A topic that has come up in our discord group as well as looking other places online is the Merchant Alliance quests. Compared to the other two factions their missions are by far the weakest. While they follow the same format as the other factions (go to an island, get something and bring it back) they feel lacking and can be amazingly frustrating, when you have spend an hour chancing pigs around an island looking for the one black one to spawn, take it back to the designated outpost to have another ship their waiting for you and one cannon ball kills all your animals.
Lets be honest, moving chickens and pigs don't inspire much interest and make you feel more like Noah's Ark rather than a trader. I'm sure we can all agree catching and carrying snakes is the most annoying piece of p**p in the world.
I'm sure this suggestion has come up before but what if the Merchants Alliance actually let players be more like proper traders.
Instead of catching chickens, pigs and snakes, let players buy and transport tea, silk and spices (as well as other goods) to sell at other outpost. It would not need to be a complex economy that constantly changes like Eve online or Elite Dangerous but a basic system where outposts have demands for different good, this could change over the course of an in game week. players could talk to merchants to find out what goods they have in stock and what other outposts need, this will let players buy low and sell high and make them feel like a proper merchants rather than errand boys / girls.
I know it's not a style of play everyone likes but figuring out different trade routes and how to make a profit can be very rewarding.
It would help make the game feel different and offer something for those who want a change from killing skellys or digging holes. Also it would be a good option for those who can only log on for a smaller amount of time and can't do a full voyage.
This would also help with the camping issue, in the current format if the outpost you want has a galley sitting there you have very little options, either sit and wait and hope they ignore you when they leave or go in and hope for the best.
with the trader model, while you might have an outpost that gives you more coin you can always go to a different outpost, sure you won't get the same coin for it but you will still feel like you are achieving something.
Like the other factions you can start with basic goods and as you level up progress to higher value goods. You will need to move a lot of goods to make the same money as those finding treasure and of course it would make sense for goods to be worth more the further away the destination.
The suspense of having a hull full of exotic silk as you sail to the other side of the map vs having a pig or two would keep you invested in what you were doing rather than a grind.
another option would be to get goods from the Merchant and deliver them to NPC's on different islands contract style like the current format but in reverse.
Let me know what you think.
