SP Bargaining Network

[crowgrrrl 39]

Hiya Everyone,

 

I've got a couple of questions. Still consider myself new to PC and getting ready to settle down and put some serious time in the game. I will be playing SP for the most part and wondered if there was an effective way to set up a Shopper Network in SP.

 

Starting out pretty much with an empty chest, though I have a few toons running around and have collected a few bits of gear. I am actually thinking about using the blank 200 TG as a Niob smither to make things easier for my beginning toons. I've read a bit about bargaining and still a little confused (whether it's worth putting more than 75 hard points in it) and have read about Gogo's permanent shopping network which I think is pretty much MP based for Clan D.A.R.K.

 

I know the importance of a Bargaining Suit, Buff Suit, etc. but with pretty much an empty chest is a Shopper Network in SP doable? I'm kinda of at a loss as how to proceed and would appreciate any help and advice I can get.

 

I suppose I could use the blank 200 toons to farm lower level sets (lowest meaning level 20..lol)as Farmer Schot did to help out with bargaining suits. It would take a fair bit of time I think since you would have to build up capital for the shoppers. I could probably use the blank 200 toon to funnel items down for the early bargainers to sell. I just wonder if it is even possible to do if you didn't have access or want to use the blank toons. Many thanks to DB for those

 

I do apologize if this has been covered somewhere else, if so please point me in the right direction..lol

 

crowgrrrl

[Llama8 8]

Yes, creating a shopper network is almost as easy in SP as it is in MP (with the possible exception of lower XP due to not having anyone in-game with you & it may not be possible to get the shopper run up into Niobium at a very low level & the mods on niobium gear are noticeably better than any other difficulty). Additionally, since the character files are on your pc, you can make a copy of your bargainer at whatever levels you want to have a shopper as you level him/her up, that way you only have to level up a shopper once...

 

If you're creating a shopper, then yes, you should always keep Bargaining at character level & upgrade your trading suit every so often.

 

One thing that you "should" do (if possible), is to run your trader through into Niobium as soon as possible, this is easier in MP since you can have a friend run you through, but you should (I think) be able to do it yourself in a LAN game if you start up a second copy of Sacred 2 (which you can do as long as your PC can copy with it) & have a high level character (a blank level 200 character would be good for this if you don't have a high level char already) run your trader through each difficulty.

[essjayehm 58]

Yes! Excellent, Crowgrrrl, I had the exact same thought...

 

And then Barristan uploaded a shopping network.... and that became my default answer to spending 1000 hours building up a 140, 100, 75, 50, 35 and level 2 shoppers.

 

However, I the faintest idea how to get it working (ie upload), but someone else would be able to help you with the technical bits!

[crowgrrrl 39]

Thanks Llama for the fast reply and info.

 

I'm going to show my complete ignorance here and ask how one person could take another character in a LAN game on the same PC through the various difficulties without having another person to run said character? I know it's a stupid question and perhaps I misunderstood it, I apologize and plead for your patience..lol

 

Just so you know, it's probably obvious..lol, I am a complete idiot when it comes to the down and dirty tech/game mechanic stuff so I feel like I am missing something really obvious in your post when you are talking about running a second copy and running the trader through with a higher level character, sorry about that.

 

I always wondered how it was possible to have a level 5 Niob toon since unlocking the difficulties is level based I thought. Again please excuse my ignorance for I'm just a babe in the woods, well make that old fogey in the woods when it comes to the mechanics and such. I have a feeling my brain is gonna explode before it's over..lol

 

Thanks again for the info Llama and your patience

[crowgrrrl 39]

Yes! Excellent, Crowgrrrl, I had the exact same thought...

 

And then Barristan uploaded a shopping network.... and that became my default answer to spending 1000 hours building up a 140, 100, 75, 50, 35 and level 2 shoppers.

 

However, I the faintest idea how to get it working (ie upload), but someone else would be able to help you with the technical bits!

 

 

Thanks Scott! I had seen Barristan's shopping network and wonderd how that would work for the other classes, his is TG network I think. I know you can shop the ammys and rings and such but other classes gear doesn't show up as much as if you had that particular class shopping, at least I don't think it does..Not sure what difference is between PC and consoles on this. I found bits and pieces of other classes "stuff" when I shopped with my seraphim on console but as it should be most was for the seraphim.

 

Do most of you use certain shopper toons for ammys/rings and a class shopper for armour, etc.? Just curious since I would assume that answer to be yes, but I could be completely off the mark here. Again, thank you all for your time and patience.

[Capt.Smack87 0]

Yes! Excellent, Crowgrrrl, I had the exact same thought...

 

And then Barristan uploaded a shopping network.... and that became my default answer to spending 1000 hours building up a 140, 100, 75, 50, 35 and level 2 shoppers.

 

However, I the faintest idea how to get it working (ie upload), but someone else would be able to help you with the technical bits!

 

 

Thanks Scott! I had seen Barristan's shopping network and wonderd how that would work for the other classes, his is TG network I think. I know you can shop the ammys and rings and such but other classes gear doesn't show up as much as if you had that particular class shopping, at least I don't think it does..Not sure what difference is between PC and consoles on this. I found bits and pieces of other classes "stuff" when I shopped with my seraphim on console but as it should be most was for the seraphim.

 

Do most of you use certain shopper toons for ammys/rings and a class shopper for armour, etc.? Just curious since I would assume that answer to be yes, but I could be completely off the mark here. Again, thank you all for your time and patience.

I use a high elf for shopping because of the amount of sockets set armor has and they can equip 4 rings and 2 amulets,and its easy to raise bargaining to 5x your char.level.For me a high elf tends to "find" better items.

[Llama8 8]

I'm going to show my complete ignorance here and ask how one person could take another character in a LAN game on the same PC through the various difficulties without having another person to run said character? I know it's a stupid question and perhaps I misunderstood it, I apologize and plead for your patience..lol

Start up Sacred (switch to windowed mode & lower the gfx settings if necessary) & create a LAN campaign game with your level 1/2 shopper character. Start up a second instance/copy of Sacred 2 (click the shortcut, or however you start Sacred, again) & enter the LAN game with a second, high level character (high level so that it won't have any problems killing the monsters & if it's high enough you can "just" run through ignoring all of the monsters) & use that character to run the shopper. I've done the same in Closed MP, so you can definitely have two copies of Sacred 2 running on the same PC at the same time as long as your PC is beefy enough to copy with it.

 

When you've got both characters in-game, keep your shopper character in-game & on the starter isle, then alt-tab to the high level character & run through the campaign.

 

Repeat for Gold, Plat & Niobium.

 

I always wondered how it was possible to have a level 5 Niob toon since unlocking the difficulties is level based I thought. Again please excuse my ignorance for I'm just a babe in the woods, well make that old fogey in the woods when it comes to the mechanics and such. I have a feeling my brain is gonna explode before it's over..lol

There are two ways of unlocking subsequent difficulties, by character level or by completing the previous campaign, hence if you have another character run your character through the campaign, they get to access the next difficulty regardless of level.

 

Thanks Scott! I had seen Barristan's shopping network and wonderd how that would work for the other classes, his is TG network I think. I know you can shop the ammys and rings and such but other classes gear doesn't show up as much as if you had that particular class shopping, at least I don't think it does.

Yes, bargaining does skew the merchant "drops" (armour, anyway, the jewellery & weapons tabs are unaffected) towards the class that's shopping, which is annoying if you're looking for equipment for a different class, but useful if you're looking for same-class gear.

 

Do most of you use certain shopper toons for ammys/rings and a class shopper for armour, etc.? Just curious since I would assume that answer to be yes, but I could be completely off the mark here. Again, thank you all for your time and patience.

You have a choice, you can either create several different shoppers with different classes at different levels (ie, a High Elf & seraphim shoppers at level 10, a TG & High Elf at level 50, etc), or you can have one shopper character at each level that you want & put up with having to shop for much longer to get not only armour for the class that you want but decent armour.

 

By far the easiest way of shopping is to do it in an MP server, start on the isle, then use the map to travel to a different portal, then as the map is "disappearing" (but before you actually port off the isle) hit whatever key you have bound to "port to island" (can't remember if it's F12 or F8 as default), this will immediately teleport you back to the island, but Sacred 2 thinks that you've left the island so it resets the merchants' inventories... Sounds a bit complex, but it's really simple, though you do have to be fairly quick on hitting the port-back-to-the-island key after you select the other portal...

[Dragon Brother 619]

Or you shop for weapons/jewelry and relics only and rely on set items that drop for gear, because eventually they're gonna be everywhere.

 

Ps. You can tweak the balance.txt settings to make accessing difficulties easier in SP if you don't want to run your toon through lots of campaigns.

[JKtheWonderguy 3]

Hiya Everyone,

 

I've got a couple of questions. Still consider myself new to PC and getting ready to settle down and put some serious time in the game. I will be playing SP for the most part and wondered if there was an effective way to set up a Shopper Network in SP.

 

Starting out pretty much with an empty chest, though I have a few toons running around and have collected a few bits of gear. I am actually thinking about using the blank 200 TG as a Niob smither to make things easier for my beginning toons. I've read a bit about bargaining and still a little confused (whether it's worth putting more than 75 hard points in it) and have read about Gogo's permanent shopping network which I think is pretty much MP based for Clan D.A.R.K.

 

I know the importance of a Bargaining Suit, Buff Suit, etc. but with pretty much an empty chest is a Shopper Network in SP doable? I'm kinda of at a loss as how to proceed and would appreciate any help and advice I can get.

 

I suppose I could use the blank 200 toons to farm lower level sets (lowest meaning level 20..lol)as Farmer Schot did to help out with bargaining suits. It would take a fair bit of time I think since you would have to build up capital for the shoppers. I could probably use the blank 200 toon to funnel items down for the early bargainers to sell. I just wonder if it is even possible to do if you didn't have access or want to use the blank toons. Many thanks to DB for those

 

I do apologize if this has been covered somewhere else, if so please point me in the right direction..lol

 

crowgrrrl

 

I run mine a slightly different way: a team concept.

 

I run first my most powerfully confident build, push his/her way into niobium. Important that he doesn't die, so not necessarily 'as fast as possible' but a little faster than I am comfortable. I use him like a 'pioneer' or 'trail blazer'.

 

Then I run my most powerful shopper character, and drag him/her behind that character.

The only things I worry about with this particular shopper is building a strong trade suit and buying rings and ammys with plus all skills, deathblow, casting/attack speed, LL weapons and rings, and opponent's chance to evade. I use these to push into set items (or strong socketed items) any character picks up that comes behind them.

 

Then, using this second 'pioneer', I make the subsequent characters behind him/her stronger, to run through the campaigns more quickly and efficiently. Don't 'park' this shopper though, want him/her ahead of everyone too.

 

So kinda like a Dad and/or Mom, making it easier for their kids to be successful

 

Just today I took what I would have considered almost throw-away stuff in Niobium and pushed it to my Gold shopper. He's got 123 mill, so it doesn't bother him to give her three mill worth of stuff

Since my thing now is picking up strong LL% claws, swords, and pole arms (and a coupla throwing potions for a future idea I have), she gets the strongest she can for herself and 'wills' the other'ns to peops behind her.

 

This way, after I've run some other characters and shoppers behind her, the pot gets stronger, and so does the 'team'.

 

I don't run mules; I only rpl the inventory w stronger pieces. Try to leave low level ammy's and rings behind, but keep only the bare minimum of weapon types to share between characters at diff levels. level thirty is the lowest I keep in the box.

 

Works for me *shrug*

[crowgrrrl 39]

Thanks again everyone for the replies, Llama for your clarification, much appreciated. I am afraid my comp. hasn't the beef to run two copies at the moment, rats..lol so I'll have to do it another way.

 

Capt.Smack that makes sense, since the HE can have bargaining right off the bat. I never had a HE shopper on 360 just my seraphim.

 

JK, sounds like a good idea and I appreciate your input.

 

Thanks DB. I might be looking into the balance.txt settings also. I seem to remember a discussion about that very thing. I'll have to dig it up. I do have another question. The blank 200 characters seem to only be able to access Niob in a free play LAN session and not all of the others. Is it something I'm doing wrong or does it have to do with the balance.txt settings? I wanted to do some set farming with the White Griffon and Boar in Bronze.

 

Thanks again for everyone's help and patience.

 

crowgrrrl

[Dragon Brother 619]

You aren't doing anything wrong, it's simply that those toons have exceeded the max level for bronze (60) and in fact, every difficulty bar niobium. This can be changed with a tweak of balance.txt.

[Llama8 8]

I thought Plat was level 100-200?

 

The simplest way to get your shoppers into Niobium would probably be to edit the balance.txt so that the min level for Niobium is 0 (or 1).

[Dragon Brother 619]

Plats only up to 180, past that niob is it.

[crowgrrrl 39]

Thanks again Llama and DB. I found the balance.txt threads including the ones where I can have the 200 toons farm bronze so I'll be messing with those soon..lol Only after backing them up of course..lol

 

I really appreciate all the help from everyone. I've said it before and I'll say it again this is THE most helpful forum I've ever encountered.

 

Hope you all have a fantastic weekend!

crowgrrrl

[JKtheWonderguy 3]

Thanks again Llama and DB. I found the balance.txt threads including the ones where I can have the 200 toons farm bronze so I'll be messing with those soon..lol Only after backing them up of course..lol

 

I really appreciate all the help from everyone. I've said it before and I'll say it again this is THE most helpful forum I've ever encountered.

 

Hope you all have a fantastic weekend!

crowgrrrl

You got that straight.

I haven't seen any posts from 'I'm just better'n you' gamers I see in other places.

Breath of fresh air for sure.

 

You too crowgrll. Don't imbibe too many adult beverages