It's not like they're hidden to the point to where you cannot find them. If you have played any live-like progression server, you know EXACTLY where the merchants are. Maybe not the location, but the zone should be a given. Most of them aren't even a secret, but do require you to defeat certain creatures or perform certain feats to be able to obtain said tiered gear in the correct chronological order of how EQ was developed expansion-wise.
Also, if that does not sound like fun, this server is not for you.
To the more important topic about fine steel weps not having a price, this is something that I will be adjusting. Since plat will play a BIG part in the server, I was shooting for it to be no-so-easy to get billions of plat by removing exploits involving money(or items resulting in money as it's likely the item in question would have a value), fixing money amounts dropped by npc's, adjusting prices on items that are super abundant throughout the game (defiant gear as an example - I do NOT want those to be the most valuable item in the game).
The reasoning on fine steel is that it's so common, and sells for a handful of plat. You could spend a day in KC farming fine steel (or worse a lower level zone in which you can obtain the same amount of fine steel for less effort) to farm a piece of decent gear that is not obtainable by farming, but by the economy-based progression.
Let's use Vadd's Breastplate as an example. Let's say it's 10k (it's a little more, but I like round numbers) and fine steel 1hs is worth 8p (i could be way off base on that). It would take ~1250 fine steel weps to buy a breastplate that is better than raex's breastplate that actually drops and requires effort to get. Why would Vadd's BP be obtainable before Raex's. I want you to have to trade 2-3 Raex's pieces for a Vadd's piece. If you think about it - it's similar to Hunter's armor progression system, but instead of farming relentlessly for hours upon end for a random gem or armor mold, you're farming for money which falls from EVERY monster, and EVERY(soon anyway) item. Thus, by reducing the cost on the fine steel weapons, it makes it a little harder, and a little less likely that someone will have a Vadd's before being able to get their very own Raex's by legitimate means.
That said; this is just a "guideline" and not really how things are. The numbers specifically are estimated to show an idea that I have for the server. Again, this may not be something you're into so feel free to look elsewhere. =) I've had plenty (for me) of interest for the server and I enjoy people who enjoy playing my server as much as I do.
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