Merchant Archive
Thread: Merchant Correspondant List (Week 3)
marqie wrote:
5 - Open (Looking for something I may have missed)
well i would definatly also push the clothes...
but what bugs me more is the TIME LIMITS... it has really been a pain this week....
i stocked my vendors at odd hours last week...so here i am 3 planets away and i strt getting emails...my first thought is oh cool someone is in my shop...by the 10th one i new it was the items purging...so i trekked back to reload it as soon as i could...sigh 40 items...so then i get it loaded and no sooner do i take a shuttle off world do i get 20 more emails...sign, the other vendor...so i go do it..and then go on a harvetsor run since i am back on the planet....once i get 4ooo Km away i start getting emails again from the other half of the items...anyway you get the idea...it was two days of needless hasssle....and i have it to look forward to again next week
the thing is nothing tells me how long they have left as far as i know so its just a mystry when items are going to come off..
my suggestions i sto either delete the time limits period or extend them
And that problem is, that whether and item is sold on the bazzar or on my vendor, they look like bazzar sales. If I sell something on a vendor, I would like to know the following things.
1. What vendor was used to browse and purchase the item.
2. What vendor actually had the item that was purchased.
P.S. I love the idea of a slide scale for the purchase of resources at a cpu price!!!
Ok, here are my thoughts on the merchant profession.
First off, it's silly to be able to get merchant exp so easily. I opened a shop, added a vendor, sent some spam, and do get the occasional visitor, but for the most part my shop is rarely visited and not at all popular, and I somehow manage to crank out the merchant xp at breakneck speed. I have a friend who did the same, only he hired 2 vendors, and his merchant xp is through the roof. This is just stupid.
Second, and possibly this is because of the above, so many of the merchant "perks" seem completely worthless and are just a waste of skill points. I mean reduced bazar fees? additional vendors? come on! You have to burn a ton of skill points, getting nothing useful in return, until you finally make it to where you get added to the map, and reduced maintenence on harvesters, those are the ONLY useful things in the whole profession imho.
My suggestions:
1) Make people actually "work at" being a merchant to get merchant xp. To me this means you get xp for people visiting your store and buying things from you, and that's it! Nothing for simply adding and maintaining a vendor etc. I think this would likely have a very positive side effect of people putting more emphasis on stores, and dragging people out of the city occasionally.
2) make the perks better. Here are some that come to mind:
a) more slots in the global bazar according to merchant skill.
b) ability of, say master merchants, to add a vendor in a city (maybe in a designated area or something).
c) more lots (useable only for adding buildings) for merchants according to skill. So for example the experienced merchant may be able to run some harvesters, and still have lots available to open 2 or 3 shops on different planets.
I have mentioned this elsewhere but I'm going to again. I'd really like the merchants to be able to get bodyguards through their hiring skills. I could chuck my own combat skills in favor of getting all of merchant.
It a little side thing but I'd like to be able to set up muzak to play in the shop just as it does in the merchant trainers office.
You somewhat wont have to have NPC vendors in cities once player cities get started up. You can just have a store in the city.
I think we've got a great Merchant correspondant as I agree with the list from the start. I would say that for #5, we need to worry about the "Merchant is useless" problem (I love be a merchant, but feel the same way... In fact, the ONLY reason I spent skill points on Ad IV is for the title of propagandist.) As you gain levels in merchant, there is nothing "new" to do. It's just more of the same...
Here's my idea:
One of my favorite aspects of being a merchant is marketing. Imagine I have the best blasters in town, and I want to market them. I could spendmy time coming up with witty descriptions of items to put in the vendor (which I do, and is my favorite thing in the game so far)... but no one reads them. I could run through the town /shouting, but that's annoying. I pay entertainers and medics to market my goods, but they do it for 10 seconds and stop. I could name a droid "buyHyuusPistols" but I get maybe one word and no spaces. The banner/sign on my store and my vendor name gives me maybe one or two words... How do I tell thegalaxy about"HyuuTech RatBlaster Pistols: You've got WompRats, we've got answers?"
How about allowing us to do advertising. Say, since we have artisan skills to become merchants,Adv II merchants can craft "Flyers" (stackable, and crafted in stacks, up to 20 at a time based on experimentation)- these flyers are datapad objects thatopen like missions. (Theyopen to a new window where we can put long text, they have a "rotating image" in the corner, andif we provide waypoints, they give the coords aswell as a "500m tothe East"status.) At level II, we can craft them and sell them in our vendors, ortrade with people to give them away. [They would, of course, be subject to the profanity filter.]
At Advertising IV,merchants couldmake stacks of flyers that are"equipable", likea melee weapon, and whensomeone witha stack of flyersequippeddouble clicks on a PC, the default action is "hand flyer" - this thengives them a window that says "Hyuu is trying to hand you a flyer, do you want to accept it?" - much like the trade window, but would instantly put it in the datapad anddisplay the flyer.[This window does not come up if the person is "/ignore"d]
The flyers could also act as coupons, by saying "Offer this flyer back to the vendor100 credits to recieve a 100 credit rebate on any item!"
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This message brought to you by HyuuTech: Imperial quality goods at Rebel prices!
I'd like to see ad. 4 become Items listed on a private vendor also show up in the bazaar of the closest town.
I also think there are few true merchants as opposed to outlet stores. I have no real idea's honestly as to how to fix this particular problem. It just seems to me that every artisan/crafter also takes some merchant skill to sell their wares, as compared to a true merchant who doesn't create, only buys from one and sells to another for a profit.
Another thought I have is to replace some non/poorly working skill with the ability to offer vendors in a consignment function. I don't pay the crafter, I collect a fee from the crafter to list his items on my vendor, the crafter gets paid when he sells. Operates just like the bazaar, just no price cap.
Perhaps just make ad.4 work and give the ability toappear in the bazaar to master merchants. In my opinion I see no reason to become master level as it is.
I'd like to see more land doled out somewhere for those that would like to try to have a shop by multiple towns/on multiple planets. I'd like to see some business specific buildings, strip malls or walk in malls for example.( Although I will concede that more land is only really needed if you plan on having harvesters, making you probably a crafter/seller instead of true merchant.
On a final note I'd like to see the future politician skill tree be an offshoot of merchant. Politicos sell lies after all, and lets face it, its the heads of major corps. and the rich people that run things anyway. 
"In my opinion I see no reason to become master level as it is."
You get a C3PO!!!!!!
Ad barking does not seem to remain on for long..I have to refresh it each day...which is not good since all my clothing items are now 'unidentified items' and no one is looking under the proper catergoy. I am having my vendors remind ppl to look under 'all' when shopping lol....but when I'm offline who knows if they are doing it.
Also *poke* Hiring 4 (dressing vendors) still not working
We still need to have our Planetary Ad Campaign last more than 18 hours. Everyone has to log in each morning and UNREGISTER, then REGISTER. That defeats the purpose especiallyif you have offworld vendors.
Stettin Palver - Master Weaponsmith - Chilastra - Corellia/Coronet, 275 -5959