Merchant Archive
Thread: Pleading on behalf non-Merchants
Balkstar wrote:
Can you promise me you will hit the "permentantly switch off vending" button on the vendor when you model clothes? Oh thats right. there is none.
Correct. So the situation we have here is that there are two dev oversights which conveniently nullify each other if one is used correctly.
1) Vendors can be retained by non-merchants.
2) Tailors have no way to display clothes without vendors.
Someday, of course, both oversights will be rectified.
In the meantime, where some might see coincidence, I see providence....
GoCanes wrote:
p4Samwise wrote:Each schematic is worth 1000 items, and you can make a buttload of schematics. Just ask the top weaponsmiths - on the day of the experimentation change, some of them stockpiled enough "temp nerf" schematics (using resources that they had in sufficient quantities to never worry about running out) to last them YEARS, even with the high volumes they sell their wares at. Never underestimate the power of hundreds of lot trades. They could drop weaponsmith and continue to use every single one of those schematics without interruption.I was one of the crafters that took advantage of the one day experimentation change before they nerfed it back to it's current design... Schematics are essentially items, so just having schematics is not the point of all this (or at least that's my point of view)... The problem is that non-Merchants are using a "skill" that they no longer have... If Merchants could produce vendors as items and sell them, it would be similar to the hording of schematics, but the fact of the matter is that placing a vendor, advertising on the planetary map, etc... are all skills granted to Merchants in the skill tree, not items that can be sold/traded...
The skill is creating or placeing a vendor. If you drop Merchant you can no longer create or place a vendor. You have lost the skill. The vendor remains. As does the schematic. Such is life. Now that being said the DEVs have already said that they made a design mistake and it will be fixed. Such is life.
-Indene-
Can't we just cut to the chase..
P4Samwise - You seem reasonably intelligent.. I sincerely doubt that you are arguing the point that a bug which grants most of the major skills of this proffession freely to anyone who chooses to exploit it should be left in so that tailors can use vendors to model clothing.. I'm not going to bother arguing the flaws in that point, as I'm damn certain you are already well aware of them... I kinda get the impression that you are pretty much arguing just for the sake of arguing (perhaps with Balkster particularily)..I realize that he induces that reaction out of many people, but it would still be nice to see an end to this discussion eventually..
Perhaps if we step outside this particular paradigm for a moment using a hypothetical..
Say for the sake of argument (as though there isn't enough of that), that there is an interior designer proffession in the game, and has been since beta.. Now let's say that the interior designers get the /move commands at novice, and no one else gets them.. (Yes I know that would piss everyone off, and I'm not suggesting we do that, just a hypothetical).. My question to you is this.. In this situation, would you still believe that the home decor bug/exploit was a perfectly acceptable thing to do? Please explain your answer..
p4Samwise wrote:
It'd be impossible, because the home decor exploit in the real world requires use of the /move commands.
But to make the assumption that it didn't: are normal players allowed to drop items in their houses? If not, then I'd say that dropping items in a house by means of a bug would be an exploit, because it gives that player a storage advantage.
If normal players ARE allowed to drop items in their houses, just not /move them,then I'd say a bug that allows them to move items up and down (e.g. to put a bottle ON a table instead of INSIDE it)would be fine, because it really makes logical sense within the game world that a bottle dropped on a table would land on the table, and doesn't afford any sort of advantage in terms of item storage over qualified Interior Designers. If anything, the situation that puts the bottle INSIDE the table would be the bug, and those who can work around that bug should be lauded, not condemned.
Now, if normal players aren't allowed to drop items in their houses, but Interior Designers are, I'd find no fault with someone dropping items in his house while an Interior Designer and then leaving the decor as it is. After all, if another Interior Designer had done the decorating and dropped the skills, it wouldn't be fair to the customer to have thedecor suddenly vanish - why should thefinished product go awayjust because the skill to create it did? Is it an "exploit" to takeNovice Interior Designer, do a quick decor job, and then drop the skill?Is that person getting the Interior Designer skill for nothing? I'd say not:
1) That person is no longer able to decorate his/her home, or use it to store new items. Or,for that matter, retrieve items from storage and then put them back (or possibly even retrieve them at all, depending on how the system works)! All the items that have been dropped are locked in that position; they have become part of the house.
2)Presumably, some work was done to get toInterior Designer in the first place. Any skills used after that point were earned fair and square. After the skill points were reclaimed, the skills can no longer be used, but the fruits of those skills are fair reward for having attained the skills, just as a retired weaponsmith canstill use her old guns, and a retiredrifleman canlounge on a pile of looted force crystals and holocrons.
Of course, the question we should all be asking at this point is why the Interior Designerprofession has been designed in such a way as to make it a gating factor for people who are trying to contribute to the game world. Perhaps instead of having the sole ability to place items in homes, the Interior Designer should have special skills that enhance that already-existing ability (like the ability to push a house past its normal storage limits, or an improved interface for home decor), and the soleability to craft snazzy new items of decor? It never made much sense to me that Architecture = Furniture.
I do not like the Interior Decorator analogy, because it affects players so personally. Most people take pride in decorating they homes in any MMORPG, so I cannot seea profession like that having legs.
I believe, Samwise, that you still have trouble understanding goods from tools. In the case of an Interior Decorator, their goods are the services rendored to the customer a nicely vertically decorated room, like a sliced weaponfrom a smuggler, or a face lift from an ID. Their tools are the ability to use the /move up command.In using that tool, they can provide the good that the customer is looking for. That good will last as long as, say, an unused T21 rifle, a hair change, a heal from a doctor or medic... on and on and on, even after the supplier of the good has moved on to other things.
You need to realize that as it stands now (and TH has said this in 2 seperate conversations) vendors are a means, not the ends.
Balkstar wrote:
I believe, Samwise, that you still have trouble understanding goods from tools.
I understand the terms perfectly well, and the argument that you've built around them, but since they have every appearance of being an artificial distinction generated solely to support your pre-existing stance on this issue, I don't give them a lot of weight. 
You did hit the nail on the head regarding the "legs" of the Interior Design profession, though. That's the main reason I can't be too quick to condemn "vendor poaching" - a great deal of its potential uses really seem to me to be in the same category as interior decorating. In particular, the entire Hiring branch is essentially giving you interior decorating skills (since there's no difference whatsoever between the different vendor levels except theirappearance in your shop), and the same is true to some extent of the Management branch (since one might place extra vendors in the same spacefor aesthetic rather than business reasons).
To me, that's leagues away from using those "poached" vendors to maintain an interplanetary trade empire.
MasterJian wrote:
Say for the sake of argument (as though there isn't enough of that), that there is an interior designer proffession in the game, and has been since beta.. Now let's say that the interior designers get the /move commands at novice, and no one else gets them.. (Yes I know that would piss everyone off, and I'm not suggesting we do that, just a hypothetical).. My question to you is this.. In this situation, would you still believe that the home decor bug/exploit was a perfectly acceptable thing to do? Please explain your answer..
Im personally very interested in what merchants think the effects will be if after a period of grace all of these vendors are removed. Id like to do a pro con analysis, not only regarding the merchant proffession but also likley effects on the economy.
Pro
Certainly there will be less people who keep empty vendors, except most of the empty vendors on the map are from people who have left the game for a long period of time, and who quite possibly have cancelled accounts. However it would stop people using merchant for storage.
The equality argument, that people will have to get skill points that people who arnt using the exploit have. I can see this, Soe can see this too and are likley to be very happy with the idea as it seriously encourages people to go and get a second account. Just as a view here as soon as publish 10 hits and people go mad getting jedi, the secondary slots opened are likley to be full of merchant/doctor characters.
Thismay make merchant a viable proffession in its own right, i dont know what the stats are but i think its likley that 70% of people currently use the exploit.
This would encourage co-operation, this change will only benifit independent merchants who are allready cornering certain markets, over peoples dead bodies are they about to give merchants 10% of their profits when selling there T21's etc. PA's Player cities etc will simply make a merchant for them, i still feel this is not going to make merchant particually viable.
It may make items easier to find due to reducing the number of vendors on the planetary map.
Cons
A massive increase in bazaar sales, this will not help a already lagging database, it could in fact make the bazzar unworkable.
Huge increase in spam around coronet as people will hawk their wares in spacial, a probable large rise in spam e-mails too.
This is another fix that benifits the established and will make it increasingly hard for newer crafters,
That this is seen as money for nothing by people and will cause a lot of resentment towards the merchant class, people who craft items are unlikley to give them to anyone they dont know. I dont feel that this change will make any difference at all in any way to current merchants because of the following principle, there is not going to be less items produced. Theres may be a change from smaller houses to larger malls, but no one will be able to say 'I want to make money I know ill become a merchant.' Merchant will only ever be a support career to those who are producing, reading through the boards there seems to be the idea that there will be reselling involved, again I say people will not produce something to be sold at a mark up. Indeed consumers are far more likley to go direct to crafters as they know there is no mark up. Merchants will still be the providence of people who either craft, or produce resources on mass.
This will hurt player cities, any decrease in goods sold from vendors (which is likley as there will be less) avoids sales tax which cities need to survive.
In summary I am concerned by this change as i am not sure....and am interested in peoples views, what merchants really want out of this other than people to have to use skill points up. There dosent seem to be any real benifit to the profession, there are very very few real merchants and obviously they have the loudest voices on these boards, but do recall the outrage over the proposed crafting changes where the majority carried it.
The only viable alternatives Ive heard are to allow merchants to craft vendors for sale, this makes sence but views that then these merchants should funnel back funds are just ridiculous. If you get this however welcome back to square 1, you will still have the same issues, everyone getting the benifits without the skill points.
Calfek wrote:
oh and just as aside, just because ive dropped my WS and Chef skill points dosent mean i dont still have crates and crates of food and weapons set aside. No other artisan based career loses the benifits of what its already done, why should merchant.
Try to make another weapon after you've lost the skill to do so. (Don't even think about saying "a manufacturing schematic"..that doesn't count it is already produced. Running the 1000 items from it can be done by anyone..but when it is gone..it is gone it doesn't just keep producing items forever. The point is you can't make another one.
The skill in weaponsmith is about making new weapons. The skill in merchant is about selling things with a vendor. That is what we do on a day to day basis to make our money.
erm...exactly...... thats the point im trying to make.....I cant make another vendor, I cant make a T21 either, dosent mean i still dont have the benifits of my weapons. So why would i have no benifit left from merchant.
This is true of BE, DE, WS, AS, ARCH, Chef, Tailor etc, etc in all of these professions you do recieve benifit after the event. Even more so with schematics. If i make as a chef 50 1000 use brandy schematics then that will encroach on chef business all over the server, but chefs dont complain.
The reason its an issue for merchants is that in merchant there is nothing else, theres only the vendors, thats why merchants are so possessive. If you had ability to use the bazzar more or extra lots or anything else other than vendors then this wouldnt be an issue.
Calfek wrote:
Just to clarify...I dont want to be able to make new merchants i dont think thats fair.
I only wish to be able to use those i already have.
As it is my merchants are named fine service foods and Barman, Ive now dropped chef how much use will they be in a months time, but I still have a huge reserve of chef items to sell. Saying that now youve dropped merchant the vendors should go poof is exactly equivilent of saying all that food should dissapear too.
However this is not the main thrust of my argument, I was more concerned with what your views are on what will happed should non pointed vendors be removed. So far all there seems to be is a general view that it will be 'better' I am genuinally interested in your views on how it would effect the economy, especially in realation to the bazzar, increased spam and player cities.
First your point isn't valid. The skill of a weaponsmith is to make weapons. The skill of a merchant is NOT to make vendors it is to sell things. Vendorsare the tool we are granted access to to accomplish that goal. Just as weaponsmiths are given draft schematics to accomplishtheir goal. That is the point. Trying to equate a vendor with a weapon you made with your skill isn't right. It is closer to the weapon when related to the combat profession that has a certification for it. You give up the skill you lose the cert and the weapon becomes ineffectual for you because your goal is to fight and the weapon is a tool granted to you.
Its hard to judge exactly what will happen in the next few months because there is going to be a lot of changes that will effect the economy. The first one will be the end of the Holocron Grind which will have a ripple effect through the entire game. Some good things will come from that ending and some bad (resources prices are likely to drop again becasue of lower demand for one thing)
I don't think the revocation of vendors that aren't being held my active merchants will ruin the economy. I think people will still sell things. They will have a choice on how to do it. Some will sell more on the bazaar. I don't fear that will tax the bazaar system all that much for a few reasons, one of which is that the vendors and the bazaar use the same database connections. The second is that they are rewriting the bazaar/vendor backend code night now to make it more efficient.
Some crafters will get enough skills back to sell their items themselves (they only need 9 Skill points if they are an Artisan already and 24 if they aren't) That gives them one vendor that isn't pretty but it works just as well as 6 NPC vendors do at this point. The only thing they lose is customization and advertising. If they want those skills they can free up some points for merchant.
Others will look more closely at door to door sales or even *gasp* wholesale. Its not for everyone but it doesn't have to be.
Some will probably get mad and quit. I can't stop them and neither can any one else. You cannot avoid any change that someone might quit over. You end up with a stagnant, broken game that everyone quits.
The Spam in major cities doesn't bother me so I can't speak to it. To me people yelling trying to sell their stuff is part of the atmosphere of a large city and its far better than the silence of abandoned cities.
Player cities.. well I know my player city will have at least 6-7 vendors in it. Other cities will as well. More than half the vendors I go to are empty. I wonder how many of those are owned without the skill points to operate them? ANy of those that are removed by this change will be a good thing.