This idea/suggestion has been flagged as Not Implemented because of a lack of popularity, lack of interest, lack of feasibility, or other determination by the Development Team, so the suggestion will not be implemented. Once a suggestion has been flagged this way, the decision is final. Although the issue may be raised again in the future after a six month cooldown. A response explanation from the Development Team can be found in the thread.
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- Proposal
To reduce Skill Point costs for Merchant in line with costs for Image Designer allowing a dedicated crafter with 2 master professions to still master Merchant without having to sacrifice any of their Artisan points
- Justification
Merchant is a mostly passive skill/class that once the crafter has established their storeront has no further bearing on the character aside from how many items can be stored. Unlike Image Designer, which is an active skill set but is still getting its skill point costs reduced, Merchant is entirely passive.
- Motivation
Merchant is not even really an active skill. It's literally just determining your vendors available to choose from, whether you can dress them or not, how many you can have, and how much each can store. It should be able to be mastered along with 2 advanced classes like Armorsmith/Weaponsmith without sacrificing any Artisan skills
Skill point requirements for merchant should be reduced to fall in line with the changes being made to Image Designer that allow it to be mastered without sacrificing any Entertainer skills.
Merchant is not an active skill. It's literally just determining your vendors and shop. Merchant allows you more options for selling your stuff. Anyone can sell on the bazaar. A merchant can have a shop and a lot more vendors. They can choose from more types of vendors. They can change what a vendor is wearing. They can put a lot more on a vendor. But is that really worth the same skill points as a crafting skill takes?
Once you've placed a shop and set up your vendors, most crafters never really use those skills again. They're totally passive. Sure, your vendors can hold a LOT more than a non-merchant, and you have a wide variety of vendors to choose from, and you can change their clothes, but once you've done that, then what good are the skills past that? The only merchant skills you use after setting up your shop, placing all the vendors you're allowed and dressing them, is the vendor item limit increase. That's it.
And that should cost the same amount of skill points as mastering Weaponsmith, that you will constantly use those skills every day? Or Armorsmith? Or DE? Or SW? Arch? And so on.
ID is being changed so you can have it mastered along with Dancer, Musician and Ent and ID is a more active profession/skill set than Merchant is. Merchant should be treated the same way as far as Skill Points goes.
This suggestion has been closed. Votes are no longer accepted.
With merchant you receive cost reduction from house, vendor, etc maintenance, so basically is game changer... More vendor or advertising too.. i have m artisan m tailor m architect and merchant 4x43... Not needed the master really.. just choose wisely.. so from me i don't support the idea.. image designer is other than merchant.. have it or not, nothing changes.. but if you can place more vendor that means you can drop in every planet, with advertising in tent in a really low maintenance cost.. that can change the whole economy.. for now you need to think what can you do.
Well, let's take a look here then:
Cost Reduction: Yes, you get to list items on the global bazaar at a reduced cost. You get a 40% reduction in costs to list on the global bazaar (not your vendor) at Efficiency III. You get a 20% reduction in cost of your structures at Efficiency IV. At master, you get a 40% cost reduction in vendor maint fees. Not really a game changer.
Advertising: You can register your vendor on the planetary map at Advertising III, and have it there at 50% cost once you reach Advertising IV. Most people are not looking on the map for you. They're finding you through the vendor search while looking for items at the bazaar and getting a WP added to Datapad at that time. What is the benefit here? At earlier levels of advertising, you can have your vendors speak when people enter the shop. Well, OK then.
How many merchants are setting up multiple shops on different planets? I know a few may, but really my points stand.
Once you've placed a shop and set up your vendors, most crafters never really use those skills again. They're totally passive. You save some money on structures. You can add yourself to a planetary registry at a cost.
You get more vendors. Your vendors can hold a LOT more than a non-merchant, and you have a wide variety of vendors to choose from, and you can change their clothes.
Once you've done that, then what good are the skills past that? The skill set is not worth the point cost of a full Crafting Class.
I think this is a good discussion to have, but on the whole I tend to agree with Dzsuhi here, I would not want Merchant to be a give away as it has some value and does not stand alone as an island like ID. In fact I made my 3rd toon master merch just so I could free up the skill points on my crafter, and I still wouldn't change it.
I think this is a good discussion to have, but on the whole I tend to agree with Dzsuhi here, I would not want Merchant to be a give away as it has some value and does not stand alone as an island like ID. In fact I made my 3rd toon master merch just so I could free up the skill points on my crafter, and I still wouldn't change it.
Wouldn't be a giveaway, though. You still need the prerequisite Artisan line, and then still need to spend skill points in Merchant. I just don't believe it should cost the amount of skill points to master it as a full crafting class Those skills are used regularly throughout the toon's life. Merchant isn't after you get your shop set up. You get some benefits in reduced costs and larger vendor capacity, but is that really worth an equivalent skill point cost of say, Master Armorsmith?
To be fair here, the ability to Master ID along with the other three Entertainer professions was already in-game and it was taken away by a recent game update. Older Entertainers who already had mastered the 4 professions retained the 4 Master levels while the newer Entertainers could only master 3. They are just putting things back to way thing were prior to that update. Another reason is someone had provided proof that it was this way in other versions of SWG.
I have a Master Artisan/Architect/Tailor myself and the remainder of my skill points are in Merchant(x444). Would I like to get my Master Merchant back? Sure. However, according to the skills calculator, the above mentioned reduced fees (structure, vendor, bazaar) are part of that mastery, and I would understand if the Devs decided not to implement this proposal.
I think rewriting Merchant to move the bonuses from the Management branch into other branches & reducing Novice Merchant is the perfect way to do this. Some professions really shouldn't have 4 branches because one or more don't really do enough to justify the points & this is a great example.
master merchant should be an investment though. I don't want everyone to be master merchant cause it's "passive" If someone is wanting to me a master salesman they should have to spend points to be master merchant. Only issue I have with merchant is I wish we had even more power, or reductions. More fun options to have shop designs, more races, ability to rename vendors. Stuff like that. Make master merchant even more powerful and I would be happier.
"I don't want it to be a giveaway" or "It should be an investment"
Yeah, a reduced cost tree would not be a giveaway and it would be an investment. The arguments against doing this don't really seem to be saying anything of substance & mostly agreeing that Merchant doesn't have enough in it to justify the points it currently takes. Yarr at least suggests some more stuff, but most of that is QoL that should just be in merchant trees along with the cost reduction. Really, Hiring & Management should be combined into a single tree.
yeah, I wouldn't vote against this or anything. I have always felt Merchant should give more. as to what, it could be many things.
Honestly - would be nice if Merchant was like Politician - no SP required
Merchant shouldn't be open to everyone. Should be for serious vendors only and should require investment. Perhaps if you think everyone should be able to have a vendor then have everyone with an ability for perhaps one vendor with a limited storage/item amount. I get not wanting to craft but be able to sell more than bazaar allows. I just like the idea merchant is for the dedicated crafters.
Well how about making merchant like what happens on Entertainers. They can master ID, Music, Dance and Entertainer. Why can't Artisans master 2 higher professions, Artisan and Merchant? It would also create an additional credit sink since vendors require credits for maintenance.
Mechant and ID are two completely different types of classes. You can have master ID in addition to Dancer and Musician otherwise you could not buff 20pt and your character would be completely useless. Thats why nobody would ever go for master ID and there would non master ID be around on the server.
Merchant is a class everyone wants to have and everyone needs it for themself. Basically you just want to "overpower" yourself with additional Merchant skill.
Bottomline is
Everyone want other people to waste Skillpoints on ID, noone wants to play it. (if a lot of Skillpoint is required)
Everyone wants to be merchant themself but don't want to invest in it.
I don't get the logic.
Your "bottomline" includes two assumptions with no data or logic applied. Most of the people above are not arguing for everyone to just get Merchant (one person said that); they are, rather, arguing that a crafter with MArtisan & 2 Master advanced crafting classes still be able to get MMerchant. That is still a commitment to invest in it. You commit a grave logical error in framing your arguments as "everyone" and no one wanting to invest in anything, that does not reflect the arguments in this thread.
The way that people are able to master ID along with the Entertainer, Music and Dance is that the skill points cost for each box above Novice ID was reduced 1 point per box, otherwise ID would need an additional 16 skill points to master all 4. So I am proposing that merchant be the same number of skill points required as the ID. The previous assumption that the 2 classes are completely different and nobody wants ID while everyone wants merchant is incorrect. Both the Artisan professions and the Entertainer professions are credit makers. Once crafts items and sells those wares on vendors and the bazaar and the other Dances/plays music/ID's for tips to make credits. As I mentioned before, allowing the Artisans to master Artisan, 2 higher professions and merchant would create a credit sink due to upkeep on the vendors. It would also have more master crafters available to meet the needs of the expanding community that exploded with the launch of 1.0.
If merchant held no value in its bonuses, this wouldn’t even be a topic.
I can’t get on board with giving these bonuses to people basically free of charge. Choosing between mastering 2 profs plus artisan or 3 profs is good enough. Image designer isn’t a full time profession, and also isn’t passive. If we didn’t have new people joining at all, would image designer even be required? Most are one time customers.
Did you know in brawler, one can master TKM, Fencer, and Swordsman at the same time, but can only choose one of these profs if pikeman is included? Why shouldn’t that be changed also?
Its not convincing enough to give merchant the “it’s nothing really” check. With that, I’m out.
Thanks for your suggestion.
We're not open to changing the skill point requirements for Merchant at this time. We are, however, always looking for ways to enhance the role of the merchant and provide more value for those skill point investments. As indicated on our roadmap, we are actively working on plans to improve the merchant experience for upcoming updates.
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