Why is it so hard to spend Crowns? Why is it so hard to find/discover Crown merchants? Why oh why?

(This is a repost - thought I'd do one every quarter as long as this is still an issue).

Why is it that the obsidian crown merchants (apart from potions) are so hidden in the scenes?

Example:
how many regulars know about the spooky crown merchant in Owls Head?
Or
Why is the crown merchant inBrittany graveyard sneaking off the path off to the side usually hidden from view such that even if you know about him you sometimes miss him? Instead of simply being next to the big entrance statue.​

Why is it that crown merchants don't hint about their brethren?

Example
Why isn't the potion merchant in Ardoris talking about Carvaggio's Wolf and if asked (keyword click) puts the poi on compass? And vice versa.
Same for all scenes with multiple ones.
Or
Why don't they have a keyword which lists the towns that have special ones like Vertas Ardoris etc and put it in our Journal when we talk to one of them?​

Why is it that the web page linked from the store have them only listed as LOC but no instruction how to use /loc to get the LOC or how that LOC value works, or a description of the way to find them, or better yet a map with an X.

​

why do they not list all the way to get crowns?

Can be found rarely on creatures and resources in the wild.
Can be traded from other outlanders.
Can be imported from other lands (store).
​

The handed out book by the shogun merchant in Ardoris is a great step in the right direction. So that is one down.​

It's strange to me that they feel so secret and hidden and unfinished yet they are supposed to be a revenue generator.

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?page_id=64674

Suggestions:

• Some (IIRC the ardoris one) Crown merchant already hand out a book on how to acquire crowns.
  Copy that concept and hand out a similar book on where they are located - all of them.
• Put all the Crown Merchants as POI on the compass.
• Add a popup hint text when reaching the first town with a Crown Merchant.

 

Seriously? The crown merchant is stuck in building right at Central Brittania near the wharfs... I find him there even after hours... he never sleeps

 

I have to agree with @SabeSr that the issue isn't that "merchants are hard to find", it's more than that.

It's that there are merchants that you have to travel to for the sole purpose of getting what you'd gladly pay a nearby player vendor if they were able to sell things for COTO's. It's annoying.

Unfortunately, if we allowed players to sell "stuff" for COTO's, that could actually close the loop of players buying COTO's from the store (where Portalarium gets the money) and instead making it more likely that COTO's would trade hands in-game more often to reduce the profits of Portalarium. (not one that wants this game to succeed should want that to happen)

So this is a tricky situation, but one where there may be a way to make everyone happier without digging into Portalarium's profits.

@DarkStarr, @Berek

What if we simply made recipes that only required COTO's to "purchase" the items we wanted? So if @Spoon wants to buy a home that is available for COTO's, he only needs to have the recipe (which is automatically provided in his book)? This would cut out the "where's the COTO merchant for X" and the travel time, and reduce the annoyance of the current system. I see no harm in allowing for quick exchanges like this, after all we're doing it with everything else in the add-on store right now.

 

???


There are nine different types of Crown Merchants located in different parts of the world. Where each type has a different set of items on offer.
How many different types can you name and where are they located?

You have mentioned 1 type so now you only have 8 more to go.


If you didn't know about the other 8 types and thought that the Brittany one was it, then you have proven my point.

Never did I claim that it was limited exclusively to them being hard to find. That is on you.
I could write an whole essay on them but such feedback is usually less effective than the one you see above. You see the fixes proposed there are relatively easy ones and not a complete overhaul of an existing system.

 

Never did I claim that you did.

There's no need to argue these inconsequential and meaningless details. At least there's no reason for me to do it. Discussions that revolve around semantics like this are not really worth my time.

 

I think part of the reason they're not "Front and Center" in every scene they're in is precisely because Portalarium doesn't want a premium currency advertised more than it needs to be... fine line maybe between making them plentiful and carry a lot of interesting goods for the player to eventually find, and making them have giant neon signs saying, "SPEND YOUR HARD EARNED RL $$ HERE!!!" Clearly no one ever suggested that! I'm just trying to explain why they didn't really start out being front and center, and I for one, kind of like that they have to be sought out and discovered on purpose. But that's just like, my opinion man.

 

At the very least there needs to be a central page in sotawiki that lists them all. I can find no such page, so I guess I'll just have to come up with something.

EDIT: here
http://sotawiki.net/sota/Category:Obsidian_Crown_vendors