Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

Agreed.

Root cause seems to be the location.

Like the Beregost idea, but maybe move it to Soubar for neutrality? Already seems to be like the nexus of all kinds (Mos Eisley space port anyone?). Easy access for anyone and everyone wanting to spend coin. Why bother hiding it anymore, as there is already other no-risk/low-risk locations with epic items for sale.

Allows the majority of the epic item consumers valid RP access to Epic items now, instead of the mentioned mules/alts/mechanic runs/relog camping/etc etc.


Replace the reason for a hell visit with some sort of IC weekly quest? 1500xp reward plus some sort of achievement? (would need an achievement system in game). Some lore master (seems to be enough floating around the forums) should be able to come up with a fun and rewarding reason for a romp to hell for those inclined to holidaying in warmer climates.
(or get rid of it completely, and reserve it for DM events?).

/2c from someone who'se never had a character over 21, nor been to avernus.

Mork wrote: So no one sees a problem with bringing retired/mule chars to hell shop whose all purpose in life will be transferring gold to them so they can buy whatever player wants to transfer it back to other chars next reset through nexus? Doesn't that sound like too much meta to anyone?

Mork wrote:Yea I get it - making a run, shopping and then dying with lvl 30 char is possible too but actually takes some time and effort. There's plenty of creatures down there that may make it difficult. Yet still I believe it could improve situation of some organization that actually takes an effort to do whole "get back from Avernus" quest in a group and shop there how it was intended delivering goods in IC manner without suicide run/mule chars logging. I know if sounds selfish as I'm referring to my own organisation - but it feels bad having your idea for a guild partially broken cause of OOC means.

Playing a merchant/trying to establish a new merchant guild means that you will live through a hell of a lot of frustrating moments.

(From what you wrote throughout this topic I get the impression that you at least actually make it to Avernus in a group and back in a reasonable amount of time.
Shea has been there thrice yet - which is a 5+ hours trip each time, not a 10-minute-run as is claimed here in this topic - and she has died at least twice during each trip, despite being in a party of characters that were guarding her.)

Grandfathered items, epic loot, DM events, player accounts that have been used for 5+ years and are bursting with muled items/gold - quite a few players don't need any items anymore, not even if their new char startes at level 1.

Some others expect you to go to hell, buy a couple of items and sell them to the exact same price. And accuse you of greed if you try and make a few thousand (not a few ten thousand, mind you!) profit - for example to pay for the raise dead scrolls you need to get to the shop in the first place.
Or they ask you if you could go and buy the items in advance, they'd pay up afterwards - which they don't do, then, because they found some item that they consider superiour.


A lot of possible frustrating moments, as said.

The trick is to have your merchants char/guild RP but not to use it OOCly as your primary means to make a living.
It won't work.

RP your merchant, have her walking around and advertise her services, reject all deals that are obviously not doing you any good - and most important of all: Do not try and play a character that is solely focused on merchant life.
In the environment that is BGTSCC, with the conditions I described above, you are not needed.
"Primarily merchant, but with a twist or two" works way better in my experience.

And simply ignore the vendor campers, the "non-merchant-non-rp-epic-loot-grinding-machines" . . . and especially ignore muling and grandfathering. It is gamebreaking, the level of unfairness it brings is stellar, you will never be able to compete with the players that had a player account and a (couple of) level 30 character prior to 2012.

Ignore it and have fun RPing with those characters that still value a merchant char and use it as what it is meant as: an RP source.

VillageGreenWitch - thanks for hints and some good points there.
I never really intended it to be money-making machine. I'm a type that enjoys this game in every aspect be it grind, RP, PvP or boss runs. If I'd want gold much more reliable method would be farming.

Main reason I've mentioned this as a problem was due to lack of interactions that were suppose to be what make that guild running. Getting to know people through trade, creating connections, role-playing some business and doing regular bonding runs to Avernus with guild members. Right now we offer other services that focus around exploration, so it can still work.

Main issue was how soulless and empty it is to get items from there through vendor-camping and other OOC means - comparing to our group who is the one that tried to do it in IC way as epic characters.

Mork wrote:Main issue was how soulless and empty it is to get items from there through vendor-camping and other OOC means - comparing to our group who is the one that tried to do it in IC way as epic characters.

Not sure how much of an "outsider" view I have about the underlined part (I assume I'm not alone) - in my eyes there is no IC way to access that merchant as that merchant cannot be anything else than OOC as a whole.
I mean - a merchant? In actual hell? Very effectively hiding there from most customers?
Whom does he sell to? Other devils? What are they needing of these items? What are they paying with?

I do not consider this merchant to be IC at all - simply because I cannot come up with any (reasonable, not made-up by stretching imagination to the horizon and back) IC explanations about:

- why Shea (or anyone else) would go there in the first place (except fanatical paladins/clerics - which would NOT go shopping but slashing, though),
- why anyone would help her getting there,
- why the merchant would be there,
- why anyone would go there for a second time after seeing the place (it's hell after all, cannot emphasize that often enough. That place should be an automatic partywipe each time, not a grinding area for the high-end powerbuilds.)
- why she would sell any of those devil-tainted items to anyone
- why anyone would buy these devil-tainted items
etc etc

All these (and some more) "why" questions have a really good and reasonable answer OOCly. But none of them I can answer ICly.

Even if that merchant was located at the School of Necromancy in Sshamath, Shea would have a way better IC reasoning to go there.

So in conclusion I accepted that people have an OOC need for those items (myself included!) and that I will use an OOC means to aquire those items.

Well to me it makes no sense to treat it OOC-ly. Its there, it was presented as a part of this world and as such simply should not be OOC. If you consider Avernus OOC then you should do the same with UD as it is place no less dangerous, with MUCH more people going there.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with assumption that epic characters can deal with some demons without any sweat and claims that apparently our chars are not as powerful as lvl 30 pnp versions simply don't add up considering epic quests done by DM-s that no lvl 15 (like someone suggested before 1/2 HD) would survive.

Was quest where group killed dracolich AND lich with ton of their servants in the same dungeon OOC? Was it OOC when my char apparently dodged magic manifestation with force of small atom bomb? Am I suppose to pretend it never happened IC when DM-s let players play obviously epic campaign? Neither such nonsense is written in DM rulings nor they adjust their quests to 1/2 HD chars.

So unless that changes I'll simply assume my char has same power lvl 30 PnP char has, eats demons for breakfast and goes shopping with Bell lord himself cause he prefers to diplomatically "send her for a quest" instead fighting her.

Now feel free to tell me how wrong I am and all locations and content that PnP 15HD couldn't handle are OOC including DM-s quests, Upperdark, and like half of our maps.

With the exception of Nexus, whether an area is treated as IC or OOC is down to an individual player's interpretation. You may consider Avernus to be IC or OOC, likewise for the shop itself. You may even need to consider any area to be temporarily OOC because of current behaviours in that area.

An issue does arise when one interpretation is pushed upon another player. We therefore need to consider the items available in Avernus as being available from other sources too.

For example;
If the only place in the game where you can buy a powerful holy sword is at the Avernus merchant, then that sword can never be used by a Paladin. A Paladin is not going there to buy one, they are not going to pay a third party to get it for them because that is just as bad, and if it is the only source, then they can never buy one from any third party for knowing it to be wrong. The player of that Paladin may consider it an OOC area, so the item would then also be OOC and unusable.
To prevent such imposition, we need allow players to roleplay that the powerful holy sword came from another source. From exotic trade around the Sword Coast. Then all characters have equal access to all items.

So the Badgers may get their items from Avernus, IC. If it becomes known, then their customers may drop, so probably best kept secret. Other players will be going there entirely OOC and regarding the items as having come from somewhere else. It is for players to respect the difficulty of getting such items, and that difficulty may not be in terms of the physical challenge of Avernus. They may have been through detailed roleplay for acquiring the item, then the act of getting it into inventory results in this OOC trip.

i see a problem with one player treating something OOC and another not. That is for the server admin to decide is it not? If the GM of your PnP game places a setting, it is a setting. we have GM's too and they made it IC. a paradox of having an item from (x) but pretending it is from (y) is problematic. not only that its taking the game in your own hands and is akin to metagaming NPC's.

you rolled a pali. play the pali. dont use the evil sword. nuff said.

If it's in game it's not OOC, what you see is what you get.

Valefort wrote:If it's in game it's not OOC, what you see is what you get.

That includes hackers and the occasional troll? :p

There is always a solution for Palys:
In fact there are many items from that shop that can be used only by good/lawful chars being that I'd imagine they are NOT of infernal origin.
It can be roleplayed as sacred artifact that was lost/stolen, and is reclaimed by said Paladin through dealing with group that specializes in dealing with devils. I cannot find the source right now but in some manual I've read that it is entirely acceptable for Paladin to deal with Evil characters when it leads to greater good.

I'd go step further and say that specific merchants alignment is not known at all. For once we can be sure he is lawfull dealing with selling powerful items for a fair price.

Another question: Is his shop really in Avernus? Cause last time I've checked all I can surely say PORTAL to his store is placed in Avernus. Shop itself can be pocket dimension that could be placed in any plane. Perhaps he is Lawful Neutral Tiefling that just studies demons to find means to fight them? There are a ton of possible explanation as far as imagination is limitless.

aaron22 wrote:i see a problem with one player treating something OOC and another not. That is for the server admin to decide is it not? If the GM of your PnP game places a setting, it is a setting. we have GM's too and they made it IC. a paradox of having an item from (x) but pretending it is from (y) is problematic. not only that its taking the game in your own hands and is akin to metagaming NPC's.

you rolled a pali. play the pali. dont use the evil sword. nuff said.

It's not an evil sword though.. I'm just glad I don't play Paladins.

Mork wrote:There is always a solution for Palys:
In fact there are many items from that shop that can be used only by good/lawful chars being that I'd imagine they are NOT of infernal origin.
It can be roleplayed as sacred artifact that was lost/stolen, and is reclaimed by said Paladin through dealing with group that specializes in dealing with devils. I cannot find the source right now but in some manual I've read that it is entirely acceptable for Paladin to deal with Evil characters when it leads to greater good.

I'd go step further and say that specific merchants alignment is not known at all. For once we can be sure he is lawfull dealing with selling powerful items for a fair price. Doesn't he look like a Tiefling after all?

Is his shop really in Avernus? Cause last time I've checked all I can surely say PORTAL to his store is placed in Avernus. Shop itself can be pocket dimension that could be placed in any plane. Perhaps he is Lawful Neutral Tiefling that just studies demons to find means to fight them? There are a ton of possible explanation as far as imagination is limitless.

Exactly, we all have our own interpretations.

Edit:
Oh, it is not about the item being useable by good. It is about not empowering markets controlled by Devils.

ThornsM wrote: Oh, it is not about the item being useable by good. It is about not empowering markets controlled by Devils.

Still don't see a problem. Recovering holy artefact can be perceived as greater good.
But I see somebody answering to that: Paladin should recover it by force not through trade? Well - he can't. Just the same as evil char won't get vendors items by killing him. It's a limitation of a game and we all have to adjust somehow to that fact. Please don't do it saying something is OOC when obviously it was put into the world and presented in IC means.

It's not an evil sword though.. I'm just glad I don't play Paladins.

i know. i was being over dramatic. like palis do

The interpretation is down to the individuals playing characters with strict moral codes.

Personally, I've no issue with Avernus, it has its unique and challenging place in game. I agree with the others who'd see the shop relocated though, to somewhere that it is less taxing on plausibility for poor pedants like me.
I guess it was placed on Avernus to give a degree of exclusivity beyond the base mechanic of pricing.