Pawn Shop - Again

[Guardian 452]

We all love finding pawn shop after pawn shop that is broke. The last thread about them seems to have died out with no one responding to it anymore. I had an idea that I wondered if it would work or not.



What if the pawn brokers had something(s) to sell. At high prices of course but things people would possibly pay for. I am not 100% certain how it works with them but I beleive this would give them money back to buy more things. Thus self regulating them to an extent.



I know their is the arguement that they have a limit so people dont just get umpteen million true from one broker and well I fail to see how a limit solves this. It just delays it... people will just bleed them dry, wait for 300 hours plus for a server reset and do it again. So they arent being stopped at all. Heck Ive done it.... I made a mad selling frenzy when I was trying to get funds for a house.



Unless the coin limit is there for another reason that I am not aware of.



Anyway... just an idea for y'all to kick around



THanks

G-452

[Cinnabar]

Considering that the pawners pony up 10ish% of the value on items 'bought' by them, if it were possible to have them keep some (all?) of the items pawned between server resets and have them for sale at 50-75% of value, there might just be enough traffic in and out of the pawn shops to keep them semi-solvent. Just a thought.

[Dorganath]

   

Quote:

   
   
      
   
   

Originally Posted by Cinnabar                                           Considering that the pawners pony up 10ish% of the value on items 'bought' by them, if it were possible to have them keep some (all?) of the items pawned between server resets and have them for sale at 50-75% of value, there might just be enough traffic in and out of the pawn shops to keep them semi-solvent. Just a thought.

That would be like the player merchants system we had way back when, and given the amount of junk that people fence through pawn shops, the lag on that would be absolutely horrid.



You old-timers know what I mean.

[Unknown User]

Yes I thought of that same kind of system... because ive kept a pawn window open and watched people sell stuff and sometimes id say... Dang I have a toon that woulda bought that.



But a pawn merchant with 327 barley and 218 corn will be a lag monster.

[Unknown User]

Howabout something(1) along the lines of:

• delete all CNR
• keep one-of everything else

(1) assuming the Toolset inventory management functionality works on stores

[Dorganath]

CNR sells for 1GP each, and it's unlikely this is the reason for depletion of the pawn shops with tens of thousands of gold to start.



Even a limited version of a persistent pawn shops will be problematic. I'm not even sure semi-persistent (i.e. cleared at a reboot) pawn shops are a good idea.



If it matters, I've had this problem in the back of my head for some time, just have not gotten all the way through it.

[Unknown User]

I agree people selling 1gp items to the pawn isnt a problem.... unless you try and make the pawn resell what is sold to it. Which we all know cant happen because of the lag.



So I guess it comes down to which is the real problem. Not everyone being able to use the pawns.... or the people who are.



Right?





.

[Dorganath]

Well in truth, and I've thought about this some in my attempts to figure out a good solution, the problem is two-fold.



One is behavioral in that people use them as trash cans that pay people to take junk off their hands.  They stalk server resets and empty out their inventories of all the unwanted drop items for the return in gold.



In some part, this is why they exist...a source of gold for people who have goods they don't want.  But as in all things, there are people who take things too far, and of course that infringes on those people who are not greedy and/or ambitious enough (or who simply don't have the time) to spam the pawn shops before they're depleted.



The second factor is the servers themselves and their stability.  I know you (Guardian 452) remember when a 6-hour stretch was the beginning of borrowed time and we tried to reset the servers every 12 hours, give or take, just to keep them smooth.  Now, we go days between. My normal schedule is to reset once/week, and experience has shown they can go even longer than that and remain both playable and stable (under the right conditions).  



So the point here being that since the servers stay up longer, the pawns don't get replenished as often and thus they stay depleted.  It's kind of amusing in that this is a case where things are working both as designed and as well as they can, but because of the latter, the design of the former becomes somewhat inadequate in a way that was not really ever anticipated.



Anyway...that's what I'm trying to reconcile...how to make the pawns more functional  due to longer server up-times without making them a bottomless source of gold.

[Unknown User]

Just popping in with my two bits



I am not so sure that the real depletion is due to drop item sales. It is standard practice to raise gold by selling crafted items to large city pawn shops. Many players (including myself) do this. So crafting gives you not only adventuring XP and crafting XP but for some crafts (cut polished gems and arrows with enhancements on them being two of the good ones) it also gives you a lot of gold from the pawnshops. Maybe this is by design, if not then change the pawnshop pricing for crafted items to the same level as CNR.

[Dorganath]

This is a good point, and I'd forgotten about crafted items, though the effect is the same.



As for coding...It's really just a straight percentage of what NWN thinks the item is worth.  There's no special calculation based on the origin of the items.

[Guardian 452]

I do most certainly recall the days that the servers were as stable as a celebrity marriage. LOL You are right the awesome server stability is a big factor in the pawns becoming depleted of coin today.



Absolutly crafters sell the stuff they make to the pawn brokers.  My crafters do it too. We all need money to upgrade as our characters progress, get new gear, horses, houses and pay for services like gathering and contract killing (ok most of you not so much with the contract killing )

Since a sword lasts forever what else are we to do with all the things we make to progress in their given trade? And dont say donate them 'cause that doesnt pay the above bills.



*ducks and runs away as he opened another can of worms*



I dont envy the balancing act you are pondering Dorg. Yet another..... actions of the few affecting the many.

[mixafix]

Given the current population of players would one or two pawn shops...nicely out of the way perhaps...but not level restrained, help the issue.

 

 Particularly if they were smaller pawns and less likely to be dumped on with big value items.

[Unknown User]

Kinda what Mix said, but how about 1 or 2 new pawns near Vehl or Hempstead that would be "ghost town" pawns.  Ghost town pawns would give you very little for your items.  For example lets say a normal small town pawn gives you 10% for your items, this "Ghost town" pawn would only give you 1%.



This could help with chacters who just want to sell items like vials, flasks, and other items just to clean their inventory and would most likely stay funded because of the lil payout per item.

[darkstorme]

I like the idea of a few pawns who never go broke but pay far poorer prices like small town a hair less.

[Unknown User]

The default price given by pawn shops is already 1%.  Just thought I'd point that out.

[Unknown User]

Allow me to interject.



The simplest way to limit the vast sums being depleted is to put a cap on the gold paid per item. If it can be based upon the item's level - say, 100 for items under requirement 5, 200 for 6-10, 500 for 10+.



Also, add things like healing kits, target potions, and mining picks to the pawn brokers - at a minimal markup.

[Unknown User]

   

Quote:

   
   
      
   
   

Originally Posted by darkstorme                                           The default price given by pawn shops is already 1%.  Just thought I'd point that out.

Different pawns in game pay more than some others. So which is 1%?

[Dorganath]

   

Quote:

   
   
      
   
   

Originally Posted by darkstorme                                           The default price given by pawn shops is already 1%.  Just thought I'd point that out.

Actually it's not, at least not according to the palette.  I checked the shop in Port Hempstead to be sure and it's definitely not 1%.

[Nehetsrev]

*passing through Emwonk just sighs and shakes his head and walks away muttering*

 

 "Emwonk visuals lifeless equine suffers additional flogging..."

[darkstorme]

Hm.  I suppose I've never really shopped around for my pawn shop needs; only ever dropped stuff off at the Hlint or Leringard pawn shops.



The one time I was curious, I compared the lens price of items to the price offered by the Hlint pawnshop and it looked like a 100:1 correlation.