>Hmm I don't tip at all, Trader's tip from me is locking Trading in like 30 seconds with the pouches I bring. Plus it's not like Traders need the money, they have contracts for that. Time is being rewarded with OP experience gain. Plus I'm sure they also take a cut out automatically. I always assume this and therefor have their monetary tip by taking their percentage.

If sarcastic, kudos. If real, would you please give a character name so I can highlight you appropriately?

>Actually, speculates have hard cooldowns that can't be reduced by skill or stat. Speculate finesse seems to have a 1 hr cd of IN GAME time.

Now that can't be right, because I know when I last timed it that it was something like 4 minute duration and about 19 minutes offtime. And I think that it's gotten longer, but I haven't timed it in a LONG time.

I'll do that right now and see how it goes.

And the results are that at 97th circle with 30 Dis, it lasted for 6'58" exactly (I have activation and cooldown messages highlighted and used a stopwatch). That's considerably longer than I remember, I KNOW it didn't used to last longer than 5 minutes. Was reused at 23'11", so maybe about the same cooldown time, maybe minus a minute or so. Perhaps Discipline decreases the cooldown time, but I don't have it trained well. I do know the EFFECT of Speculate Finesse has grown in the 50-odd circles I've been tracking my bonuses, from 3-4% to at least 10%.

>I'm not asking them to use their speculate for me.
>I bet you don't tell them this up front

I don't use my Finesse on any random Joe Schmoe who comes in anyways, unless they happen to come in personally when I'm selling my own stock and ask, then I'll put my stuff up and sell theirs.

>Perhaps there should be a gem trader that buys tied pouches from everyone in every province, so if you want to not bother with tipping

There are financiable gem (and furrier) shops in every province, except Fofedhdar.

>I would be all for being able to sell my own tied gem pouches.

No one is stopping you from visiting any of the financiable shops. I'll even provide a list for your edification:
Financiable gem shops available: Illaya Taipa, Rossman's Landing, Throne City, Darkling Woods, Horse Clan and Fever Point. (That's 1 in Zoluren, 2 in Therengia, 2 in Ilithi, and one on M'riss).
Finaciable furrier shop available: Caravansary on North Roads and Aesry habor. (That's one in Zoluren and one on Aesry)

Byebye now. Go give us who finance shops even more profit.

>Plus I'm sure they also take a cut out automatically.

And this is insulting and says a lot about your character that you just flat out assume that all Traders are money-grubbing thieves who will cheat you without qualm. I don't hesitate to tell you what your pouch appraises for, what the offer is, and the simple math to determine the bonus generated by the offer. If you don't like it, just say so and I'll give you your pouch back and you can go away and bother someone else with your pettiness.

P.S., it's simply appraiser offer divided by pouch appraisal and goes to 2 decimel places, so if you correctly appraise your pouch at about 250-350 Appraisal, and have a calculator on hand (I use Windows Calculator), you can do the simple division and tell if a Trader is lying (unless he has some badass speed at calculation). Only works if it's a tied pouch though, because it's treated as one "gem". Open pouches each gem gets its own bonus applied and so the math isn't pretty, but it's usually within 2-3 percentage points of the Trader's base bonus.

Naniaki,
Crossing gemologist and shopkeeper

>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear

>then the Player trader would still get your pouches, and go sell them keeping far more of the profits, and get their "exp tip."

Actually only up to about 90 plat, which is only a couple 500 gem pouches. Which should be about 102 stones tied weight.

Naniaki

>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear

Didnt know there ws a gemshop in Ilaya normal folks could use. Normally bring back to Xings and the tip usually reflects about 3/4 of the extra a trader gets me anywhere

>That's not realism, that's cynicism. Realism would recognize that yes, not everyone is good. It would also recognize that not everyone is a thieving bleep and that you should hoard your money like a miser and distrust every single person you see.

>I'm not naive, I'm honest, which DOES exist in the real world still.

The few that are honest far outweigh the ones that are not honest, and I really have no desire to take guesses. I assume skims off the top, which i'd say you all do, or if you don't regularly, you have at one point.

>That's what that list of shops I copy/pasted IS. It's a bunch of shops where anyone, not just Traders, can "walk into a gem shop, sell my pouches, get what they're worth, and be done."

>That you should care about the fate of those gems afterwards is irrelevant. (And it seems to be a very odd fate, not quite sure how the system works to determine what it spits out for the financing Trader).

>Seek out a Trader to sell a tied pouch at a time for you, seek out a financed shop to sell a tied pouch at a time by yourself, sell your gems one at a time from an open gem pouch, or let the janitor get the gems. Those are your 4 options.

I understand those are my 4 options, and I utilize one of them. Finding a Trader to sell my pouches for me, it gets sold I collect my money. They get a free exp "tip" I'm just saying if another option existed I among others would leverage it.

Wow. I never knew there was so much disdain of Traders for doing something which makes things more convenient for folks and which gives them considerably more coin while doing so - selling tied gem pouches.

The solution seems simple to me, Traders: Note the folks who don't tip. Next time they walk in with pouches to sell, CHARGE them for the service up front. If they don't want to pay, you're not loosing anything anyway, and they can use one of the other options to sell their pouches at their own inconvenience not yers.

Also, if anyone ever made a snarky comment to me like "enjoy the experience tip", that would be the last pouch I ever sold for them.

Aluriaz

Solution 1: Create a PHA equivalent for pouches.

Solution 2: Wait for lunar magic and put a hex on them if they don't tip you.

<<Solution 2: Wait for lunar magic and put a hex on them if they don't tip you.

Solution 3: fill your own pouches.

>Solution 3: fill your own pouches.

I have done so many dobek start ruby pouches, clarified and unclarified, I was making estimates with less than 1% error as to the value based on the gem count. IMO, dobek pay better than celps if you script sort large rubies from the small/medium and clarify the large rubies. It's hard to beat an average of about 10.7 gold per gem.

Naniaki

>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear

This thread has hung around a long time.

No trader hater here, but for IC reasons, my thief would never hand his gem pouch over to anyone he doesn't know. That would just be all kinds of wrong for him. He uses a trusted "associate" as his fence for selling animal skins and gems. I never ask a trader for a sell, and I never accept when they offer. So I avoid the only two situations where I feel a tip or payment might be in order.

On those rare occasions his associate isn't available, but it's time to sell a gem pouch, he uses the old fashion way and does it himself. Yes, this has sparked some nasty comments from traders at times if they're in the shop waiting for pouch people. "Hey, buddy, there's a trader right here!" "Stop! Let me sell it for you!" "What are you doing? Give me your gem pouch! I can sell it!" and so on. I've heard it all. When selling them myself I try to find an empty gem shop, but it doesn't always work out that way.

This thread is the first time I've heard about outposts. Interesting idea.

Kaxis

---

>You tap a large jar with a stained label depicting a skull and crossbones.

>In the large jar you see some toad oil, some moda tongue oil, some dolomar oil, some moruryn oil, some westanuryn oil and some viper sac oil.

>You exclaim, "Collect all six!"

>I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Gem pouch selling without having contracts from hunters for regular service is nearly a waste of time. You can sit for HOURS in a gem shop, gwething every now and then, and people won't come in. They come in on THEIR time, and because of 500 count gem pouches and the redacted formula for gem pouch weight means they can have a LOT of gem pouches, so they only have to come in every week or two. You generally get novices coming in with crappy pouches that only tide you over for a few minutes. I need approximately 120 plat/hour coming in in gem pouch sales to keep up with my exp drain (varies depending on pouch value/count). The real exp over time is in contracts, and that's also where the money over time is, if you don't have some high level hunter feeding you gems/bundles. When I last checked contracts about 20 circles ago, I was getting about 7 plat/hour profit. Gem pouches are convenient, but not ideal for a person only interested in money or exp over time. Their convenience lies in that you can lock Trading and do OTHER things.

Sitting in a Gem shop waiting for EXP is an inefficient use of your time, unless you want to be lazy or sit there working non combats that's not really a good argument. People, like myself generally gweth when they're in need of a Trader. If you're in the area its a quick few second stop that will take your Trading from Clear to Mind Locked. I'm not saying its your only means of income from skimming/exp from Trading. I'm saying for the amount of time spent you gain a HUGE increase in your experience and make pretty decent coin from taking whatever extra you guys take when you sell pouches.

>Empathy and healing is similar. Are you saying you don't tip Empaths for healing you, because the ability to lock their Empathy in a couple minutes compared to half an hour of Perc Health is tip alone?

Yes, that is correct.

>I do it all the time on my characters. I also lock 6 armors, brawling, and while I'm bored, throw in hiding, stalking, first aid, mech, appraisal, and scholarship.

That's nice, my training regime keeps 24-27 skills moving at once. That's completely different than Gem Pouch experience, its a massive boost taking you from Clear to high mind levels in seconds.

>make pretty decent coin from taking whatever extra you guys take when you sell pouches.

At this point, I have to admit you're either delusional or being an intentional troll with the incessant "all Traders skim". I also find it telling you're not willing to say who your character is. If you're going to come out and insult an entire Guild and every player who plays that Guild, I think you should be responsible and sign your name.

>That's completely different than Gem Pouch experience, its a massive boost taking you from Clear to high mind levels in seconds.

There have been other skills that have done so. Difference being (aside from Empathy/healing/wounds analogy), that you can keep a skill at mindlock forever. A Trader eventually runs out of gem pouches. See the part where it takes me 120 plat/hour to keep up with my drain, and I'm only a fairly high level Trader.

Naniaki

>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear

Yes, Apu just declared himself King of Traders. You under his decree as a trader, with his Gem Shop Bill of Rights! Don't think about breaking these commandments, or he will coin-stun you! That's how he rolls.

Another post from me to answer the original question (btw I was just joking when I said '/end thread', it's interesting to discuss even if we've all been over this a billion times):

The standard system that most Traders I've talked to use is to offer the Customer whatever they would get from the appraiser without speculate finesse, and then rely on tips for the majority of the profit, plus getting some profit by later selling the pouches with speculate finesse on. This is the most tried and true recipe for making a decent profit, maximizing exp gain, and keeping Customers satisfied and coming back with more pouches. Obviously not all Traders go this route though, depending on how much emphasis they place on Trading EXP vs Profit vs time spent, etc

I personally use a variation of this system, where I don't even ask the appraiser to app the pouch - I just appraise it myself and offer the customer 1.50 times the base appraisal value (which is on average what the appraiser would offer me, but it removes RNG, and also allows me to buy pouches in the bank, in my shop, wherever)

The typical tip percentage that most Customers go with is 10%. The math is easy, it's a decent amount of profit for the Trader to show your appreciation, and it still leaves plenty of profit for the customer. Obviously not all Customers go this route as well. Some tip much more which of course is always noticed and greatly appreciated. Some tip much less, which will of course runs the risk of pissing off the Trader depending on how much they care about Trading Exp vs Profit (and which of course may or may not matter at all to the Customer)

Apu
_
http://www.elanthipedia.org/wiki/User:Apu

>At this point, I have to admit you're either delusional or being an intentional troll with the incessant "all Traders skim". I also find it telling you're not willing to say who your character is. If you're going to come out and insult an entire Guild and every player who plays that Guild, I think you should be responsible and sign your name.

For starters you would be taking an OOC discussion and carry it over in game. We are discussing this as players. Your comments show you can't differentiate the two. Our characters have never met. Good to know your quality of role play though.

I'm surprised to see so much drama on this. It seems like you can boil this down to two basic rules.

1 - The individual is selling their pouch to the trader for a mutually agreed upon price that they're both happy with.

2 - The individual tips if they choose to.

---

With #1, everyone is happy, or at least satisfied, with the deal.

With #2, it's extra and solely dependent on the generosity of the individual. If the trader is upset and wants more gold for their time then that should be rolled into #1. It's ridiculous for someone to undercharge on #1 and then get mad that they aren't making a profit on #2.

>I'm surprised to see so much drama on this.

Actually this thread has been quite informative.

1. It got me to retest my current Spec Finesse time limits,
2. I found out something I never even thought about trying with appraising other people's pouches before even taking them and bartering them off them, that's going to be my new style of buying pouches, and
3. Other people have found out things they didn't know about (Trader financial outposts where non-Traders can sell, even though I swear they've even had GM announcements about them).

So even with a troll leading the thread, discussion for the sake of discussion has been good.

>you would be taking an OOC discussion and carry it over in game. We are discussing this as players. Your comments show you can't differentiate the two. Our characters have never met. Good to know your quality of role play though.

I want to know who you are so I can never meet you. I do not ever WISH to meet you, let alone RP with you. Your stubborn clinging to "all Traders skim" is petty and insulting, and impugns my honor both in game and out. The act of skimming is an in-game action, but the PLAYER is the one who decides to skim.

I want your name, OOC, so I can highlight your character, OOC, because you don't want to tip me for my services, because of a belief that "mind locking Trading in seconds", an OOC mechanic, is reward enough. Well it's not enough. The act of generating immense extra profit through my Trader's bonus is worthy of getting a cut of the extra proceeds. I refuse to take it by lying and cheating, which makes me even more upset when people give no or insultingly small compensation for it, hence my highlights of people not to interact with again. I assure you, you would only get to do it once to me.

Naniaki

>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear

My Outcast Ranger always tips, and usually a significant amount. It is my RP for him to do so because as a member of a quasi-hated organization/government he would feel the need to overcompensate to those who perform duties for him. To give them a feeling that what they did was a good deal despite any prejudice other members of their guild or even their own friends might have. I do this to even greater extents when I run him down to Crossings and sell my loots.

My pretend-Trader Thief always tips, though admittedly not nearly as much as Alexii would/does. I RP this as him wanting to use another Traders "good standing" to make more profit for himself. Instead of straight coin tips, I normally tip with either large-format gems or with an item from the stockpile of trader jewelry that I have for impersonation.

In the end, if you don't RP as a money-grubbing penny-pinching tightwad... there is little reason NOT to tip. That said, if you do RP as being greedy/un-trusting than I can totally understand not giving a tip. However, expect that some repercussions to that RP will come as well and you may be making things harder for yourself.

---

* SPLAT! * You destroy the annoying thing!

>I'm nitpicking for the sake of discussion but you call someone else out on bringing up OOC-ness when it appears your assumptions are based off OOC, you don't do an in game action(TIP for a service) because of EXP gain which to me seems OOC and you don't tip because you assume everyone is ripping you off, since this is a player discussion I assume it is the YOU the player feeling and assuming.

My character doesn't trust anyone and feels anytime anyone does want to do something there is some personal gain attached to it. Traders and Empaths need to "practice" their skills in order to hone them, their Guild Leaders require this to progress through the ranks. That's not really OOC. That's no more OOC than saying going Hunting to be better with a blade is OOC. My character provides gem pouches which help teach the Trader how to haggle better and make more money, there's the tip.

Asking someone for their character's name on an OOC message board because they don't like what the Player says is completely different.

>This thread is why I only sell my pouches with traders I'm friends with. It solves everything.

But I don't have any friends!

Sniffle sniffle.

---

Let's save us all some time: I'm a troll who rarely has anything helpful. There.

And Katt's on the "To poach" list.