Issue of Merchants and sub-guilds with related skills

[moab]

My point, SIR, is that the classes don't matter.  This is a ROLEPLAY game.  Ask any staff and they will tell you that the most powerful characters in game history have been good roleplayers, not characters with maxxed skills.  It is, quite literally, possible to conquer the known world without ever using your coded skills.

That is the point, and if you don't GET that, I'm not going to bother explaining it any further to you.

I certainly agree with that - however - how sweet is that maxxed mage when he's also an awesome rper, eh?  I didn't mean to disagree at all.

However, class does indeed matter.  Your indy merchant gets stuck out in the desert because he gets lost in a sandstorm.  Never mind his backgroun says he spend his entire first twenty years of life living in the desert, hand to mouth until apprenticing to some other desert merchant and learning merchanting skills.

In the current scheme you are helpless without a friend.

In a better scheme, your character would have some points in desert survival (or whatever) and some in merchanting and might have a better chance of making it out alive.

This goes along with the whole "rangers can camp, but wilderness warriors can not."  The system of classes (merchant included) is gravely flawed and you know it.

What - so I have to be able to become an expert archer and give up the freedom to excel my parry just so I can quit in the wilderness?

It just don't make no sense, joe.  :-D

[Anonymous]

I've always thought some sort of grouped skill selection system trumps classes, though balance is certainly an issue.  I don't expect it's going to change, though, the class system has been working well enough for a decade now.

Regardless by grouped I mean that in order to balance things out a number of skills are grouped together with the player only able to select a given number from that group.  Something like group A consisting of hide, sneak, backstab, sap, poison, disarm, kick, bash, parry, dual wield, shield use, with only 3 being selectable at chargen or something.  Another group might have language skills, barter, value, scan, listen, search, etc, with only 3 selectable from there.  Then a third group consisting of magic, weapons or trade, with each branching off from there and only one of those categories being selectable by a character.

The idea is to avoid the sneaking, hiding, bashing, sapping, backstabbing, flame-throwing warrior but still allow for some uniqueness between characters.  I suppose the subclass system does this to some degree, but I'd like picking skills in some balanced manner better.

[moab]

I agree, CRW, it isn't likely to change - too much code involved, I imagine.
But unless we're going to change, discussions about class are really rather silly.  :-D

[Tamarin]

I certainly agree with that - however - how sweet is that maxxed mage when he's also an awesome rper, eh?  I didn't mean to disagree at all.

Of course.

However, class does indeed matter.  Your indy merchant gets stuck out in the desert because he gets lost in a sandstorm.  Never mind his backgroun says he spend his entire first twenty years of life living in the desert, hand to mouth until apprenticing to some other desert merchant and learning merchanting skills.

If this happens to your merchant, then your merchant is a fucking idiot.  And really, anyone who spends twenty years in the desert isn't going to be a merchant.  They're most likely going to be a ranger.  Coin doesn't mean shit in the desert for the most part, and the amount of crap a merchant has to lug around would be discarded in the desert.

In the current scheme you are helpless without a friend.

Not at all true.  I think what's more truthful is that a very small percentage of the player population is actually playing realistically.  They had to bump up the severity of storms and make them untraversable because non-ranger type people were going from Tuluk to Allanak in five minutes through blinding, un-navigateable sand storms.  If people would just realise that "oh gee...maybe i'll DIE if I go out in the sandstorm..", then they wouldn't need friends to survive.

In a better scheme, your character would have some points in desert survival (or whatever) and some in merchanting and might have a better chance of making it out alive.

If you want some of this, pick a class/subclass combination that fits your background.  Don't expect that just because you SAID you have 20 years desert experience that you can get away with picking a merchant class.  Most merchants spend time in caravans, or in a city, where they can work on the merchantly arts.  Someone who has 20 years desert experience doesn't have this luxury, because they've probably been learning how to hunt and fend for themselves.  If they did manage to live a desert lifestyle, it's probably because they had help, and thus having help would allow them to focus on merchant stuff while neglecting the survival techniques which someone else is managing.

This goes along with the whole "rangers can camp, but wilderness warriors can not."

I don't think wilderness quit is such a big deal.  I've played 4 nomad warriors who never had a problem quitting in the wilderness.  There are plenty of quit safe rooms out there, and I can think of probably 10 off the top of my head.  No matter where you are in the known world, there's probably a quit safe room within a five minute OOC kank ride.

The system of classes (merchant included) is gravely flawed and you know it.

Life is flawed.  The whole universe is flawed.  Armageddon is priceless.  If you don't like the flaws, go play somewhere else.

What - so I have to be able to become an expert archer and give up the freedom to excel my parry just so I can quit in the wilderness?

Think about it: two fighter types.  One (the ranger) decides to spend 10 years of his life shooting things from a distance.  In terms of melee weapons, he owns a longknife and rarely uses it for combat.  Fighter #2 (the warrior) spends 10 years of his life fighting animals in close quarters with a couple of swords.  It's pretty obvious and realistic that the one who uses archery all the time is going to suck at parrying because he never uses it.  The close-quarters fighter is going to suck at archery because he spends all his time swinging swords.  If you look at archery some more, it's obvious that it's a ranger skill.  You need wide open spaces.  Archery sucks in a city because there's crowds and buildings and kanks and wagons and narrow streets...If you want to be a master archer, you have to go out of the city to do it, and that means ranger.  That means you're going to learn how to survive in the wild, and that means you get to quit in the wilderness.  You shouldn't pick a class just because they get wilderness quit, and then bitch that you can't parry as well as warriors can.  Honestly...

[Malifaxis]

I've known a merchant who was not only one of the best RP'ers I have ever had the pleasure of encountering, but also powerful enough to get about 95% of the playerbase absolutely fucking murdered with a mere twitch of his upper lip.

Flawed?  Fuck that.

Perhaps if you can't properly play a merchant, you shouldn't.  They are an awesome class, but very few players can slip and stick in that mindset.

And gosh... merchants are screwed in the wilderness?  Um.  No.  I could take a character with a total of 3 skills... contact, barrier, and forage, and survive in the wilderness if I used my brain as a player and payed attention to my surroundings.  If you can survive with that, you can survive with a merchant.

Certain classes are more easily played by certain people.  Myself?  I know what I can play well, and I know I suck utterly at rangers.  Like terribly.  You don't even want to know how bad.  I hear on and on and on and on and on about how much rangers rule.  Yeah, whatever.  They suck.  I can't play them, so they should be changed.

em snorts, kicking the soapbox over to the next contestant before heading off to get freakin hella plowed on vodka and agvat with Seeker.

[Jorlain]

Or you could be like me... And never die. Ever.

[Ghost]

After all - what does a merchant do:

1. Buys
2. Sells
3. Networks
4. Organizes
5. Speaks a nifty language
6. Pilots a wagon
7. Crafts

Just what does an assassin do?

1) Takes contract.
2) Kills.

Pickpocket?

1) Steals.

Burglar?
1) See pickpocket.  Only using a different skill.

Ranger?

1) Arrows.
2) Fights.
3)Hunts
4) Forages.

Warrior?

1) Fights.
2) Dies.

Looking at this picture, I see, merchant class have more poinst than the rest.  Right?

[Tamarin]

Ghost you can't be serious...

[Rhyden]

Ghost you can't be serious...

Nope, I think Ghost is bang on. Merchants really can do -way- more than any regular common fighter/thief type character.

[Tamarin]

Most of the classes can do all of those things...it just takes a bit of smarts and planning.

[Ghost]

I was making some sarcasm alright.  I could not stop myself doing it.

There are already some examples given out to suggest how merchant guild rock.  And still seeing a merchant can't do anything comment, well.. I could not stop myself doing it.

I can't play a merchant guild character myself though.  But that does not mean merchants suck.

[moab]

Tam>
Have your warrior get caught in a sandstorm and see how good you are getting back to a quit safe room, eh?

Classes are flawed and are used because they are easy to balance and because the code base already supported them.

They don't reflect an organically collected set of skills.  To argue they do is to ignore plenty of RL examples all around you.

We put up with them for the two aforementioned reasons and because we make exceptions for the fantasy land we're playing in.
*shrug*

[Tamarin]

Ya...It's happened a couple of times.  The first time, I had to fight my way through raptor's get back to Luir's.  The second time, I pitched my tent and waited it out.

Now, the storm didn't come out of nowhere.  The weather was crappy when I went out, and I should have known, but I took the risk.  And I dealt with it.

[Akaramu]

I did not vote because I'm missing the option "I like the merchant guild, I play it, and I find it powerful'.

But that could be because I have not ever bothered practicing skills much at all with any class. Never branched a thing except with a merchant PC, so my other non-karma classes were rather powerless.

*shrug*

[moab]

I would say that is the beauty of the merchant class and wherein the game approaches a MUSH-like quality.

You are - generally - free from code concerns (you hire other people to worry about that stuff) and are free to roleplay.

[Tamarin]

I did not vote because I'm missing the option "I like the merchant guild, I play it, and I find it powerful'.

Same here.

Talk about a biased poll...

[Maybe42or54]

The power of merchant class is also stolen from by people that have a background that screams that they are a merchant and then they pick ranger subguild and general crafter.

Or Vice versa.

And I didn't vote either for the above reasons.

I don't have much experience with a merchant class, but you know what?
The imms know how to manhandle the otehr classes.

OOcly, You can't die to the hour of "spar" crafting. (that is, crafting over and over with little emotes)

You don't really have to devote hours OOC to master the things merchant's do best.

You don't have to do a lot of things to keep your class up-to-date with the others of your classes.

A 67 day merchant can still be killed by a 2 day merchant.
A 67 day merchant can probably have the two merchant killed, along with half the relatives of stated twodayer.

[Incognito]

The poll was one-sided, because it was meant to be sarcastic - more to highlight my point than anything else.

Having said that - quite a lot of people have posted their thoughts on the Merchant Guild, and their thoughts on the "balance of power". Maybe some were more vehement like Tamarin. But it's all in good spirit!

However, no one has hit on replying to my original concern.

I'll repost again, in layman's terms.

Lets say there are 3 PCs in the game - Trader Joe (guild merchant), Elven Punk (guild burglar) and Ranger Bob (guild ranger).

Now, Trader Joe, being the slick merchant he is, can haggle the pants off any shopkeeper in the bazaar, cruise in his own argosy AND even use his spare time to make some nifty items with his tools!

Elven Punk on the other hand, being an elf - can sneak around town and get into cool locked places using his tools, but, being a city-slicker city-elf, he can haggle the pants partially off any shopkeeper int he bazaar too! Oh, he knows he's prolly not as good as Trader Joe, but so what? He can get a tidy discount, and doesnt need a merchant like Trader Joe.

Ranger Bob on the other hand, is a desert person, but he's a wily fella! He's a house servant! He kin overhear his masters' conversations and he can even craft lil stuff to please them, but best of all, when he's not hunting and skinning all kinds of beasts, he can drive his master around in his 4x4 mek-powered wagon! So guess what? The master gets a kickass guard, who can drive him around too, and again, there goes the need to hire poor Trader Joe!

Granted, Elven Punk will never be as good at haggling as Trader Joe, or that Ranger Bob will never pilot as well as Trader Joe, the point still remains.......

Trader Joe - try as he might - can never learn to fight like Ranger Bob, or pick locks like Elven Punk, even though he doesnt aspire to learn those skills to the degree of expertise that Elven Punk or Ranger Bob might have!

What I meant to say in the original post and here - again is - if skills unique to the Merchant Guild are available via subguilds, to other guilds, why not make other skills available to the Merchant Guild too, which are unique to other Guilds. It's only fair! (If you feel that those subguilds shouldnt be available to other guilds, then sure - make them special subguilds, only available for Merchants!).

I already agree to Sanvean's point that no subguild skill level will ever surpass the level of the main guild level.

I think someone mentioned somewhere that except Tentmaking and Wagoncrafting, ALL other merchant guild skills can get attained by the other guilds, through choice of one subguild or another. That's just plain tragic!

Anyways, I'm not gonna continue this banter, on the same subject again and again. I hope my point has reached atleast a few folks who might understand the point I'm trying to make.

[EvilRoeSlade]

To remedy this percieved inbalance, I think merchants should be able to craft things that aren't available from any other source, and are obviously of better quality (and this should be codedly reflected) than anything that can be purchased from an NPC's store.

[Marauder Moe]

To remedy this percieved inbalance, I think merchants should be able to craft things that aren't available from any other source, and are obviously of better quality (and this should be codedly reflected) than anything that can be purchased from an NPC's store.

This is already the case.  Or at least, with some of the crafting skills it is.  Some objects can't be crafted unless you have enough skills, and probably there are a fair amount that lie above the skill cap of subguilds.

[Tamarin]

Precisely.

Incog, I understand what you're saying.  I reaaaaly do.  Trust me.  And I have two follow up points:

1) Most of the blander class skills are available through subguilds (things like sap, some melee stuff, steal, sneak, hide, etc).  If you picked a merchant thug or merchant rebel, you'll probably get the necessary combat skills to be able to fend for yourself long enough to escape from a nasty situation (provided you get some training).  Does this mean you'll be hired as a guard?  Probably not.  Your examples were also really specific.  The jobs that your two pseudo-merchants took weren't really merchantly jobs.  The ability to pilot a wagon is by no means merchant-specific.  Lots of different types of people should be able to do it, include servants, caravan guides, etc.  As for the theif...yah, he can haggle a bit.  But most of his income is from stealing.  And he'll never be anywhere close to as prosperous on his own as he could be stealing items and having the merchant sell them for a hugely inflated price.  He might be able to have a few thousand coins in his stash, but with a good merchant, that amount could easily increase 10, or even 100 fold.

2) Pick up a copy of Dale Carnegie's "How To Win Friends And Influence People".  It has some good insights on how to get people to take interest in you.

[Tlaloc]

I think there is a pretty glaring phallacy going on here, in which people seem to think that non-merchants can do merchanty things just as good as regular merchants can.

Simply put, they can't. A merchant will always be able to out-craft and out-haggle any other character in game, hands down.

What I meant to say in the original post and here - again is - if skills unique to the Merchant Guild are available via subguilds, to other guilds, why not make other skills available to the Merchant Guild too, which are unique to other Guilds. It's only fair! (If you feel that those subguilds shouldnt be available to other guilds, then sure - make them special subguilds, only available for Merchants!).

Firstly, Armageddon is not fair.

Secondly, subguilds are ment to flesh out a characters background. They were ment to make it easier on the staff, so that we wouldn't have to keep adding skills to people who kept adding things in their backgrounds like: "I grew up as a potter, and thus, should know how to craft pots."

If your merchant has had fighting in his background, take one of the fighting subguilds that have been created for that plain reason. Were you a theif? Take a theify subguild.

The main point is: nobody will ever be as good at what your class is 'supposed' to do. Burglars are the best at breaking into things. Rangers are the best at ranging. Warriors are the best at fighting. Merchants are the best at Merchanting. No amount of sub-guilds will ever make a Ranger a better choice when you're hiring a merchant than a real honest to god Merchant.

[Angela Christine]

The poll was one-sided, because it was meant to be sarcastic - more to highlight my point than anything else.  

Tip:  Heavily biased polls don't highlight your point, they make it look like you are completely unwilling or unable to see any point of view but your own.

Lets say there are 3 PCs in the game - Trader Joe (guild merchant), Elven Punk (guild burglar) and Ranger Bob (guild ranger).

Now, Trader Joe, being the slick merchant he is, can haggle the pants off any shopkeeper in the bazaar, cruise in his own argosy AND even use his spare time to make some nifty items with his tools!

Elven Punk on the other hand, being an elf - can sneak around town and get into cool locked places using his tools, but, being a city-slicker city-elf, he can haggle the pants partially off any shopkeeper int he bazaar too! Oh, he knows he's prolly not as good as Trader Joe, but so what? He can get a tidy discount, and doesnt need a merchant like Trader Joe.

Ranger Bob on the other hand, is a desert person, but he's a wily fella! He's a house servant! He kin overhear his masters' conversations and he can even craft lil stuff to please them, but best of all, when he's not hunting and skinning all kinds of beasts, he can drive his master around in his 4x4 mek-powered wagon! So guess what? The master gets a kickass guard, who can drive him around too, and again, there goes the need to hire poor Trader Joe!

Granted, Elven Punk will never be as good at haggling as Trader Joe, or that Ranger Bob will never pilot as well as Trader Joe, the point still remains.......

Trader Joe - try as he might - can never learn to fight like Ranger Bob, or pick locks like Elven Punk, even though he doesnt aspire to learn those skills to the degree of expertise that Elven Punk or Ranger Bob might have!

It is true that a merchant cannot pick locks, except perhaps as a special app.  Personally I wouldn't mind if merchants that had mastered, say, wagonmaking branched lock picking, lockpick making, and the theoretical skill of lockmaking.  By the time he masters wagonmaking a merchant knows a hell of a lot about engineering gadgets both large and small, so being able to make (and pick) simple locks to use on his wagons, chests and such would be a sensible extension of his skills.  It wouldn't unbalance the classes, because mastering wagonmaking takes a hell of a long time, so very, very few merchants would ever branch lock related skills.

A merchant can become a hunter like a ranger using the archer or hunter subguilds, he just has to be a little bit more careful to avoid melee.  Once he has the archery skill a merchant actually does fairly well hunting small game, as long as he has the strength to use one of those magick two room bows.  He can manufacture arrows faster and cheaper than anyone else.

As for melee, merchants may not be as baddly off as you think.  I had a dwarven merchant who did pretty well gathering feathers and small bones from little forest creatures through melee.  The dwarven tough hide and high strength probably helped, but despite combat taking longer than it would with a combat class it was totally possible to take down small prey in melee combat.  

Merchants do get the shield use, dual wield and two-handed skills just like everyone else, and a shield isn't a bad idea for merchant.  The right subguild may even give you more skill with using a shield.  The idea isn't to go out soloing gith, but to survive a fight long enough to escape or for help to arrive.  It also isn't a bad idea for a merchant who has to travel outside lawful areas to wear light armor rather than fancy clothing: fancy cloathing is likely to attract bad guys, and light armor might just deflect enough blows for you to escape serious injury.

Merchants don't get weapon skills, but that doesn't mean they are completely useless in combat in the long run.  I remember a GDB story about a Vivaduan in the distant past who, after mastering his complete spell list, did start soloing gith in the desert.  Why?  Because it was the only thing left.  Ok, that was the bad old days but the point is that every class has the invisible Offense and Defense skills, even classes like Vivaduans that are supposed to suck in combat.  Those skills improve very, very slowly, but they do improve.  Theoretically a merchant who joined the Byn or other clan that provided regular sparring opportunities could eventually get to the point where he would be a credible fighter -- never an expert badass, but a passable fighter none the less.  I had a non-combat class get recruited into a combat possition once, sort of by accident.  In regular sparring she didn't do very well, though a subclass like thug might have helped.  But in unarmed combat, fisticuffs, she did pretty well and sometimes even won against combat-class PCs.  I wouldn't count on every hunting bahamets, but a non-combat class can get to be ok at fighting if they work at it.  They'll have to work at it harder than a combat class would, but that applies equally to any PC attempting things outside his classes normal skills.  A merchant/stonecarver will have a much easier time carving stone than a warrior/stonecarver would.


There are many skills that are not available through subguilds, including but not limited to:

lockpicking
backstab
weapon skills
wagonmaking
tent making
pick making
componant crafting
charge
instrument making
poison
trap

Many of these skills are held or branched by multiple guilds, they are not unique.  What unique skills are not available through subguilds?  I don't know them all, since I haven't maxed out every class . . . or any class,   but a few that stick out as probably single-guild are:

wagon making
tent making
pick making
instrument making
charge
perfume making


Most of those are merchant skills.  Rangers get a few things nobody else does, fighters get a few things nobody else does (at least not for a long while) and merchants eventually get quite a few things nobody else does.  The three sneaky guilds overlap most of their skills eventually.  The magick guilds overlap most of their non-spell skills.  

Just on pure crunchy skills, not merely behavior that any PC can learn, merchants do eventually have a very robust skill set.  The key word there is eventually.  Like mages, merchants start pretty weak and slowly become an unstoppable juggernaught.   That's why some people like the warrior guild: warriors are pretty good at their core competencies right from day one.  If you want something beaten up, a warrior can contribute in a meaningful way right out of the HoK.  Warriors are the Instant Gratification guild.  Rangers do ok pretty quickly, that discount in time spent learning to ride and the ability to ignore bad weather means that they can ride out into the desert and get eaten by a scrab almost right away.  Sneakies, mages and merchants have to be more patient, it is going to take a while before they gain the power to be self-sufficent and successful in their core competencies.



That said, I'm not opposed to low-cap weapon specialist subguilds.  I've even suggested some in the past.

Spearman - spear-making, throw, piercing weapons  (like archer, but with spears)
Savage -  spear-making, throw, skin   (like hunter, but with spears)
Swordsman - sword-making, slashing weapons, disarm
Axeman - axe-making, chopping weapons, lumberjacking
Blunty Mcblunter - club-making, blunt weapons, sap

Ok, I haven't got the names ironed out, but you get the idea.     These skills would all have very low caps, to prevent them from being over-powered.  This would allow a PC to be "passable" with one weapon type they normally wouldn't start with access to, but never to become an expert with it unless they had an appropriate main guild (mages of course still wouldn't be able to cast spells while holding a weapon, so they have to suffer the crippling unarmed penalties while casting, which ought to keep a little bit of weapon skill from unbalancing them).   Like the archery subguilds, these would help disguise your main guild.  People aren't going to expect that axe-weilding manic to be a pickpocket, so they won't automatically suspect him when their wallets go missing.


Angela Christine

[Delirium]

AC for President.

[Maybe42or54]

And I'm still mad you can't be good at using whips unless you are a warrior.