Shopowner QoL

Hi, I’ve been dealing with running a shop for a while and thought of minor suggestions that would make it a bit easier for us (because it’s a bit tedious).

  1. Out of stock plinths should have other indicator rather than removing the model or at least retain the total profits info when looked at.
  2. Plinths that share multiple items should have a breakdown of what was bought and not just the total profit. Probably a report on the profits tab would be nice.
  3. Tax Epic Skill should also be working for individual who have access on the beacon and not just the beacon owner itself.

Some ambitious ones :slight_smile: :

  1. Add a master controller somewhere (like beacon control) where we could see the status of the plinths and baskets like quantity left, budget left, etc. and we could take all the profit in one click :smiley:

  2. Exposed APIs for the status of the shop XD

I enjoy measuring the shop’s performance by listing info like quantity bought at what price, check overall profit, etc. and these are the things that would make it easier.

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I agree with every except this… ^^^^ Lets keep the video game in the video game pls!!!

The moment this turns into Eve I exit stage left…

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What would exposing the api do? Or better yet what’s an api? :sweat_smile:

It’s basically the game exposing some game info for others to see on demand even outside of game. You know, for those wanting to keep track of their shops 24/7 haha. But yeah seems to be overkill XD

You say overkill, I say dedication! What shop(s) do you own?

Open API’s allow Third Party programs to access data…
An API for shop stands could allow you to go to a web sight and find the lowest price for an item…

this would effectively turn the wonderful vendor economy we have that allows shop keepers to enjoy being shopkeepers into a fancy Auction House where You check the web sight to see where the cheapest items are at… And now the shops reputation, location, and all the hard work no longer matters now it turns into going to a web sight and finding the cheapest item…

I don’t play games with an Auction House for a reason and I stopped playing Eve for a reason!

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It’s the Chisel Knight’s Shop you can find it in either Ultima Aqua Hub or PS Hub on Lamblis. :wink:

To be fair, I would also hate to have the auction kind of market. My intention was purely personal use so probably we could omit the price. I just wanted to check the stocks and probably log them at the same time so it’s not super manual encoding stuffs.

Not APIs, but a mobile app where you can check the status of your shops, beacons and portals would be great

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I sort of agree with you, but I think there are degrees of convenience for shoppers that wouldn’t upset the universal economy.

For example, I pondered the idea of warden perks - and maybe one of them would be an information booth that would tell you the high/low/ave prices of what’s being sold in that settlement (or planet, if it’s a capital). But not saying locations of where these prices could be found. So it would help shoppers understand the range available and start to judge good/bad deals.

And crucially, it would be an in-game service.

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Its not that hard to just go price your competition in game…

I remember back in beta when I first opened the door to sparta…
The first thing I did was check
Omni’s Prices
V&W’s Prices
Gemporium’s Prices

And quickly figured out the value of merchandise i certainly didn’t need an API or 3rd Party program to do that…

There are a lot of Lazy shop keepers in game and you know what that’s a good thing!!! It allows the diligent shop keepers to be able to buy them out when there selling to cheaply… and it also turns there customers away when there selling to high… Which means they end up in the shops of the people who really try and really put in the effort… And that’s the way it should be!!!

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That sounds like it would take a hit on footfall for other vendors. If everyone bew where the cheapest stuff was, other vendors may lose out on coin from footfall…especially small vendors.

Its not footfall i am worried about however footfall would become the shop keepers best friend as it is…
Football should not be your path to success…

If you can instantly know prices then it just becomes check web sight and sell for 1 cent less then what the web sight says the current price is… And that becomes a cycle and the prices go down and down and down until they are so cheep there is no margin, no way to make money… then your path to make money is to be the cheapest guy and hope the footfall will support you…

This. I remember in Ultima Aqua hub (wont name due to rules) some dude had the nerve to have a plinth for an item (think it was ATC’s) and a request basket right under it and was buying them dirt cheap and selling g them with almost a 60-70% markup. I know your trying to turn a profit, but this was some gamestop level ■■■■ and he lost a customer becuase of it.

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I do want to make a comment about this…

So prices on a request basket is a whole new animal especially when your dealing with an early volatile economy.

The Prices aren’t even close to stabilized yet, but many of us shop keepers have a good idea of what prices should be… So our request basket’s buy at those rates… Not at a percentage of the wildly high rate that the item is currently selling at…

Example: Saltpeter you can find it selling from 140 - 1000 across the various shops… Its actual value is about 89… I simply just don’t sell it at this point in time… As bombs are selling at wildly high prices… But I most certainly not going to buy Saltpeter at 60, 70 or 80 when I know its not worth that…

So I often set request baskets to the rate that the market should stabilize at…
So you can see some wildly different prices between my baskets and stands…

Why don’t I milk it and raise the basket price? Because then I have to sell it for more then I should…
So If I get enough supply at the basket at the realistic rate then I can put it on the stand and be lower in price and help to bring the price down to the point it should be at…

So if you see a big off set between the current stand price and basket price don’t be so quick to jump to the conclusion that the shop keeper is trying to scam you!

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I also have a comment on the matter.

I too tend to have those wide varying price and it is mainly due to overstocks. There are items that are continuously getting sold in my request baskets but not getting bought on the same rate. This leaves the shop full of stock and less on coin and affects the overall performance of the shop like there would be limited budgets on some basket. However, we do not want to totally remove the basket as it will lose some potential seller which are also potential buyers of the shop (and it’s not that bad if you’re getting the item cheap as well).

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I kinda figured the market was in an awkward place with the whole reset and stuff not being as ready available as it was before the reset. At the same time… I wasn’t sure if aplha/beta players were trying to take advantage of oblivious new players.

I dont make much coin other then level ups and about 50-60 footfall (live in a somewaht secluded area) so I try to save my coin for items that will make my crafting more efficient as I’m mainly a builder/gatherer so I use almost everything I collect. There are a few shops I do like to peruse just to keep an idea in my head of ranges. So far only bought compact rubies for coils to make compact coal (shit luck on serpersindi). Other then that I’m just saving till is feel prices are leveling out more.

I appreciate your elaboration on this

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Not read through everything here, but found how ESO online used their api with trading worked well, people developed tracking of average prices of items, not pointing people exactly where to go to get the cheap items, but really helped as a seller to be able to know what sort of price was reasonable to sell at, helped keep the economy balanced, and saves allot of time in working out how to price things rather than just basing on another shop you saw or through changing prices on your items till they still sell but don’t sell out in an instant…

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I’m indifferent as to whether there was API’s for actual prices or not. That being said, there’s one thing I would LOVE to get my hands on, and that would be an overview of shopkeepers that both buy and sell the same item, and the markup they put on it.

More than around 30% markup (to account for buying and selling fees and then a reasonable profit margin), and I’d want to just not use their shop out of principle. Of course, I know I can do it manually already (and occasionally have done), but an overview would be cool.

I agree with much of what @Sulfurblade has said. With the addition of taxes. I haven’t picked up the tax epic yet, so some of my more expensive items are selling for hundreds of coins apart. But buyers need to understand that with 10% tax if I’m buying something for 5000c, and selling it for 6000c, I’m not making a single cent. 5000c plus tax means while you get 5000 for selling to me, I spend 5500. Then, when you pay 6000 to buy from me I only get 5400. At that point I’m losing money, which is no way to run a business!

Edit: math error, it’s been fixed

I think being able to access all the shop stand data out of game would be the wrong decision as it would take away from the exploration aspect from the game. I want to have a reason to wander through the cities people have built to be able to find these great deals and such. Having all of that out of game would kill any reason for me to wander around different settlements and kill any kind of competition between shops, as the only one who would make any coin is the one that wants to make the least profit.

Also consider that the ps4 player base would have less access to that kind of out of game tool and would suffer because of it.

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