Oblivion talk:Merchants

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The repeatable stats for merchants would probably be gold limit, merchantile skill, and location. Their activity cycle might be useful too, but mostly for the thieves' guild fences. --Trithemius 08:51, 27 March 2006 (EST)

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(moved from main article page) Note: I gathered and entered the information for all of the Imperial City merchants and it's a pity someone else wasted his time doing the same. :P However, adding the trader's mercantile skill level to the table would appear a good idea! Started sounding so good that I implemented the upgrade myself. -FMan/TX (Sami Klemola, Finland)

I figured plenty of people were doing this, my preliminary tests of the merchants haggle rates seems to indicate that they are depending on Disposition and Personality and Skill in a way I can't easily determine (without examining the files in the TESCS or spending a lot of time testing. I think it's very important to incorporate the merchant skill level in the table, and to remove extraneous information like the rare items column. --Trithemius 18:17, 27 March 2006 (EST)

Hmm. Agree with the mercantile skill and I did add it to the the table, but ... hmm, well, I'm doing a list in the items page from which you can find the "rare items", yes, so maybe they could be removed from this table, but is there a harm in them being there, except maybe that the items will be different for higher level characters?

I am currently in the process of listing all the traders from every other city that isn't on the list yet.

What is the purpose of the Merchant ID column? Generally it is the name w/o spaces, but what would someone use this for? Also, I can't seem to figure out where in TESCS a merchant's rare items are set, anybody know? Nevermind, I figured it out: In the merchant's store cell are some persistent reference containers, usually placed outside the playable area. The chest inventories define the merchant's inventory. They are hooked to the merchant by editing the NPC reference placed in the cell (not the NPC base as found through the Object Window). There is a tab in the Reference editor for Merchant Container. -Thehankerchief 15:39, 30 March 2006 (EST)

All right, that was useful information, thanks. I have now entered the merchants from all cities and pretty much finished with the table. I presume there are some more miscellaneous traders in backrooms/cellars/hidden locations, which should be added to the table upon discovery. -FMan/TX, Finland

Well, it seems like the system might be more complicated than just the merchant container tab. Take a look at HamlofRedTooth, he doesn't have one set, yet he has an inventory. It looks like he's selling anything that has its Ownership set to him. I posted a question about this on the official CS wiki. -Thehankerchief 16:50, 30 March 2006 (EST)

That's very interesting. :) I added yet some more traders to the table. How do you find out the hidden characteristics of NPCs? -FMan 18:29, 30 March 2006 (EST)

I use TESCS, lookup the merchant's name in the NPC table, edit and grab their mercantile skill value. Getting the rare items a merchant sells shouldn't be too hard, look under the Container table for ones that start with Vendor. You just have to be careful to check that the vendor actually sells the item. Like VendorRedDiamondJewelry has UniqueRingUnseen, but if you go to the cell, the owner of that container isn't HamlofRedTooth, but RisFralmoton, who doesn't seem to exist in the game. P.S. Suomi eläkoon -Thehankerchief 18:48, 30 March 2006 (EST)

Right. I thought the CS is the only way to find the information and no console command for displaying it? I haven't yet downloaded the CS4. All of the rare item information I have entered, comes from the actual game. I'm still gonna add the ImpCity rare items, which are so far missing from the Item page. --FMan 18:52, 30 March 2006 (EST) (Yes, Finland rules!)

• Wow! This page has soon had almost TEN THOUSAND hits. Apparently this information was much in need. It took some work, but now I'm glad. :) Someone said that you don't need a mudcrab merchant due to the way barter now works, but there's another issue that still isn't addressed. There is no way to sell expensive items for but a fraction of their actual value, which sucks balls. --FMan 12:19, 7 April 2006 (EDT)

Contents 1 break out into sections by city? 2 Merchants from official add-ons? 3 My feedback 4 Service Icons 5 Best Merchant 6 The Page Itself 7 Scrolls? 8 Renting a room

[edit] break out into sections by city?

I'll do it if people promise not to revert

What exactly do you mean? Do you mean make a seperate table for each city? If so I would say no...its a rather nice table as it is and not excessively long. -- DaveH 17:02, 10 April 2006 (EDT)

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(moved from main article page) Suggestion: Include a small Icon of what the merchant looks like. This would be useful in guild halls where there are a number of characters running around and you want to find the alchemist.

[edit] Merchants from official add-ons?

Their is one extra Merchant with money of 2000 that comes with the wizard's tower - Aurelinwae at Mystic Emporium behind the normal merchant (Imperial City Market District). I'm not sure how useful she is for selling stuff without Journeyman Mercantile. -- Merlyn (moved by Actreal 23:07, 15 May 2006 (EDT))

I moved this comment as it is mostly discussion and inconsistent with the table format. Perhaps someone with the full info on Aurelinwae and others can insert merchants from official add-ons to the tables with a footnote regarding which add-on they come from. I would, but I don't have any of the addons. --Actreal 23:07, 15 May 2006 (EDT)

[edit] My feedback

The previous one big table was much better than this split up one IMHO and I'm annoyed it was split up even when others opposed. Now the page looks messy, especially with each table being of different width. The one table worked very well. It was easy to find what you needed and I printed it as well, but you can't really print this mess - well, you can but it will look horrible. Furthermore, there seems to be a vague "other" section, which is totally useless listing unknown inns: where the hell are they? --FMan 11:52, 17 May 2006 (EDT)

I didn't split it up, but I find it much more readable now than one long table of merchants. That said, I don't print it out, I read it on screen. Also, I'm generally looking for a merchant in a specific city not doing a Cyrodiil-wide search. I added the "Other" section to list all the merchants in places that don't need their own sections (i.e. standalone Inns or villages with only one merchant). As it happens, these are all innkeepers. I think it is important to record them for completeness since they are just as useful as any other merchant - you can sell goods (although not for much gold before getting Expert in Mercantile) and invest in their shops. As for where the inns are, they all have links to the relevant Places page with directions and/or map guidance, except Gottshaw Inn, which is just west of Kvatch. All inns appear on the in-game map as an Inn or Village symbol. --Actreal 23:20, 23 May 2006 (EDT)

TheRealLurlock, thanks for putting the "Unknown" section in. I also was unsure what was going on with them... maybe somebody else has ideas. I have some variants to point out... again, not sure what's going on with them, but my notes differ from your main table...

• I cannot get these merchants to sell me anything, even though the CS suggests they are merchants. All will let you invest in that shop, though:
  • Enilroth, even when in Morvayn's and even though he has a Morvayn key. Notice he does not list any apparent merchant services (task assignments) on his AI tab.
  • Magra at Cheydinhal Borba's.
  • Edgar of Discount Spells. He does offer spells, but not merchandise.
• Other "Unknowns" you might want to add:
  • Karinarre of Bruma Novaroma. She has a key (in CS) and can be found in Novaroma. But, no sales.
  • Ormil of the Bloated Float has a key, but no sales.
• Oddly, Kirsten and S'thasa both show up in the game with Expert merc skill on my Haggle screen, and an interpolation (see my xls) based on best Haggle rate of 164% buy/65% sell suggests they're both Merc skill ~95. This is very puzzling - how can they be different from what the CS settings say? How many others might not be what the CS says? Likewise, Engorm has a merc skill of ~71 in the game, not the 26 seen in the CS. I have a list of merchants and am checking off who is and isn't as expected, but it's slow going because I'm doing it casually as I get the chance.

If you (or anyone else) can confirm or deny any of the above, maybe we can pin down what's going on and/or perhaps important gameplay differences. For example, I'm not a Thief... could that matter? Or maybe quests open some of them up, or...? --RedKnight 18:45, 30 July 2006 (EDT)

The page is looking great, TheRealLurlock! A regular work of art! Thanks for that! --RedKnight

Hopefully better late than never still counts ;)

I investigated the mercantile skill for Kirsten, S'thasa, and Engorm and confirmed that their skill is larger than the previously quoted values. The problem is that these three merchants are leveled and therefore their mercantile skill goes up each time the player levels up. It's not a common problem: the only other merchants who are leveled are Nerussa, Vlanhonder Moslin, and Candice Corgine (technically, Etira Moslin is, too, but her mercantile skill is manually set to be 100 anyway, so it's not too relevant). I've added notes to all of these merchants' pages and added info to the merchant charts.

I also opted to delete the "Unknown" section. I investigated everybody listed in the section. Most of them are people whose class is "Merchant" or "MerchEnchanter", but otherwise do not act in any way as merchants; I added notes to each of these NPCs' pages and deleted them completely from the Merchant page because I can't see any reason why someone looking at this article would want to know about them. IMO, Engorm and Candice Corgine are merchants: you can sell them items, and Candice has merchandise available for sale. They are definitely far more functional as merchants than Vlanhonder Moslin, who was being treated as a "normal" merchant. So I've just merged them into the standard tables.

I'm not sure about what to do with the various merchants who never buy/sell anything but still will allow you to invest in their store. For now, they're included in the tables (S'drassa is the only one who was listed in the "Unknown" section, but there's another half-dozen scattered elsewhere on the page). And most of them have descriptions on their NPC pages as to why they never sell items. It would perhaps make more sense to move them all to the bottom of the page and create a new special section, but I feel like I've done enough tweaking for now ;) --Nephele^Talk 03:15, 27 August 2007 (EDT)

[edit] Service Icons

Trying out the Service Icons from the Oblivion:People page here as well. (Just did Anvil so far) What do people think? Only part I'm not sure about is that now you need to rollover the training icons to see what they train. But on the plus side, you can now see what level trainer they are, as well as if they offer other services such as repairs, beds, etc. May even add spell icons for people who sell both spells and merchandise.

Oh, while I'm at it, does anybody really care about the "Merchant ID"? It's not like you can even use that, and most of the time it's just the vendor's name, minus a space if there is one. The FormID is another matter, that can actually be used in the console (in case a vendor disappears and you need to respawn them). But the editor ID is pretty much useless outside of the editor. --TheRealLurlock 21:48, 26 July 2006 (EDT)

Sure, ditch the Merchant ID. It's not very useful, even in the CS (where you can sort on real name). Sounds like a good idea. Also: I highly recommend not using icons for anything that can mean more than one thing. One can't see what somebody trains in, at what level, if they print the page. My PC is finicky about task-switching out of the game, so I don't do it. All your fine editing work is lost, in a printout. :( BTW: The list is missing Sabine Laul. (Also a number of others with class Merch*, but the others appear to be non-functional(?) merchants in the game. Or at least everyone I could find, is. Fathis Ules is a fence, eh? I'm not a thief.) --RedKnight 17:22, 27 July 2006 (EDT)

Lurlock, on second thought, don't worry about the Training icons, at least not for me. After all, if somebody really wants to know trainers, they will go to a Trainers listing. Not a Merchants listing. Sorry for any bumout I mighta caused after all that good work! --RedKnight 23:55, 28 July 2006 (EDT)

Ask and ye shall receive. Added in new icons to tell you which skill they train. Updated all the People pages to match, too. --TheRealLurlock 14:17, 30 July 2006 (EDT)

It looks great, Lurlock! Thanks for that. Also note, I've figured out Mercantile better, and added quite a bit to the page. Plus I put a link to a simple spreadsheet listing of Merchants there, for anybody that wants a more compact listing and/or to sort or play with the merchant info. --RedKnight 16:51, 30 July 2006 (EDT)

[edit] Best Merchant

i'm very surpised that the merchant with the most gold isn't noted here. Check Oblivion:Rowley_Eardwulf. ^{—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 83.189.228.244 (talk • contribs).}

If you would like to add merchants from the mods feel free to do so. This page was mostly created when only Frostcrag Spire had been released, and has not been updated every time a new mod has come out. --Nephele 12:37, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

[edit] The Page Itself

the merchants page wont load for me....is this a problem with the server or is my computer being difficult with me..again? Feartheflame 13:17, 25 January 2008 (EST)

nevermind...it loaded...i guess my computer was just being difficult

Feartheflame 13:21, 25 January 2008 (EST)

I am having the same problem, when i try to load the page i only get a white page. I tried on two different computers with two different browsers. I can access the talk page only by entering the address manually. Any ideas? I do not have this problem on any other page here and I've used the site extensively in the last couple of days ;)

--79.220.250.166 06:16, 10 September 2008 (EDT)

It's a known issue with the caching of some pages. I've purged it - try again now. If it still doesn't work, register an account and try again. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 06:21, 10 September 2008 (EDT)

just registered an account right now anyways and the page works now, also in a browser where I'm not logged in. Thanks a lot! For future reference, if this happens again, is leaving a comment the right step or was there something I could/ should have done to rectify the problem myself? thanks again! - --Nono 06:26, 10 September 2008 (EDT)

You might be able to purge the page yourself but I'm not sure. It'll generally be easier to post a message and hope somebody notices. Logging in to an account should always fix the problem, though. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 06:54, 10 September 2008 (EDT)

[edit] Scrolls?

Would it be possible for someone who knows of such things to add scrolls to the different types of items sold? I know that Calandil and I think the two brothers that are actual merchants from Three Brothers Trade Goods (or whatever its actual name is) sell scrolls, but I know not every shop-keeper sells scrolls and sometimes scroll sellers are hard to come by. The only decent scroll merchant I know of is Calandil in Imperial City.

I don't buy many scrolls, but am seeking some now and came looking for a list of merchants to make the rounds to. Maybe I'm the only one that would find that info handy. Maybe not too. --Alaston

[edit] Renting a room

If you rent a room in an inn how long does the rent last? 24.23.230.168 02:41, 29 May 2008 (EDT)

As far as I am aware, until two things happen: 1. The clock passes midnight; 2. You change cells.

In other words, if you rent a room after midnight, you can sleep in that room until morning, then go out adventuring, and when you return the following evening, the room will still be available for you to sleep in.

If you rent a room and then never leave the 'lodgings' area, you can sleep in that room for as many days as you want, as the ownership of the room door and bed (which is what dictates whether you can sleep there) is not reset until you leave that cell.

--Gaebrial 02:54, 29 May 2008 (EDT)

It's usually one or two cells. For instance, with Luther Broad's Boarding house you can spend as much time in the bar area or the rooms area as you like but if you go into the basement you'll lose the room (as long as the day has changed). –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 05:09, 29 May 2008 (EDT)

I didn't know that! Mind you, I don't tend to rent a room at Luther's - I just break into the second room and sleep there (that bed is free). Is it based on the way the cell is named? e.g. you only lose the room when you leave a cell that begins 'Luther Broad's Boarding House'? or are certain cells flagged in some way? --Gaebrial 05:46, 29 May 2008 (EDT)

In Luther Broad's case, the two cells are checked in his NPC script. In fact, now I look in a little more detail there seem to be one or two other oddities. The Cheydinhal Bridge Inn and Grey Mare (and others) both have a "24 hour" script rather than checking for a change of game day and don't check the cell at all. And Luther's seems to be the only one that lets you stay in two cells. It's never easy is it? :) –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 05:59, 29 May 2008 (EDT)

That probably explains why Luther follows you around, unlike other publicans. I'm not sure that any of the scripts need to check for a cell change unless, like Luther's, they let you 'stay' in more than one cell. The ownership of the bed & room door shouldn't change while you are in the cell. Especially bearing in mind that, for many inns, the rooms are in a separate cell to the publican, so the publican's script won't run while you are in the 'lodgings' cell. I wonder if the '24 hour' scripts are on those inns where the rooms are in the same cell as the publican? --Gaebrial 02:45, 30 May 2008 (EDT)