Hey there, fellow Catz! Today I want to talk about one of the NPCs in ZpellCatz: The Merchant. You will find lots of items and Thalers when looting dungeons in ZpellCatz. Most of your equipment will be self found, but when RNG is working against you, there are NPCs to help out. I talked a lot about the [url=https://www.indiedb.com/games/zpellcatz/features/zpellcatz-itemization]itemization in ZpellCatz in April '21 (a long time ago, but the article still provides correct info[/url]). This time, lets focus on the Merchant. [b]Offer Pages[/b] The Merchant starts with a small selection of items. Then, whenever you finish a main quest relevant task, a new offer page unlocks. [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/7f497d8f1b44f497c3acffeaba710b0048befd32.gif[/img] [b]Fixed Items[/b] Most of the equipment items sold are of special quality (fix stats + some bonus stats). The cool thing? The stats and their values are fixed, meaning they are always the same. One of the design pillars of ZpellCatz is "Randomization vs. Reliability". Since most of your looted items are completely random, you have a source of reliably rolled items. [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/378067632f2e7b922680287578eb4e8f99a082a8.png[/img] [b]Gems & Sockets[/b] But the Merchant has a lot more to offer than special quality items, if you have saved up some Thalers... One of the more powerful stuff sold are gems and sockets. We'll talk about gems and the Jeweler NPC soon, but some short info here: Gems are quite powerful and you can put them in sockets (that are independent of your items) to receive their bonuses. [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/3bea092b1dc6c7f8f3ab3ffb78f53048a6e69718.png[/img] [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/5faa4c07023f0bfd946040fe83f5565628f67fdb.png[/img] [b]Currencies[/b] The Merchant is also the place for changing currencies. You have too much Emerald Dust and Sapphire Dust but you're short on Ruby Dust? Merchants are happy to help you with a cutthroat 3:1 exchange (well, that's how capitalism works, amirite? :-D ). [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/4a56f4ccab8278b3f961dd21be3eedecba18f5e2.png[/img] [b]Respec[/b] Not satisfied with your allocated skill points? The Merchant has a respec scroll, but it's very, very expensive. So, it is possible to respec, but don't expect to do that oftentimes. [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/826f4e67ec391be40fafcecea2373097ec69c812.png[/img] [b]Randomly Rolled Items[/b] Okay everything mentioned so far supports the reliability side of the "Randomization vs. Reliability" design pillar. In contrast, there's one kind of product that's purely random: Buying randomly rolled items. [img]https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//40273531/4fb442b0c14d90b0123a830ae5e5e19f920f6dca.png[/img] That's pretty much everything the Merchant has to offer. But there are other important NPCs that we'll look at in the future (Blacksmith & Jeweler). Want to get notified when new articles are released? [url=https://discord.gg/D6CkrUu]Join my Discord[/url] and [url=https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447700/ZpellCatz/]wishlist & follow ZpellCatz here on Steam[/url]. Note: All info here is in development content and subject to change.