Holy POOT! It's like FREE MONEY!

[Ruatha]

In preparation for my first attempts at Misty Thicket Picnics last night, I discovered a BUNCH of JumJum Spiced Beers on a vendor, already pre-made and awaiting consumption. Obviously someone was skilling up and just sold the stuff back to the vendor.

My first thought: "Hey! These will come in handy! I better buy a few stacks if I can for my MTP attempts." <*cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching*>


My second thought: "Hey! I betcha there are folks who would PAY MONEY for these things so THEY could make their own MTPs! I'll buy a lot and try to sell some at the Bazaar!" <*cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching* *cha-ching*>

(Note that I wouldn't have had this 2nd thought if not for Morani and Refland and some other folks on this forum who pointed out to me the previously unknown (to me) joys of vendor diving, a skill which I am only now just beginning to explore.)

I paid 3gp per stack of 20.

I sold it at the bazaar for 5gp per bottle (or 10pp per stack of 20).

Now, I can't two-box, and probably wouldn't even if I could. So I only set up as a vendor if I'm going to bed, or going AFK for an extended period. So last night I set up as a vendor right before bed. Wake up this morning, come downstairs, check EQ, and lo, someone has purchased 10 stacks of JumJum Spiced Beer, for 10pp a stack. Those 10 stacks cost me 3pp. I made 97pp profit.

Yeah, I know it's not as exciting for some of you, but for ME it's darned nifty! The other neat thing was that I checked backscroll in my chat window and he asked if I had any JumJum stalks for sale. That COMPLETELY didn't occur to me. I'll have to grab some stalks on my next trip to Rivervale and try selling them in teh Bizarre tonight!

This is fun!

[Jannelle Silverthorne]

Cheer!!

I've made a lot of money selling stuff off vendors that way.
Bone chips are 1.5 silver and I make a decent profit at 4 gold instead of the 1 plat or more that others try to sell them for. Adds up over time and then there's always the bonus of more rare things like Windstones and now Swirling Shadows.

[Arbelac]

You can buy JumJum Stalks in Shadowhaven.

[Jannelle Silverthorne]

People make money selling Fuzzlecutter 5000 in the bazaar.
Why?
Because some people like the convenience of not having to go to West Freeport to buy it. Even tho you can take the book from PoK now.
Or they just don't know where it's sold and it's not worth the effort to find out since the prices in the bazaar stay reasonable.

[Anaxo]

You can make quite a bit of money vendor mining and selling back the results in the Bazaar. So far I've added 35k to my bank account, and that isn't even including all the money I respent to fund my diving in the first place (plus a couple gear upgrades.)

[Reflan]

A whole lot of people do baking in POK and Shadowhaven and Thurgadin, Ruatha. A trip to the vendors near the baking merchants there can often net you many stacks of fishrolls, patty melts, and sometimes even misty thicket picnics and halas pies, believe it or not. And picnic baskets are very often on vendors who sell ingredients for them. Many times I have found 10 or 20 stacks of very sellable stuff, especially food, I can buy for pennies on the dollar that way.

And of course there's always the chance that a regular habit of vendor diving will turn up something really lucky -- a rare PoP drop, a blue diamond, etc. And silks and quality hides and zombie skins are always great.

Definitely a good habit to get into if you can spare the time. Often you turn up with a bunch of nothing, but sometimes you really score a lot of good stuff essentially for free.

edit -- by the way, jumjum spiced beer is one of the most common things I see around, since people use it both for skilling up and for misty thicket picnics, which of course they make by the hundreds or thousands. Check the vendors in shadowhaven by the brew barrels often.

[Cigarskunk]

Yeah, my brother sells coldain tempers in the bazaar for 30p without any problems at all, I'm selling silver threads at 5p each without issues, I can't keep chisels in stock at 10p each and it's getting tempting to put some armor molds and tailoring patterns up just to see if someone will bite.

[Itek]

Here's one, for which I will probably be shot in real life...

Friend of mine hunts the bazaar for bargins...

Like people selling things for LESS than the vendor will buy them for...

He makes a few K a week doing this ....

Hint: before pricing things, at least SEE what the vendor will buy them for.

[Quesci]

I'd probably buy firing sheets in the bazaar. I occasionally have to pop in there for one more imbued emerald or distilled mana or whatever and just go ahead and throw it on the wheel while I am there. Then I have to run all the way to the shorty section of Shadowhaven, buy a firing sheet, fire it, and then run back to the bazaar to stash it on my trader. I'd pay a plat for a HQ firing sheet in the Bazaar just to avoid that.

Q

[Malathos]

I've been making a slow but steady turnover with both chips as well.
I price them at 5gp each when everyone else is selling at 1pp and someone either passes through and buys them for being cheap, or I get bought out by one of the other traders - which makes me happy as I've then got time to go scrounge up some more

On the subject of finding stuff on merchants, recently I've pulled out 2 geerlok hammers (15pp each), 5 batfang headbands (where did they come from ?) at 25pp each - and my greatest score to date - around 50 leather padding (stuck in the bank now for FP runs) for about 6gp each

Best Bazaar deal I found so far was a ruby going for 30pp - vendors will pay around 100 for them and they cost around 140 to buy from gem merchants

[Gargazon]

You could have sold the beer for more than that I bet. Next time try 2pp each! :twisted:

[Morani]

Congratulations on your new addiction. Vendor mining is fun, it's like Christmas and gambling all rolled into one.

I actually do NOT recommend pricing the beer at more than 1 plat unless it costs more than that to make it (I think 1 plat is a nice number for most of the high end tradeskill "common" items). The reason why is you want to establish a buyer's base and the best base are the ones who want to make money like you. There are 8 components (counting the cake slices separately) to the MTP. One successful combine makes 4 picnics. If you sell the components at 1 plat each, that's 8 plat for one combine or 2 plat cost per item. For skill ups of that level, it's cheap enough that someone will buy everything they can get and yet it's also cheap enough that a seller can still make 2 plat profit on each for 1/10 the number of clicks. You benefit by selling bulk and others benefit by not having to do the work. I find that the BEST sellers, other than raw materials, are the ones that require another tradeskill to make. I had 20 stacks of picnic baskets (tailoring and smithing) on my mule for less than 6 hours before I sold every one at 1 plat each AND got a request for more.

However, THE single hottest item that I can never stock enough of is bone chips; those necros have a SERIOUS problem with that addiction. I sell my chips at 5g each and it doesn't matter if I have 1 stack or 40, they SELL! To date, I have sold almost 5000 bone chips I've farmed off merchants. That's 2.5k in plat at 5 gold each. (I've not tried Celestial Essences yet but I will be this week; been trying to study the market for them.)

[Dulsin]

I found a Plat rose ring in the bazar for 15p and have picked up many diamonds for under 150p

[Delores Mulva]

Re: Bazaar bargains.

Check out the Bricks of Ethereal Energy. Vendor for 7 pp each, I have yet to enter the Bazaar and not see some at 5 pp or less. Nice source of pocket change to make up for cash lost vendor diving.

Oh, and watch for Tae Ew baked goods or meat. The stuff the recipes make sells for over 19 pp each. I had a really fun time the night I found 28 Tae Ew Rolls being sold for 2 pp each!

Delores Mulva
Lotus Cult
Quellious

[Zyrtryx Conjureblade]

I do vendor mining for profit all the time. In fact, I sold about 72 spiderling silks for 3pp each in the Bazaar earlier while logged on as my Necro, and about a stack of them were bought off Murissa Sandwhisper in North Ro and vendors in the Freeport Necro guild.

I've got a Blue Diamond that I bought in PoK that I've been trying to sell for months (Hard to, when they are a LOT of them for sale in the Bazaar), but I can usually sell or trade something I find through vendor mining within a week.

Currently, my Necro alt has 2 Windstones I bought for just short of 19pp each off a vendor in East Freeport sitting in one of his trade satchels. I'm trying to raise money to buy this character, Zyrtryx, a horse or lizard, and most of my alts are broke or close to it, so I'm still hyped over that particular find. (Got a LOOOOONG way to go, though, before I can afford one - I usually have less than 200pp in the bank)

As for finding food and Baking supplies on vendors in Shadow Haven, I've got about a stack of Woven Mandrake sitting in the bank that I bought from one of the alchemy supply vendors a few months ago, and I've found Ohabah Truffles and JumJum Spiced Beer on vendors there a few times, but I've yet to find any Halas 10lb Meat Pies or Misty Thicket Picnics on vendors. (The Woven Mandrake is going to keep gathering dust in the bank for a while, though - I found a stack of Picnic Baskets on a vendor in PoK once, and blew 20 attempts at MTPs with them - No successes OR skill-ups!)

Never tried vendor mining Traders in the Bazaar, though......