>Basically, keep what we have in place except:
>
>1. Create some number of vendor mobs that sell/create sleek
>a/s/b wands. Put them in the sort of magical places mentioned
>elsewhere in this thread. Tower of Sorcery, Consortium,
>Thar-Acacia, etc. Maybe put some in harder to reach places
>and have them charge less because they're so hard to reach.

I'll be honest, when people say put something in the Tower of Sorcery, I just assume we may as well put it in Galadon. There is no risk, no difficulty at all with that.

>2. Optionally add a minimum exploration and/or observation
>requirement in order for these vendor mobs to do business with
>a given mage.
>
>3. Fix the prices so that gathering the coin necessary to
>purchase a wand of type X requires "slightly" more effort than
>what is needed to gather that wand using the current
>exploration-based sleek system. (discussion below)

So it enables a second system based on gathering coin instead of exploring areas (which I'd argue, gathering coin is really easy).

>4. Each time a character buys a sleek wand, regardless of the
>type, he has to wait a set amount of time before buying
>another sleek wand. (discussion below)
>
>5. If you want to encourage character longevity (which may not
>be a goal) then optionally allow the haggle skill to affect
>how much purchased wands cost.

How exactly does this encourage character longevity?

>Point of #3:
>
>This makes it so that the purchase-based system is actually
>utilized, but is not utilized to the exclusion of the current
>exploration-based system. It retains the property that
>"player knowledge" still gives an advantage, since a player
>with "perfect" knowledge would be better served by not
>purchasing his wands.
>
>However it does limit the advantage a player derives
>from having "perfect knowledge", since even a 100% ignorant
>player can purchase sleeks as long as he knows how to generate
>gold.
>
>It would be essential to set the prices and "waiting period"
>correctly, since if the prices are too high then this system
>morphs into exactly what we have today. But if the prices are
>too low and/or the waiting period too short then it becomes
>"every mage has a/s/b all the time".

Honestly I think that if these things were going to be for sale, it wouldn't be all of them, and the prices would be fairly prohibitive. I think a new player who struggles searching through areas is going to have the same troubles gathering enough coins. I do think this makes the serial thief/empire player who wants to try a mage a lot easier.

>Point of #4:
>
>I think this one is especially interesting. At first glance
>you might think that since purchasing any wand type
>imposes the same waiting period, one would always want to
>purchase barrier. But if a mage is only using the "purchase"
>system and is always purchasing barrier then he will never
>have aura or shield. Thus, the guy using the purchase
>system as his only source for all three types must use them at
>1/3 the rate of the guy who only wants to keep barrier on tap.
> Goal: If you want the "full wand package" then you have to
>use your wands sparingly.
>
>This "dual" system would also let mages who've found only
>certain sleeks to "make up" for that by purchasing those types
>they can't get via the exploration-based system.

This exists a bit, though not exactly as you describe in the current system (sleek wands reset completely different than anything else in the game). What do you think these waiting periods are?

>Some thoughts:
>
>1. This proposal retains the property that "player knowledge
>counts for something". A player with perfect knowledge of
>existing sleek locations could continue to use those locations
>and ignore the purchase system entirely. He would, however,
>only get a "relatively small" benefit from doing so. Also,
>the ability to generate gold becomes more important.
>
>2. This proposal retains the property that "getting your wands
>should incur some risk". Not only do you have to visit one of
>a small set of wand mobs, where an enemy could lay in wait,
>you also have to gather the coins or items necessary to
>exchange for a wand.

I honestly don't really see a ton of risk in gathering coins, and the biggest risk is going to the purchase point. Though if I was a smart battlerager, I'd just whack the merchant so nobody could buy them (and likely I'd make the resets on the merchant a bit different, so that was a viable tactic).

>3. This proposal provides an option for veteran players who
>don't want to "pore over a bunch of areas I've already been
>through a thousand times". Such a player could ignore the
>exploration-based sleek system entirely and just purchase his
>wands. By doing so, however, he would be tying himself to a
>slightly less efficient system of wand delivery (i.e. more
>effort per charge).
>
>4. This proposal provides an option for novice players who
>feel intimidated by the current exploration-based sleek
>system. Such a player could just buy all his wands, assuming
>he knows how to generate the necessary coin.

And that's where I see one of the problems. I think assuming they know how to generate the necessary coin.

>Potential problems:
>
>1. Outlander mages are screwed since they can't use coins.
>One solution would be to have certain vendors accept powerful
>magic items in lieu of coins. However, this creates a
>perverse incentive for Outlanders to loot powerful magic items
>from Pkills. It also opens the door for players to exploit
>"pathological items" that happen to be high-level and
>magic-flagged but are not especially hard to obtain.
>Requested items would obviously be excluded from consideration
>entirely.

I agree that allowing bartering for wands is going to encourage more looting. I'm curious what your definition of "powerful magic item" is.

>2. Pathological means of generating gold now become "a big
>deal". If a mage figures out how to generate gold at a
>pathological rate, i.e. in an exploitative way, then he
>essentially has "a/s/b on a stick". This is mitigated,
>however, by the fact that each wand purchase comes with a
>fixed "waiting period". It would basically mean that such a
>mage would buy all his barrier wands, since they require the
>most effort to obtain from the exploration-based sytem and
>because gold is meaningless to him, while using the
>exploration-based system to get aura and shield. But...as
>these gold exploits are removed, this becomes less of a
>problem.

Overall, this boils down to trading exploration for coin-gathering, and I honestly don't know that it's that much better than what exists today.