Merchanting

[Doughnut]

I searched and did not find any debates on this subject.

 

 

 

 

 

Recently a topic has come about where players were buying willow bows for 30 or so odd gold piece, and were then selling to a quest npc for a profit. When buying these bows they would add something making it seem like they were leveling fletching with these bows, rather then sell them for a profit.

 

 

 

Which brings me to the topic.

 

Why or why not do you like Merchanting.

 

Is merchanting unfair?

 

Are Merchanters scammers?

 

And the last question are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong?

 

 

 

I hope I got the general idea accross, and may it bring a good discussion about. :

 

 

 

 

 

(Also, since this is a discussion please make well thought out and clean written responses. No +1's. :-# )

[Alg]

merchanting is just knowing prices and taking advantage of that. nothing wrong with it, unless they confuse 'merchanting' with 'scamming'

[Bobbington]

Merchants can be annoying occasionally yes, but at the end of the day it's a lagitimate way of making money.

 

 

 

They are the middle men, where yoiu have high leveled players training they tend not to deal with the item collecters they deal with the retailer. A real merchant will be able to stock large amounts and are reliable.....

 

 

 

 

 

However the problem comes with the new age merchants to heard they they can make money through merchanting, merchanting is an unranked skill, it's not somthing evrybody can do. The new age merchants are price manipulators, and do have a negatve impact on the game.

 

 

 

So the line must be drawn at why a player is merchanting, if the answer is greed it's a bad place to be.

 

 

 

Real merchants are a good asset to the game.

 

 

 

You must rememebr though that while merchants do their thing, ststistically their account becomes no better, so you could ask: "whats the point?" I will leave you with that.

[Maleficus1055]

Merchanting is completely fair. If one buys an item(/s) at a low price, whoever sold to them made the decision to hit 'accept'. And whoever buys the items(/s) also made that decision. Us merchanters are in no way scammers.

[SanNo1]

i kinda like them. i sell the monster drops and clue rewards i get for the lowest market value and sometimes a little underpriced so i get an amount of gp which satisfies me and can get back to slaying. the part of the merchanters is that they buy my stuff and sell it to other people for a profit. i just really dont like standing in falador shouting "selling [insert item]" for a long time, i rather get a decent amount of money and xp.

[128backwards]

Why or why not do you like Merchanting.

 

well I dont like it personally because , it often raises the prices of things and since I almost never sell its usually does me more harm than good. Of course life isn't always gonna go your way...

 

 

 

Is merchanting unfair?

 

I believe that people should have the choice to do that they want in order to earn money in real life or in game as long as it doesn't hurt anybody. So I personally believe that merchanting is completely legitimate, and I dont see how it could be unfair because anybody can get into merchanting it requires next to nothing to start merchanting, its just a question of how good you are at it.

 

 

 

Are Merchanters scammers?

 

Merchants buy and sell, if I bought something is that scamming? If I sold something is that scamming? I say no, sure sometimes the prices are really up there, but people are buying at these prices. Buying or selling at extreme prices is only scamming if people either, do not know the true value of what their buying or are some how tricked into buying something they did not want. Most people who trade exstensively don't deal with these problems. Lets say someone sold sharks are 5k ea, an extremely high price for sharks. This person knows that sharks are worth a lot less, but is willing to pay that much because he/she really needs it. If this person agrees to buy it at that price is it scamming?

 

 

 

And the last question are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong?

 

I am assuming that most merchants can easily make money, and that they're fairly rich (+10mil). Well if oyu expose their strategems that is your own choice to make. I personally dont think it hurts merchants too much because they already have lots of money and probably a decent cash flow. If the cash flow decreased slightly they would still make lots of money and after about 20mil or so you have nothing left to spend on (except for rares). And if you have nothing left to spend on what will that money be for?

[Roberthree]

It's only scamming if there is a lie involved. I've openly told anyone I bought willow/maple bows* what I planned to do with them.

 

 

 

I even helped a guy do the Achievement Diary so he could sell them himself.

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows so I can level fletching" <= Scamming

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows" <= Not Scamming

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows so I can sell them on Karajma for a profit" <= Honest, but a bit stupid.

 

 

 

If they don't ask, don't tell. But most people don't feel like selling their bows to a shop so they save time and sell them to me.

 

 

 

(*= I don't buy the bows anymore. I buy the logs and get fletching xp, then I sell em)

 

 

 

i just really dont like standing in falador shouting "selling [insert item]" for a long time, i rather get a decent amount of money and xp.

 

 

 

Bah, thats why I hate selling stuff. I could never merchant, but thats why we have Rune Crafting.

[SanNo1]

 

Bah, thats why I hate selling stuff. I could never merchant, but thats why we have Rune Crafting.

 

 

 

runecrafting ftw

 

on topic: they arent scamming, they are just making money on their own, legal way, with sometimes getting a lot of cash but no xp.

[ChickyBee32]

It's only scamming if there is a lie involved. I've openly told anyone I bought willow/maple bows* what I planned to do with them.

 

 

 

I even helped a guy do the Achievement Diary so he could sell them himself.

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows so I can level fletching" <= Scamming

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows" <= Not Scamming

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows so I can sell them on Karajma for a profit" <= Honest, but a bit stupid.

 

 

 

If they don't ask, don't tell. But most people don't feel like selling their bows to a shop so they save time and sell them to me.

 

 

 

(*= I don't buy the bows anymore. I buy the logs and get fletching xp, then I sell em)

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don't think that falls under scamming. Scamming is more to do with prices items are sold/bought for. I would say in 99% of cases, the person selling the willow bows would do so no matter what the buyer was planning on doing with them. Now, if you were to tell someone that instead of paying 15gp per bow* you wanted to pay 10gp per bow because fletching is about to be opened up to F2P so the market is going to be flooded and prices will drop... that would be a scam.

 

 

 

 

 

*I don't know what the prices are, so don't jump on me telling me they're wrong.

[Roberthree]

Meh, I've made over 300k doing this and I never had to lie. I see no reason why people have to make up crud about fletching.

[Solidus_77]

merchants are not scammers in any way, shape or form.

 

 

 

Merchants provide an important service: convenience. Basically, when you are selling goods it takes an undetermined amount of time. Merchants will take all your goods for a slightly lower price, or give you an offer much faster meaning you don't have to sit through the annoying waiting. In a way, the merchants do the boring waiting for you therefore providing the service. Their payment, if you like, is based on the profit they make.

 

 

 

That's the general idea behind merchanting. There's no deception because both parties agree on one price and that price is maintained so merchants are only people offering a much demanded service. No connection with scamming at all. Although people think merchants are immoral and deceptive they are just wrong.

 

 

 

Often merchants are confused with price manipulators. Price manipulation is an organized attempt aimed at artificially changing the price of a good. Merchants do not change the price of a good, they simply buy from people who want to sell quickly and sell to people who want to buy quickly (and who, of course, agree on the price)

 

 

 

Another misconception is blaming merchants for a change in price. Now this is just ignorance. Merchants influence neither the supply or the demand for a product. They simply use the price range

 

 

 

It's only scamming if there is a lie involved. I've openly told anyone I bought willow/maple bows* what I planned to do with them.

 

 

 

I even helped a guy do the Achievement Diary so he could sell them himself.

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows so I can level fletching" <= Scamming

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows" <= Not Scamming

 

 

 

"Hi, I'm buying 500,000 willow bows so I can sell them on Karajma for a profit" <= Honest, but a bit stupid.

 

 

 

If they don't ask, don't tell. But most people don't feel like selling their bows to a shop so they save time and sell them to me.

 

 

 

(*= I don't buy the bows anymore. I buy the logs and get fletching xp, then I sell em)

 

 

 

 

But he's not lying about his price. He is only lying about his intentions. Scamming is when he says he buys for x price buy instead he wants to buy for another price and, by switching amounts or other methods, he tricks the person into thinking they bought for x price.

 

 

 

This whole issue is controversial, but not at all scamming (or at least not in the context that we know) because both parties agree on THE SAME PRICE. They can do whatever the hell they want with the stuff after they make it, they are not obliged to give reasons.

 

 

 

The only person who's to blame is the seller for his ignorance. The merchants simply have valuable information on their side. And those who try to keep this method secret know the value of this information

[Doughnut]

Solidus that was a really nice reply.

 

 

 

Seems like the general consensus is that Merchanters are not scammers, would be nice if the people who think they are would come here and have there ideas posted. :

[Lady_Shahdie]

Here are my stances on the following questions:

 

 

 

Why or why not do you like Merchanting.

 

I neither hate nor incredibly like merchanting. I may not mind to merchant every once and in awhile due to the ease of making profits steadily or quite quickly. However, I do not enjoy merchanting due to the contributionless style of it (you are not really generating new items in RuneScape by you own hard work). When I mine or smith something for sale, I have a feeling that I am contributing to the RuneScape economy and truly generating new surplus items.

 

 

 

Is merchanting unfair?

 

Heavens no! Its a very honest practice when done the correct way. Any division of Sales careers in real life embody the same concepts and are believed to be fair. So the same should mostly apply to RuneScape as well.

 

 

 

Are Merchanters scammers?

 

A portion of them are. There is no way I can confidently say they are not but gladly it is really a select few that choose to scam (not the whole majority). When I say scam that means they item switch at the trade screen, grossly overprice items/grossly underbuy items, fool new players into paying ridiculous prices/sell for ridiculous prices, etc.

 

 

 

And the last question are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong?

 

Expose as in revealing the sales methods of these merchanters? Of course they are right to do so. This in reality is public information therefore the merchant has no right to claim it damaging.

[highlanders]

Why or why not do you like Merchanting.

 

I don't merchant because it's boring.

 

 

 

Is merchanting unfair?

 

No, every player can do it.

 

 

 

Are Merchanters scammers?

 

It's not since there's no abuse of the seller, the seller sells the item at x price by their own will.

 

 

 

And the last question are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong? Mispelled questions are not worthy of an answer.

 

 

 

But, may I add, most merchanters don't go very high on the morality scale, most got such a bad attitude.

[mathgenius50]

Why or why not you like merchanting.

 

I do like merchanting because I can make lots of money. :D

 

 

 

Is it unfair

 

No because anyone can do it.

 

 

 

Are merchanters scammers?

 

No because some people sell for below normal and others buy that and sell for its acutal price.

 

 

 

are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong?

 

Some like price manipluation is wrong

[lchaosl]

Why or why not do you like Merchanting. I like it because it makes me easy money.

 

 

 

Is merchanting unfair? No, people don't feel like getting the highest price for their items and merchanters take advantage of them being lazy or just not caring.

 

 

 

Are Merchanters scammers? Only if the lie about the purpose the are buying the items, for example the willow longbow buyers. Scamming is decieving another person for your own benifit.

 

 

 

And the last question are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong? Right. Anyone willing to spend the time to earn the money should be able to, and people lying about thier motives deserve to be exposed.

[Berrakus]

Why or why not do you like Merchanting.

 

I generally do not like merchanting. Merchants are middlemen who eat into the seller's profit and take more money from the buyer. In almost all cases, I would rather deal directly with someone, rather than having to go through a merchant.

 

 

 

Is merchanting unfair?

 

Most of the merchanting that I think is unfair is actually Jagex's fault. I like Herblore and to me, the best place to buy Water Filled Vials is the Ardougne General Store since they sell 300 at 12 each. However, they are almost always out of stock, because merchants buy them out and sell them on the forums for 250 each. All I'm asking for is a choice. Make the vials re-stock a lot faster so that one merchant can't buy them all. Sort of like Eye of Newt in Port Sarim. They restock so quickly that I have the option of buying them there for 3 each, or on the forum for 100-200each. Giving merchants the ability to take over the entire market for an item is never good.

 

 

 

Are Merchanters scammers?

 

It's like with PKing. The people who stink at it become RC PKers or clue scroll PKers. People who stink at Merchanting become scammers. For example, they flood busy market places and forums with ridiculous prices, trying to manipulate the prices of the items they are trying to buy or sell. Real merchants know what they are doing and don't have to resort to illegal tactics.

 

 

 

And the last question are players who expose merchanting schemes right or wrong?

 

Right. Merchants are middlemen. Like I said its all about having choices. Let the buyers and sellers know what the merchants are going to do with the items and in doing so, you are allowing the buyers and sellers to decide if they want to do that too, or if they think its too much of a hassle and would still rather just do business with the merchant.

[anim7]

If merchanting was scamming, what about the stock market? People buy stocks at the lowest price possible hoping that their investment pays off in the end. Are all those investors/speculators scammers because they can understand value of money and economics and use that to make a profit?

 

 

 

Crab fishermen risk their lives to catch these huge crabs that they sell to big time buyers for like a dollar a pound and after it has been exchanged hands many times from one person to another, it end up at a store for 10 dollars a pound and the consumer buys it. This is totally legal.

 

 

 

Merchanting is a way of life. The merchant is an honest player providing service to others. Most people cannot physically go to these crab boats to get their food for a dollar a pound so they pay more for a service which is provided by merchants.