Merchant Archive

Been reading a few posts here (I love the ones about "Pure Merchants", and getting rid of the Artisan vendors...LOL!)...seems like you folks are kinda going about things the wrong way. Numtini (sp) seems to have the right idea about enhancing your class.

The way I see it, the reason why Merchants are rather useless at the moment is that they have nothing to offer. The argument of removing vendors from Artisans is moot, as any yo-yo can just skill up to Novice Merchant, instead of staying a Business 3. So what's the point? It's not like Merchant is a hard class...heck, it takes no work. You plop down a vendor, and get XP.

Personally, I'm of the opinion that Merchant is not a stand-alone profession...of course, I'm also of the opinion that there is NO stand-alone profession. All professions are there for people to take whatever skills they want and use 'em. I myself went up the Hiring tree because I wanted nice vendors...but that's besides the point.

What Merchants need is a progression of skills. "Vendor" skill is already a step forward. "Hiring" is another. However, we need an "Efficiency" skill. Those 4 crappy Efficiency boxes are junk...Merchants should just get a flat reduction across ALL items that require maintenance...from Harvesters all the way to Vendors, and on to Houses. Anything a Merchant places with a maintenance cost should have its cost reduced via an Efficiency skill. Get Efficiency 10, and you have 10% off everything... etc. etc. etc. By the time anyone gets Efficiency 4, like many have said so eloquently, the reduction in maintenance is insignificant.

Another skill...Advertising. A Novice Merchant should be allowed to have a customized "Greeting" on his vendors that is triggered when that Vendor is "Used". This would allow someone to put upa vendor that says "Don't click me, Id on't have anything...", or "Hi, I'm the Melee weapons vendor, I sell only Melee weapons." The 2nd thing a a Novice Merchant should have is a customized Ad-bark "vendor". Basically, a "thing" you could put in your shop that SHOUTS something every X amount of time. This message can be customized. Now, where the Advertising skill comes in as how FAR this Shout actually goes. Get Advertising 100, and everybody within 1,000m will hear the Ad-bark. Perhaps this is difficult to implement...who knows...perhaps we'll end up with a whole ton of spam...again, who knows. (Ad-barking vendors already generating a ton of spam, by the way).

Also linked to the Advertising skill line should be the ability to register on the global map. On top of this, there should be some sort of "Bulletin Board" in each city, where a Merchant (ONLY) can register himself, and an advertisement. This could work like a mission terminal..."Use" the bulletin terminal, find a shop you want to visit, and click "Create Waypoint" and you get a waypoint to it. Pretty simple stuff, but it could generate lots of traffic. AND it would give Merchants a huge advantage. (Even if Artisans placed vendors, nobody knows where they are or what they sell...nobody runs out 1000m from the city just to look around and hope to spot a vendor...no, they say "I want a T21" and aggressively seek out where the nearest T21 vendor is.) Plus, the "sorting" on this bulleting board could be dependant on Advertising Skill. The guys with Advertising 100 would come out on top...the guys with Advertising 10 would be down in the dumps.

What I'd LOVE to see is a Delivery skill. Basically, the ability to transfer items long distances. This would make Merchants INCREDIBLY useful. Make the fee very high to begin with, then lower the fee with more Delivery skill. Want to send something to Lok? Great...that'll be 3,000 credits. Oh, wait, Master Merchant wants to send something to Lok? Oh, sir, that's only 300 credits for you. Not only would this work to send items to PCs, but also to stock vendors from afar, if needed. This would give Merchants a lot of power in creating "satellite" shops. Plant a Large House on Naboo, put down a vendor there, then place a Small house on Corellia and Tatooine and place vendors there. You can move items around instantly, paying a small sur-charge, and be able to attack the market, when the market's hot. Run out of stock on Tatooine, but you've got 3 left on Corellia, and a customer REALLY wants that Wookie Wristwrap? No problem...Fed-Ex it.

So, in my opinion, the Merchant profession should have Delivery, Efficiency, Advertising, and Management (Vendor/Hiring) trees, each with their own progression of skills.

A Merchant tweaked out like this would have SOOOO much marketing power over the lowly Artisan vendor, that you would hardly give a sheezle. And seriously, NONE of this would be exploitable, or cause any sort of class imbalance. It would just give a Merchant advantages in areas where Merchants SHOULD have advantages.

PLUS....a lot of these skills would work great if someone wanted to be a hybrid...say a Smuggler with Delivery 4...or maybe a Miner (Artisan who surveys a lot...they really need a Miner profession, that's another thread) with Efficiency 4...but the Management and Advertising trees would be pretty much for people serioues about Merchants (which is about the same for every other profession...2 easy-mixing trees, 2 trees for Master wanna-bes).

Anyway...throw the tomatoes...opinions are opinions and everyone's got one...this is just mine.

What I'd LOVE to see is a Delivery skill. Basically, the ability to transfer items long distances. This would make Merchants INCREDIBLY useful. Make the fee very high to begin with, then lower the fee with more Delivery skill. Want to send something to Lok? Great...that'll be 3,000 credits.

I have friends who make a lot of money (10k/trip) delivering things that would be mighty unhappy if we were to get such a thing. Instead how about the ability to set up delivery contracts. You give the contract to someone with another person's address. They deliver it and them once it's signed off on the courier gets the payment and the recipient gets the goods?

I think giving merchants the ability to write contracts on lots of things would be a valuable addition. Purchase orders if you will. Sell purchase orders through the bazaar for things like commodities. "3000 fiberplast at 5cr each" for example. Someone takes it and fills it with fiberplast and gets their 15k payout -- sort of like bulk order deeds were in UO.

I particularly like the ideas about a Delivery skill set.

I also like the delivery idea. I plan to be on at least two planets, if not three.

Tag, good one, post idea on the week 3 list

well...dont know if this is the correct thread or not but there needs to be some kind of skill that allows for SIGNAGE or somehow adjusting the house....

so when you are walking past you know immediatly that it is a weapons shop or a clothing store...

i personally hate going to some little village and having to walk up to 10 different house and read the tiny signs in hopes offinding a Droid...

we should also be able to place "billboards" or markers around the planet...Joe's Bait Shackthis way------->

Joes...just 900 km ---------->

Joes...just 700km --------->

Joes Bait and more 500km ------------>

SLOW DOWN or you will miss Joes

Numtini, I agree and disagree with you.

I disagree in the sense that I don't really care for people who are working as "couriers". Yeah, I am for giving others a chance, but this is one field where I think Merchants should have a very key advantage. As I see it, the biggest problem a lot of Merchants will face is logistics...the obstacle of having to run around between different places to get things where they need to be. If Merchants had the power to truly run a multi-planet, multi-vendor "corporation", then the ability to transport items quickly from one place to the next is a huge power that they're missing.

Let me put it this way...if the Carbineer is the front-line, kill 'em all guy in a battle...then the Merchant should be the front-line, vanguard attacker in the "market" battle. "What, we've run out of Laser Rifles on Corellia?! Quick Numtini, push these 12 Rifles onto your vendor there, and send a message to your contacts to spread the word that they're available...mark up the price by 10%, there's lots of profit to be made!"

I do agree, and very much like, with the idea of "purchase orders". You have no clue how badly I've wanted to put up a "Want To Buy" post on the Bazaar. It'd be nice if someone could pluck the order off the Bazaar (or some other terminal...I really think there should be some sort of Merchant terminal, like an advanced bazaar, but that's off-topic)....and the order would act like a container, where they could place items, and when the order's filled, they could have an option on the radial menu, "Send Order"...and boom, the Merchant would get a screen pop-up "Your purchase order on 1,000 units of Carbonate Ore has been filled and shipped." and then an option to look at the items, and accept or reject the order. (This would allow for Merchants to see what they're getting, so they're not short-changed)

The possibilities for something like this would be endless, and I'm sure would bring MUCH happiness to the Artisans. Think of these examples:

PO from a Master Weaponsmith for 100 Generic Melee Weapon Power-Ups (this, of course, would be from me)

PO for 300 Control Units.

PO for 100 Armor Repair Kits.

etc. etc. etc.

An ambitious idea...but I love it...

As a miner who's working into merchant just to see what it's like, I'm *very much* in favor or "buy orders" in addition to "sell orders" on both the bazaar and possibly on vendors. As it stands right now, the only way to try to judge demand on a commodity (note: this is different from special items like weapons, clothing, etc. Bulk trades, as for resources) is to place a batch on the market and see how well it sells. If it flies out like hotcakes, it's probably too cheap. If it stays up for days, it's probably too expensive. Looking at what's *on* the market gives you a sort of upper bound: things that expensive aren't selling so well, try lower.

If people in search of goods could also make "buy orders", that is, place an item on the bazaar indicating "I will buy 3000 energy for 1500 credits", we get a whole new dynamic. Now we can judge the demand as well as the supply. It also gives us a chance to learn about special requirements. For non-commodity items, it would be interesting if you could place a buy order based on statistics. For example, "I will buy a vibroknuckler with a max damage no less than x and a min damage no less than y for z credits."

This is a mixed bag for the merchant profession, based on my understanding of it. On the one hand, it definitely makes *trade* easier: because both supply and demand are evident, it's easier for the market to satisfy demand. On the other hand, the bazaar is the right place for this sort of thing (at least for commodities), which is a detriment to a profession so heavily based on vendors. A couple of possibilities spring to mind: First, the buy order list might only be visible to merchants, perhaps with an "order value" cap that increases with skill. (i.e. as a novice merchant you can see orders with values up to 3000 credits, but as a master merchant you can see orders with any value.) Another possibility is that buy orders may only be satisfied from a merchant's vendor, and delivery is at the merchant's vendor. This would add another dimension, which provides for a sort of delivery order--"I will pay x for y units of green diamond crystalline gemstones on Corellia" as opposed to "I will pay x for y units of green diamond crystalline gemstones on Naboo". A merchant who specializes in transport might be able to learn about the order for Corellia and pick up the green diamonds on Naboo in the process of doing other work, then deliver it locally later. Or a merchant on Corellia might hire a non-merchant to transport the materials to her shop so that they may be used to satisfy the order.

Anyway, I think this would be a very nice thing. The tricky part technically is letting people specify what they want without a sample of what they're looking for. (If they have a sample, it's easy: I want to buy a certain amount of... this! Otherwise, there's a whole issue of building a UI to allow you to choose a specific class of resource, perhaps set minimum stats for that mineral, or a specific item and set stats for that item.) So, I don't think this is likely in any sort of short term, even for commodities. But I'd so love it if it was magically implemented.