T-21 without rifleman without the "special" abilties, I can do it, I'm just not as effective at it.
Without merchant skills, you will still be able to sell merchandise.
Because of the limits on the bazaar, you just won't be as effective at it.
ofim wrote:
I do have less options IE I can no longer chance the vendor location
Noone can. Not even master merchants.
or do any of the other merchant profession "special" abilities. But I still mantain the use of my vendor,
Which you shouldn't be able to.
just like I can use a T-21 without rifleman without the "special" abilties, I can do it, I'm just not as effective at it.
Just like the bazaar is a less effective way of being a merchant.
Elyssa wrote:
Again... game mechanic.
ofim wrote:
I fail to see why I should have to when I can loot a corpse with out wasting extra skill points. They could atleast make merchant a "novice" profession there for reducing the SP cost to acuire it.
It requires more skill points so that access to it is limited.
If vendors were easy to have, everyone would have them (after the fix).
Exactly. Merchant is nothing more than a skill point sink to screw crafters. Give Elite crafting professions 1 vendor at novice(bazaar style is fine by me) with 150 item limit, then it will be a game machanic and the merchants wont have the right to complain about it.
ofim wrote:
Exactly. Merchant is nothing more than a skill point sink to screw crafters. Give Elite crafting professions 1 vendor at novice(bazaar style is fine by me) with 150 item limit, then it will be a game machanic and the merchants wont have the right to complain about it.
I disagree.
My original point in this thread was that Merchant Skill gives you the knowledge to have employees (vendors).
Anyone can build something and sell it as a one-person operation through the bazaar.
If you want "employees" (vendors) you must possess the skill to manage them.
The game mechanic simulates this by requiring you to spend skill points.
Elyssa wrote:
ofim wrote:
I do have less options IE I can no longer chance the vendor location or do any of the other merchant profession "special" abilities. But I still mantain the use of my vendor, just like I can use a T-21 without rifleman without the "special" abilties, I can do it, I'm just not as effective at it.
Without merchant skills, you will still be able to sell merchandise.
Because of the limits on the bazaar, you just won't be as effective at it.
I didn't have to give up my T-21 when i droped rifleman, why should i have to give up my vendorif i drop merchant.
ofim wrote:
Exactly. Merchant is nothing more than a skill point sink to screw crafters.
Merchant gives someone the abiity to efficeintly and effectively deliver a wide variety of goods to a wide variety of customers.
Give Elite crafting professions 1 vendor at novice(bazaar style is fine by me) with 150 item limit, then it will be a game machanic and the merchants wont have the right to complain about it.
As a master WS you have novice artisan anyways. To spend the extra 9 skills points is most certainly reasonable. Now whether or not the limit at business 3 is reason is yet to be determined. But 150 items at that level seems good to me.
You gave up the ability to kill effectively with that T21. Just like you should have to give up the ability to be an effective merchant.
ofim wrote:
I didn't have to give up my T-21 when i droped rifleman, why should i have to give up my vendorif i drop merchant.
Elyssa wrote:
ofim wrote:
Exactly. Merchant is nothing more than a skill point sink to screw crafters. Give Elite crafting professions 1 vendor at novice(bazaar style is fine by me) with 150 item limit, then it will be a game machanic and the merchants wont have the right to complain about it.
I disagree.
My original point in this thread was that Merchant Skill gives you the knowledge to have employees (vendors).
Anyone can build something and sell it as a one-person operation through the bazaar.
If you want "employees" (vendors) you must possess the skill to manage them.
The game mechanic simulates this by requiring you to spend skill points.
And the point of every elite crafters argumentis that we have a limited right to some sort of realistic way to sell our goods. I love how the 5 people who give a damn about merchant point to the bazaar like the holy grail for thier argumant.
A bazaar terminal "vendor"is a vending machine not an employee.
You don't even have to be logged in to gain the xp to master merchant yet you ask forprotection like it was so hard to do.
Merchant is the apitomy of AFK professions as the only time you have to actualy put any effort in to it to master is when you have to hunt down a trainer.Yet you complain that people are "stealing" your skills.what arewe stealing, something you didn't even have to work for in the first place? And before you start on how it takes effort to master merchant, I was a master merchant, it take ZERO effort.
Untill SOE puts a system in place to make merchants work for thier profession, it's nothing more than a joke on crafters. A good start would be only gaining xp from sales and eliminating entrance fees.