Merchant - Skills and Experience

[Naekis]

Greetings

my character is merchant since some weeks; he sells and buys; mainly selfcrafted weapons from some smiths and many looted weapons from members of his guild.

Now I want to ask if it is possible to implement some things:

• I have read in the Trade related skills-Thread about a skill to examine weapons. I think a skill, which ables merchants to indentify the special features of a weapon like stats-additions or requirements without equipping it, would be nice, because often the merchant has not the required stats to equip it, but he needs the info to sell it. Often my character sells weapons and can't say anything about the requirements to equip it or he has to ask some to equip the weapon to get knowledge about it's features. The character can train it by using the skill and may get progression points by examine new weapons.
• It would be nice for merchants if they gain Progression Points by trading. Possibly depending on the money they gain or the difference between the buying- and the selling-price they reach. Right now my character has much money, but no Progression Points for training and he is no fighter at all. Other crafter like smiths and miners get Progression Points for their work, too.
• It would be helpfull for merchants to get a writeable list for their goods, available in the contextmenu. At the moment, I write down my list in the character description, just above my "Description of the Character". It's a possibility, but it's not nice. I think it is better if this would be devided in two different lists.
• Another idea for a merchant-skill is storing. A skilled merchant would be able to store more different items/weapons (not more weight) by getting more slots in his inventory. Because, often my character runs out of slots, but not out loadable weight and he can't stack the selfcrafted weapons without loosing quality.

This are only ideas from someone who plays a merchant and has no knowledge about programming.

Thank you for reading

[Unnamed_Source]

It would be nice for merchants if they gain Progression Points by trading. Possibly depending on the money they gain or the difference between the buying- and the selling-price they reach. Right now my character has much money, but no Progression Points for training and he is no fighter at all. Other crafter like smiths and miners get Progression Points for their work, too.[/li][/list]

How would you prevent individuals from exchanging large sums of tria back and forth just to gain PP, with no real trade in the works?

Another idea for a merchant-skill is storing. A skilled merchant would be able to store more different items/weapons (not more weight) by getting more slots in his inventory. Because, often my character runs out of slots, but not out loadable weight and he can't stack the selfcrafted weapons without loosing quality.

well, since they fixed the capacity of sacks, have you tried using them for extra storage?

[Duraza]

I just have a couple of questions 

Firstly if you are a merchant do you really need pp in the first place? There aren't much skills useful to the merchant (especially those that are implemented) so why worry so much about pp. Besides if you need anything I think you should hire bodyguards. Do you really need a special list menu for merchants to use? Why not just write down your goods in a book and allow one who wants to buy something from you able to read the book and see the prices inside? The storing isses can definately be fixed with sacks. As for the ability to examine weapons I think that what weapons do to a character should just be written in the description with the weight, size, slash, etc. That would make things easier for all characters.

[Suvok]

Well, I think they are all good ideas. Except the Progression Points one, because it can be abused. And the sacks can solve the problem with storage, but not the weight of items. I think if there were more features geared towards less violent jobs like being a merchant then have a more realistic world. At the moment, we have a lot of warriors running about the place with swords and armour in plain site, which isn't too realistic, there could be a few more normal citizens and merchants walking around the city.

Do you really need a special list menu for merchants to use? Why not just write down your goods in a book and allow one who wants to buy something from you able to read the book and see the prices inside?

Umm...this is a wishlist isn't it? The place that you are supposed to be requesting features so you don't have to improvise with other features.    I think it would be good if you have a list available from the context menu, it saves the problem of having to rewrite the book everytime someone runs off with your catalogue.

As for the ability to examine weapons I think that what weapons do to a character should just be written in the description with the weight, size, slash, etc. That would make things easier for all characters.

Sure, it would be easier for everyone if all character could kill ulbernauts and cast Energy Arrows, but thats not very realistic. If you walked up to your average guy on the high street and shoved a longsword into his hands, would he be able to tell you exactly how much damage it can deal against a human? Or what material its made from? Or the crafters name?

[Naekis]

Thank you Suvok for the support. I think we need more non-fighting jobs, too.

examine weapon-skill: I think it could be used as a realistic skill, merchants (and warriors) get knowledge about weapons through the time and there shouldn't be wrote all infos in the description for every one, the character has to use the skill to get better in examine, maybe coupled with INT. Edit: It could be a button/hotspot in the inventory, like the purify-button for glyphs in the spellbook, where the merchant has to drop the weapon and like for purifying he has to wait until he get the examined information. This skill would give more infos then the normal item-desc, but it is even slower. If the merchant skills up, he becomes faster and get more informations about examined weapons (maybe first only the normal desc, then the requirements, then stat-adds and than magic-adds. Maybe at the final level the knowledge of the price without offering to Harni or Trasok, too)

gain PP by Trading: Ok, maybe no good idea, I agree it could be abused like many other things. But right now there is a time-lock between two trades of 1 minute and if you want to get 4 or more PP at a minute you can easier go to the arena. About the need of PP; yes, because you don't start with a STR of 150 and you also have to train the other stats as long as you don't have another ability which shows you the features of a weapon without equiping it. And, yes, I hire warriors if I need some parts I can't get on my own.

goods list: Sure, I can write books, but it's a lot of work to be a merchant in-game and beyond the game (you have to buy and sell, you have to examine new weapons, you have to reorganize your inventory (sacks too), you have to add your sellig list, examined weapons have to write down in a list to know it's features the next time, you have to keep accounts of the owners of your weapons if you have them in commission, you have to give them their money and all this while three people try to trade with you at the same time or ask in /tell), and writing this books every time someone run away with it or the server crashes and he don't come back, would take more time than I have for PS a day. Please try it on your own, take over 60 different weapons and write down a list with their count, name, damage and speed, Q at selfcrafted and their price in-game and stop the time of it. Additional, a book would mean I lose another slot in my inventory.

storage: I use sacks, I got 4 right now, but it slows down the storing of weapons because you lose the overview easier and you have to reorganize the sacks often and it slows down the trading if you have to search, put the weapon from the sack to the inventory and then to the exchange (especial in times of lag) and clients aren't very patient every time.

I hope i didn't forget a question.
This isn't a whining thread, it's just a wish-list. I like the job of my character and I do the things around willingly, but it would be easier with some changes

[Duraza]

I'm not saying we don't need more non fighting jobs. Its true there are too many warriors and mages and such running around, not enough merchants and things like that. I was just trying to say that I don't believe those specific things won't help. The storage thing is something I agree should be done. Something that makes things easier than having to make an alt to carry everything. The weapon skill won't do much good because its unrealistic to believe that just because your a warrior you can't tell the slash, etc about a weapon. Making it so that only certain people have the skill to do such makes it to hard on players (because you then have to find someone just to tell you about your weapon) and in the end its just annoying for anyone who isn't a merchant. The pp still sounds like something that will be abused and at the current moment as I mentioned there aren't any really skills that merchants need the pp for. Instead of a list I think it would be easier if there was just paper. That way its not like they are making an exclusive listing system for merchants but just adding paper for anyone to write on.

Yeah I agree that more things should help support merchants and other non-fighting jobs but it doesn't seem that these are ideas that will help. Plus the exclusive skills and such makes it sounds like your bringing a class system into Yliakum. It just sounds like your making things too exclusive for them if you get what I mean. Almost like you either call your self mage, warrior, merchant, etc. That sounds more unrealistic to me. I'm I saying ubler warriors should be able to be merchants and powerful mages? No but you make it sound as if everyone should only get to be one and thats not right either...

[bilbous]

Perhaps progression points (PPS) (if they are to remain) ought to be gained purely by time in game. Practice points (pps) could stay as they are--gained by using the specific skill. This would make sense because progression points currently are gained mostly by fighting and can be used to buy any skill.

This scheme would further add to PS's RP focus because time spent indoctrinating new players would have a real reward other than the satisfaction of helping another person. It would also cause players to have to focus their training as there will be only so many PPS with which to buy training. It would enable the role players to build their stats and skills to a point which validates their characters as well.

Getting a little off-topic here but since this is a role-playing game no-one ought to be able to start a really powerful character, those characters occur after much time. It is unfair to say "I think I'll play a 90th level red way mage today, so everyone if I flame burst you, act crispy." That is the purview of the GMs who can actually set their abilities manually.

[Nikodemus]

The above is an idea i didn't see for long, or not at all, because i can't remember it.
It's really good. I just think so.
Only what about people who log in and leave the game as it is?

[bilbous]

Give gms the ability to kick players and forfeit their current session PPS. Cause PPS to accrue only on logout. Any system is possible to cheat.

[Nikodemus]

Any system is possible to cheat

Yes, but there must be something more to do about this one, because the ability to cheat that one is too high.
And if i had to GM like that, there is high chance i felt on the keyboard sleeping.
No, i don't wish this for GMs, as this is wishlist.

[bilbous]

Well you could always put an inactivity meter in so that the client would disconnect after 15 minutes, but like I said any system can be cheated. I believe checking for botters is already a job assigned to some of the GMs so giving them the ability to penalize PPS would be the only change required. Perhaps a bounty could be offered of a portion of the forfeited PPS to the player(s) /petitioning reports of botters. Of course that could be abused by a multitude of false petitions.

I merely offered an alternative to the current system. It seems attractive but of course I did not research it exhaustively.

[saladasalad]

Regarding the 'examine weapons' skill, I think that we should use something akin to the Nethack method where items need to be 'identified'. If a character who starts out as a baker, was shown a 'SS of Seduction' they wouldn't have a clue what to call it. They might call it something like 'a big shiny sword'. A character who is an expert sword fighter would probably have a pretty good idea of what a 'SS of Seduction' is, even without training in the 'identification' of weapons.

A RL example: An experienced guitarist would probably be able to identify a good guitar by name and model and tell you it's qualities. Guitarists don't take guitar identification classes though, they just learn to play guitars and pick that stuff up naturally.

A PS example: If char A has <10 sword skill and loots a 'Short Sword of Enlightenment', they won't be able to identify it. The item would be known as a 'small sparkly sword' and all its stats would be unknown. If Char A hands the 'small sparkly sword' to Char B who has >10 sword skill, the item would become a 'Short Sword of Enlightenment' and all the stats would be known. If Char B then hands the item back to Char A, the identified name holds (the person who identified it would tell them what it was). The next time Char A loots a 'Short Sword of Enlightenment' they would be able to identify it as they have already seen one before.

[Naekis]

... since they fixed the capacity of sacks, have you tried using them for extra storage?

The storing isses can definately be fixed with sacks.

Now I'm got STR 200 and use 15 sacks in my inventory, it's a way to handle the storage, but it's not nice. An option to rename sacks would help the searching problem a bit

[saladasalad]

Now I'm got STR 200 and use 15 sacks in my inventory, it's a way to handle the storage, but it's not nice. An option to rename sacks would help the searching problem a bit

Ability to rename items in inventory 

[DJ_PHAZE]

indeed great idea's  but maybe the merchant skill could be like negotiating with npc sellers and bringing down the price kind of like a persuation skill the higher the skill the cheaper u can get the items which mean u can sell them to players for normal price just u have made a profit on them