Shopkeeper Custom Item Changes

[Haneshii]

What's your Minecraft Username?: Haneshii
What's the title of your suggestion?: Shopkeeper Custom Item Changes

What's your suggestion?:
Background:
Right! So, to start, I believe Shopkeeper faction has been a bit dead as of late, even with the loss of our faction lead. (we miss sak.) Thankfully Yonio has been helping us out though! Thanks Yonio! Something I found from when I became a Shopkeeper was that my shop items were something a lot of people owned. Luckily, because it had been closed for a while, there was still a good amount of people who wanted my shops items. As time went on, I found that my sales decreased slowly until the first purchase of custom furniture which I placed into my shop. It was the custom Potted Bonsai "Cherry", which did bring a bunch of new customers. Our sales picked up more after the introduction of that item and shortly after I was given two items which was Flower Crown "Baby Blue" and Corsage "Night Out". These items, especially the flower crown excel my sales way more. Now, what does this have to do with my suggestion?

These ways to excel in the faction falls in between Pay-to-Win and Pay-to-Play
Pay-to-Win - the practice of paying to get weapons, abilities, etc. that give you an advantage over players who do not spend money.
Pay-to-Play - Pay-to-play, sometimes pay-for-play or P2P, is a phrase used for a variety of situations in which money is exchanged for services or the privilege to engage in certain activities. The common denominator of all forms of pay-to-play is that one must pay to "get in the game", with the sports ****ogy frequently arising.

The reason I believe that it falls in between is because, the shopkeeper role is always going to be playable however, eventually, your shop loses it's charm. It's value significantly decreases with no new items coming into play. We see shops like Rotasu Music and Sayonara Gift Shop who excel in sales due to the abundance of new items they receive, which keeps them extremely relevant. What I want to accomplish, is for shops such as mine and other accessory shops and restaurants to have the same thriving sales.

What is my suggestion?
Well, after conversing with some of the shopkeepers in our dedicated chat in the town discord, they've come up with some solutions to this issue. Ultimately, I've found these three suggestions to be the best courses of actions of how this could work out.
- Give shops 1-2 custom slots by default when starting out - This is to get the shop on it's feet when starting out. (Credits to A2unn1e for the idea)
- Pay a large sum of ICLY money for a custom item slot ONLY FOR SHOPS - this would be above the normal custom ic purchasing amount, this way it prevents shops from being too overpowered with items. OR instead of ICLY money large sum, use the system that KPD and EMS use. EMS allows you to get a custom med kit as long as you redeem Achievement Points for it - the med kit is a set custom though along with KPD's custom stun gun. Basically, reach a goal, get an Achievement Point which gets you closer to a Custom Item. (Credits to Rex, whozits and I for these ideas.)

Essentially these suggestions would be one whole suggestion as this would change the shop faction entirely. Fresh new items, keeping all shops fresh with new items here and there! These custom items would be owned by the shop, not by the shopkeeper. This means that if the shopkeeper were to leave shop faction, they would not have ownership over these items. It would be owned by the shop.

TLDR;
Give shops who just recently started up 1-2 free customs, similar to how they get 1 free restock when they start. Alongside that, give Shopkeepers the ability to either buy Custom Items for the shop ONLY with IC money OR use an achievement point system similar to EMS and KPD to redeem custom items. I'd like staff to consider this and of course, nerf the gain of custom items to where they see it fair to get customs for their shop. If staff would like to dive deeper into this with me, my discord is: haneshii

How will this benefit the server and community?:
This would benefit the server by offering newer and fresher items to players and the community. Especially to the shop faction, this would motivate shopkeepers to open more, a goal is good to have for them. Right now, shopkeepers goals are to open and hope to get money, however that's the only goal. Custom items are a privilege firewalled by OOC money. Which, realistically, a faction's freshness shouldn't be based off the players OOC income and ability to buy new items. Applying to the faction means you're locked to the basic game itself, buying customs are like a purchasable DLC, which is pay-to-play and pay-to-win. (Of course, it's not a competition, however when you as a shopkeeper get a ton of money this could offer advantages while having a ton of yen. (a bit of a stretch, but ex. crimerp and gangrp, paying for weapons, ballistic masks, etc.)

This would offer a fresh faction along with freshness in character development, accessories which are better characteristics, offer interesting items to RP with such as furniture without having to pay OOC money to get your shop popular and up and running.

Think of it this way. You're playing a Roblox Tycoon! You do not need to pay for upgrades with IRL money, instead you can buy these upgrades with in game currency which you earn by grinding. With having a goal, you can still reach very high parts of the game till you beat the tycoon eventually. With the shop faction, currently you're locked to base items unless someone buys customs with OOCLY money. Whether this is the shopkeeper or someone selling their custom to a shopkeeper for IC money or giving it away for free. This means there is no goal to reach to increase your gameplay other than buying items in game from other shops, which unfortunately shops take a while to get new items due to OOCLY reasons for not having money to buy customs. With these changes however, the Shop faction wouldn't be locked to OOC money to increase the shops popularity. Instead, you can either work towards a new item or you can pay with in game currency, just like a tycoon!
(I hope my ****ogy made sense LMFAO. I will explain more if people are confused.)

 

[Classicalist]

+1 I agree with this, As an outsider who is not a shop keeper i feel like some sort of form of like how auction upgrades are available could go into shops to unlock more benefits and stuff. It would make sense as the more money you make the more your business upgrades. I feel like some sort of change should be made because I do feel bad for some of the shops such as the Bakery and certain other shops do get forgotten about. I like the idea of giving shops 1-2 custom slots for free when starting out because if you look at most shop applications under the "What will you sell in your shop?:" question most people list items that don't exist in the game yet and could be made into a custom slot for them to make their shop more unique and diverse with its items. I don't wanna yap on about my opinion but over all huge +1

 

[paw]

+1 I used to be a shopkeeper, and running a café when you have no unique items is a lot harder; especially when you're starting out with not a lot of money. My maid services made way more than my shop LOL

 

[Haneshii]

if you look at most shop applications under the "What will you sell in your shop?:" question most people list items that don't exist in the game yet and could be made into a custom slot for them to make their shop more unique and diverse with its items.

I definitely agree with this as well, I know me personally, I've only been able to make one of my possible custom items into a real thing, which is our Flower Crown "Baby Blue".

 

[catastrofe]

+1 i approve this message, it makes sense to me and helps keeps things fresh :-3

 

[HATOLA]

. We see shops like Rotasu Music and Sayonara Gift Shop who excel in sales due to the abundance of new items they receive, which keeps them extremely relevant

I didnt pay even 1 dollar on Custom items, only for IC money which Im gaining from the shop itself, I got no profit for buying items for in-game money as the bigger amount of items u got the restock price is higher(For example, only 2 days ago I paid 5m for a restock); When getting a shop it is risky but yeah, we got nothing to do with it. Sak changed the max price we can offer per item and it is fair but if someone will get 1-2 custom slots it will be never enough as everytime u will need to change/to add new items as in the end people r getting bored. (not adding to that there're issues bc they might not agree eith bc of irl money etc.)
Except for it I see ur points and I agree for the rest

Adding to what I said bc now I assume u have the question of how I have a money to buy items in game. . .I had a tower long time ago. Except for it u also can say in ur shop disc "WE'RE LOOKING FOR NEW ITEMS! U HAVE X/Y ANS WANTS TO SELL? DM ME..." Also theres a limit for how many items shopkeepers can gain from a player for money, which is 4 per player

 

[Haneshii]

I didnt pay even 1 dollar on Custom items, only for IC money which Im gaining from the shop itself

The point of the change, was to unlock getting custom items for shops from being locked behind oocly payment. You may have received the items for IC money, but the player who sold it to you, paid OOC money. On top of this, shops like mine (Flower Shop, Kirei Hana) or Oto-Nashi might struggle from the fact that people just don't have the customs that would fit the store or if they do, they mostly don't want to sell them, which is fair!

as the bigger amount of items u got the restock price is higher(For example, only 2 days ago I paid 5m for a restock);

Attaching 1-2 custom slots for when someone gets their shop, would mean they could include it in their free restock they get when accepted. When you get accepted from a shop, you get one free restock. (This is subject to change if the new lead decides to do it or not.)

if someone will get 1-2 custom slots it will be never enough as everytime u will need to change/to add new items as in the end people r getting bored.

I assume you mean that I meant to limit the amount of customs in a shop...? If it is, then that's not the point. What I meant, was that when you first get a shop, you get 1-2 free custom slots to get any item you'd like for the shop. This doesn't include ones you could later buy for IC money or OOC money.

Except for it u also can say in ur shop disc "WE'RE LOOKING FOR NEW ITEMS! U HAVE X/Y ANS WANTS TO SELL? DM ME..."

I could do this for sure, I just haven't due to not being in a desperate need at the moment since I've bought my own customs for my shop and we're alright for the time being. However in the future, I may have to when the items become boring.

 

[Classicalist]

I didnt pay even 1 dollar on Custom items, only for IC money which Im gaining from the shop itself

I do get where Haneshii is coming from, Shops like for example your shop are very popular. This makes it easier to buy custom items from people as the more popular shops are making more money. Lets look at it from for example the bakery or the flower shop side of things where they are not very popular, After paying their employee's and restocks and such they don't really have much money to spend on customs. These type of shops are going to find it harder to do so. I feel like some sort of rework should be made to make it easier for new shop keepers to get onto their feet and also less noticed shops to have the chance become more known.

 

[Infi]

I understand the struggle of having a hard time starting out in your shop. I began my own custom shop by myself with nothing but the public restock items that totaled me at a 50% average restock rate (which is horrible) and with an outstanding 9 items.

that said, I actually don’t think something like this should be implemented in terms of permitting shopkeepers custom items.

The only time a shopkeeper will ever start with nothing after getting accepted is if they apply for an “other” shop that has never been seen before and will require an entirely new stock setup. Shopkeepers DO NOT OWN any custom items that they sell in their shop. Once the item is added to the restock, it immediately becomes “public” (meaning it can be resold by players) and belongs to the shop rather than the player that owns the shop. Therefor, If say I were to leave rotasu music behind, the next person who obtains the shop also obtains the stock I worked to acquire. This is why a suggestion like this is unnecessary to implement aside from the player that comes along once every other year with a brand new never before seen shop that requires a very unique stock.

That said, it’s also Pay To Win to do something like this and there’s really no beating around the bush unfortunately :( shopkeepers will need to continue to work towards their customs as hatola mentioned she did in order to profit in your shop

You also have to consider the type of shop you have. Restaurants will never make as much as retail and gift shops. Shops in the “other” category can vary in popularity. There’s not much we can do about that

Final edit: you see rotasu music as a successful shop because for well over a year I’ve been grinding to obtain instruments off of various players. Initially my sales didn’t exceed past 100k with only 9 items on my stock list, but now my sales exceed 1 million yen with over 50 items. This is through tons of hard work and devotion towards the faction, putting my own money and relationships with other players forward to obtain more stock. It was really really hard but to me that’s what makes shopkeeping so enjoying and satisfying.

 

[6Pancake]

use an achievement point system similar to EMS and KPD to redeem custom items.

The system Hospital & KPD use for upgraded equipments is an item that was bought & put into the pack (or in the case of the taser, redeemed via an old modellers quota points & given to the faction). Same goes for the "Custom Item" reward in the KPD, Yonio redeems his own modelling quota points to implement it into the pack, so for the system Hospital/Police has to work in Shop, you'd need the Lead to be a modeller or be willing to buy a custom item for each shop owner.

 

[Haneshii]

The system Hospital & KPD use for upgraded equipments is an item that was bought & put into the pack (or in the case of the taser, redeemed via an old modellers quota points & given to the faction). Same goes for the "Custom Item" reward in the KPD, Yonio redeems his own modelling quota points to implement it into the pack,

Oh! I didn't know that's how that worked, honestly just assumed that well being admins, etc just was able to add benefits to their respective faction. Interesting! Thank you for explaining that.

 

[HATOLA]

The point of the change

SO I assume Sayonara ig not a example my bro,

Attaching 1-2 custom slots for when someone gets their shop, would mean they could include it in their free restock they get when accepted. When you get accepted from a shop, you get one free restock. (This is subject to change if the new lead decides to do it or not.)

Its not the same thing as custom items slots r getting bought for irl money and new shops dont have IC money to start with, Adding 2 custom slots like I said wont help because in the end people will know the items and they wont buy it/buy less of it. .because of it, it wont be enough and will cause problems.

I assume you mean that I meant to limit the amount of customs in a shop...? If it is, then that's not the point. What I meant, was that when you first get a shop, you get 1-2 free custom slots to get any item you'd like for the shop. This doesn't include ones you could later buy for IC money or OOC money.

(explained above, its not related to the max items u can sell)

I could do this for sure, I just haven't due to not being in a desperate need at the moment since I've bought my own customs for my shop and we're alright for the time being. However in the future, I may have to when the items become boring.

This is only 1 solution from many that can help WITHOUT adding to new shop customs etc.

example your shop are very popular

I dont think its related as Im not the only one who got new items (for example salty got not so long time ago as well new items that she got from others and didnt pay OOC money for it.) Which this is why like I said I wont mind to help to anyone that needs as I posted few times for example for that other shops r hiring.


Except for it Infi said kinda what I said and etc.

 

[-kam]

very much approved, +1

 

[Ramen_Noodiles]

I honestly think there should be somesort of public item list when people get new shops or something now that I think about it. I remember contemplating on being a shopkeeper at one point and I was always slumped on "What will you sell?" section. From what I've searched I could never find a list of public items other than knowing some by memory and you can never be too sure on some unique items whether or not they're private customs or not.

Like, I know that there's some RARE items that are on auction once in a blue moon that used to be sold at shops that aren't anymore that are public and I think if there was a possibility of a public items list that shopkeepers can request for specific public items themed around their shop instead of spending their own irl cash in then it'd probably be a bit easier to understand.

Also from what I noticed, the shop system I feel like needs a rework at some point. I've seen a few shopkeepers barely open at all anymore and some haven't opened in MONTHS, I've only noticed around 5 shops open weekly and a lot of stuff is very... vague when it comes to applying. Idk, that's just stuff from what I've noticed. Maybe I'm wrong, I've never been in a faction before so I'm not the most experienced.

 

[kustomzero]

+1

 

[wethecreature]

honestly I think this is +1 because it simply gives shops an easy way to become unique and have a very special thing that players will go to them for, ie, a special item that they've never seen.

 

[Shadonk]

+1
As a previous shop owner, this is the main reason I quit the faction.. Owning a shop is unfortunately pay to win, and I just didn't have the OOC money for buying a custom (35 USD). That's a lot of money for a lot of people, especially on a 'children's server'. Over time with my shop personally, I grew incredibly un-motived because I just was not getting the same amount of relevancy as other shops bringing in new customs every other week if not every other day.. Either those customs being given to said shops by the owner of the item or not, its not as easy as it sounds if you aren't a 'known' or 'popular' player within the the community. Of course I can 100% agree with what Infi had stated here.

Final edit: you see rotasu music as a successful shop because for well over a year I’ve been grinding to obtain instruments off of various players. Initially my sales didn’t exceed past 100k with only 9 items on my stock list, but now my sales exceed 1 million yen with over 50 items. This is through tons of hard work and devotion towards the faction, putting my own money and relationships with other players forward to obtain more stock. It was really really hard but to me that’s what makes shopkeeping so enjoying and satisfying.

It is wonderful that they along with a bunch of other shop owners want to put this much work and time into what they do but at the end of the day, a lot of people just don't have time for that.. Some people just want to run a cute little shop and have customers, simply put.

I believe with this suggestion it can keep everyone happy and I don't really see any problems coming out of it. At the end of the day, SchoolRP is just a game that people want to have fun on. (I believe that's something that a lot of people forget..) I don't think there are any downs to implementing this even if some people find it to be 'pointless'. So what? It couldn't hurt!

 

[KimiNoUso]

Denied
Thank you for your suggestion! After discussing this with the team we have decided to decline it.

- Unfortunately we are unable to give away custom slots for simply joining a faction; as stated above, other faction leads who may also be modellers may offer to use their quotas to giveaway custom slots as rewards, however this is not something we as a server offer. There are plenty of public items to choose from when joining the faction, and the list of these will be updated within the next few weeks. It's worth noting that regardless of whether you get a new item in your store, eventually the item may become stale if you aren't rotating your stock due to the availability of said item.​

- We do very often get new public items implemented to the server, and we'll be making a better effort moving forward to communicate said items to the Shop Faction.​