Merchant trading

[Rageburst]

There are a few ways to make the merchant class enjoyable.

Suggestion 1:
 To set up a virtual business, you must buy a \"license\" from the current city/town. This will give you the option of becoming a shop npc where you can set up the business within the city, and go watch TV.
For an extra fee, you can hire an npc to sell your stuff anywhere within the current city.

A virtual business is viable only if you have developped your bartering skill to the point where you can buy items and sell them cheaper than the npc price OR you have collected rare weapons/items and want to sell them. While this easily increases your money, it does not increase your bartering skill (see suggestion 2).

Suggestion 2:
In addition to suggestion 1, this is the bread and butter of all merchants: trade routes.

The planeshift towns/cities can have trading routes (got this idea from a game called Freelancer). Prices for a product would sell for more $$$ elsewhere. A good guideline is that from the cheapest price in a given location, that product would sell for higher the further away you travel..... Or it could also depend on the location too like farm-like locations would sell food at a cheaper price.

The restriction for this is how much weight a merchant class can carry. There\'s also the issue of actually having enough money to make more money.

Whenever you make a PROFITABLE trade, you raise your bartering skill. A idea to implement this is that whenever you buy a product, the game will save the value at which you bought it ($boughtValue for example). Whenever you sell it for a more expensive price ($sellValue), you can get experience points for your Bartering skill. The higher your bartering skill, the cheaper you can buy trading material. When you have enough bartering experience, you can consider setting up a virtual business (see suggestion one) since you can buy material at a cheaper price and re-sell it to players at a slight discount.

The thing about this suggestion is that you can make travelling more fun.... perhaps even hire player bodyguards to escort you to the more perilous cities.

Since there should be some benefit to having lots of money, there are a few suggestions to put money to good use:
- The casino.
- Paying tribute to factions that hate you (if a town doesn\'t like your race and won\'t offer their services,  pay a tribute and improve your reputation.)
- Join the millionaire club. Insert some benefit....
- Give money to beggars
- Pay for the more expensive travelling alternatives (air travel, instant teleportation for example)
- Setting up a virtual business.

Travelling alternatives:
It\'s also possible to make use of travelling devices to help with the trade routes.... although you cannot abuse the instant teleportation devices. Therefore the prices should be equal in locations that are accessible via instant teleportation.

You can also opt to buy a cargo cart, which makes you slower, but you can hold more trading cargo. You can the use the transportation services to help carry your cargo.... Or buy a beast of burden to attach your cargo to.

[Mabrukk]

I think being a merchant can be enjoyable without getting very rich very fast - so I can\'t and wont pay a lot of money just to become a merchant.
Also I think just sitting around and selling what the NPCs sell but cheaper is the most boring alternative. It becomes more attractive the way you began to discribe in opt 2): By selling rare or even unique items.
A common problem is that found weapons (loot, drops) are normaly sold to very low prices to NPC merchants even though they are by far better then everything the miser got himself. And afterwards the sold weapon isn\'t available anymore so noone can buy what you sold.
A PC merchant could overcome this problem - if she had and sufficiently large vault to store the stuff. Then she could make herself known throughout the city to be somebody to trade in cooler stuff than the NPCs.

If yo wish to have a more complex trading system you would have to think about things like transport fees, taxes etc. When some locals produce an item thats needed everywhere you would have to think how much of the stuff is needed. Will it be used up or have a limited lifetime like food? Or will it be a buy-once-use-long-time-item like a door or a lamp?

On the planeshift site two beasts of burden are discribed and I did not read about instant teleport. But I think a complex trading system would need capacity limits especially to teleporters, or a very high fee.

Prices of NPC goods should very with demand and supply to make it impossible to travel very often on a short route and trade a lot with high revenue. Such should satisfy the demand and lower prices etc.

I developed a basic trading system for an (probably eternaly) unfinished PBEM and could post the ideas if somebody is interested.

[kronon]

I go for door nr 2:)

I think it has some great posibilities.
And because you have to travel far (to get some good deals), you get your share of danger (maybe need to hire some guards (NPC\'s?)).


I don\'t like option 1, it\'s boring and not fair for honoust players.

[Xandria]

As a wanna-be merchant in PS, I always imagined doing the second option first (a travelling merchant with little money) and continue to make profit until I get enough money to do the first option (buy a store).

The reason I chose to have a magic shoppe is:
1) Plenty of people have expressed their desire to be a blacksmith and sell their goods, so there will be plenty of weapon/armor merchants
2) Magical items will hopefully be something a bit more uncommon than most items, which will make people more likely to buy/sell them to a shop rather than the ordinary NPC
3) Magical items will be able to be crafted; I know at least alchemy and herbalism will be in the game, so at least I can make potions    and hopefully a variety of other magic items to sell as well

And hopefully, PS will eventually have NPC hiree\'s that can run your shop for you, so I can spend my time getting raw materials or helping out other people in their parties.

[Rageburst]

I like the idea of a hireree npc. That way, you don\'t need to stand still and can do more trading or get more selling material. I think paying to set up the virtual business should come with the npc.

When you pay for the business, you then have an npc follow you. You can then set up a shop anywhere in within the city. The business lasts for some duration and then you gotta repay the fee.

... Or you can sell your stuff manually by gawking at people passing by. This is for the poorer merchants.

[Waylander]

I like all the ideas its just why hire an NPC when you can get way better service from the mercenairies guild.

[ForteX]

the npc idea is really cool, I was thinking of something like that, since it would enable you to do other stuff. I guess would be cool if all players could hire an npc to make a virtual store, but the non-merchants would need to play like the triple. So, the blacksmiths could promote their job faster and with less dificulties.

[Xandria]

Originally posted by Waylander
I like all the ideas its just why hire an NPC when you can get way better service from the mercenairies guild.

[sarcasm]
Oh yeah, I\'m sure there are so many mercenaries jumping for the position of store clerk  :rolleyes:
[/sarcasm]

And the whole idea of an NPC is that they will buy/sell items 24/7, even if you hired a PC to do it they would only stay on for like a couple hours a day.

I guess would be cool if all players could hire an npc to make a virtual store, but the non-merchants would need to play like the triple.

That\'s the reason shops were made: so you have a place to go to buy items, and you have a place to go to sell items.  Perhaps smiths and very high level players could have merchant npc\'s to sell their itmes, simply because of the large volume of items they produce/find.

[Waylander]

I meant as bodyguards.  But, my guess is you knew that

[Jessyn]

i would have to say, the best way to be a merchant is to buy and sell things from other PC\'s  It\'s so much more fun, because haggling is realistic(unlike morrowind-fortify personality much?) also, if you buy and sell things from PC\'s, they will know who has good prices, and will come back for more....

I played a game called Nexus TK for a while, and i never fought monsters anymore, because bartering was so much more fun, especially when you get to understand the laws of supply and demand.

Jessyn

[Rageburst]

Why not have both?

Think of it this way.... A high level bartering merchant doesn\'t feel like travelling. What does he/she do? Sell to another merchant with lower bartering skills!

You see... If the high-level bartering merchant buys the npc products cheaper, then the low merchant would also get the products for a cheaper price. Then the low level merchant can complete the travelling route.

Example:

High-level merchant: Uses bartering skills to buy Rocks at $15 from the original price $20.

Low level merchant: Buys the Rocks from high-level merchant at $18.... saving 2$! Then low level merchant does a trading route to get even more cash.

High-level merchant: Doesn\'t feel like travelling so continues to sell to players.

Edit: Bartering skills doesn\'t need to be like in Morrowind. Maybe I should have said mercantile skills.... where the skill is automatically taken into account. In the npc trading screen, we should be able to see the full price and the discounted-from-mercantile price.