Author - kixor

Foreword and Disclaimer:

first off, let me apologize: i'm always, always, always very long-winded, and can take three sentences to describe something simple just because i never want to not give enough information. so, this may be long, but a lot of it is just clarification. you can skim over most of it and get the most important information easily enough.

i have been lurking around on the Tips and Guides section of the forums since i've started playing, since i'm the kind of person that loves knowing as much as i possibly can about anything. in this time, i've noticed that there has never been a good, explicit guide that teaches the inexperienced what they are vendoring that really might be worth some cash. hence, i've decided to write this little guide to help those that don't know what they have, or those that have an item and they don't know what to sell it for. since this guide is written from my own experience, i can only speak for the starter areas that i've spent enough time in to become familiar with the loots and quests. just because i don't mention a specific item as being part of a quest doesn't mean that it's not, it just means that it wasn't for me. please note, however, that i cannot be held for changes in the ingame economy, due either to more people playing, people getting to a higher level, or more items being introduced to the market. all price guidelines i offer in this guide are only valid as of the latest edit date. past this date, all prices are subject to market demand.

Once upon a time...: (aka inside the starter town)

when you first start the game, you have nothing but the clothes on your back - literally. you don't have any gold, and you have no weapons; not only that, but the clothing you're wearing has no pockets for accessories, nor any stat modifications. so, how do you go about making money? well, there's one key about this game: when you level up, as mobs get too far below you, they will stop dropping items, but some quests may still require those items. so what's this mean? someone with that quest either has to make a new character to get these items, or the items have to be bought. we hope it's the second one at the very beginning, don't sell any of your loots until you've done almost all of the quests in your town, at least, and this is for the exact reason i've already mentioned. not only might you end up using them for a quest, if you don't, you might be able to sell them to someone that will! i've ended up with over 200 of some items from certain mobs, just because i had the feeling it might be used for a quest. i found out later that it wasn't, and let me tell you, it really felt nice to get over 5,000 gold all at once from selling the 200 of them at the same time. now of course, if you're in dire need of money because you just saw the most awesome +7 blue weapon and the guy left off a zero on the price, then you can ignore that rule.

items to watch for, and collect, while leveling:
- Big Pouches: these are used in a "Collection" quest that allows you to get elixers, but you need 100 of them. by the time you'd do the quest, you won't find any more big pouches from mobs, so save these! if you sell them in bulk (it's a pain to buy 3 from one shop, 12 from the next, etc. when you need 100), you can get 30-40 per pouch (3-4k/100), which is a nice bit more than the 16 from the shop.
- Cotton Pouches: same deal as before, and i've often seen them selling upwards of 50 each, even up to 100 each (5-10k/100; but they were still in the guy's shop after some time, so that was probably too much)
- Viper Skins: haven't seen these being sold too often. can probably fetch 60-70 per, for 6-7k/100.
- Golden Cases: the only starter town that i know for sure where these drop is Mt. Yanmo, so if you're HD (Heavenly Demon), this is something to watch out for. these are used both in the quest to join HD clan, as well as the collection quest, meaning there's extra demand. however, those doing the HD quest are usually GC8-10, meaning they won't pay as much as those for the collection quest. the catch here is that those doing the HD quest will buy them a lot faster than people buying items for the collection quest, so if you need quick cash, set up a stand near the HD quest NPC. being on the rarer side, these can fetch 1-2k easily, and i've even seen some disappear in shops priced at 5k (20-40k/20). when in Mt. Yanmo, they are generally found at 200-500 per, for 1k-2.5k/5. (Norus says: Golden Boxes also drop in the League of Beggars starting town.)
- Small Cases: another HD quest item. these tend to be very common, so you can probably sell for 50-100 each (1k-2k/20)
- Fox Skin: a Wu-Tang quest item, these drop off the foxes you'll be killing from the get-go. the quest requires 15 of them, and for the level the quest appears, you can probably sell them for 20-40 each (300-600/15)
- Fir Tree Seedlings: these are leftovers from a Christmas Event, with no indication how long they will last. i strongly suggest that you turn in 10 of them yourself to an NPC in Hefei (he's the only one with a quest icon on the minimap) not for the Christmas Suit, which is nice for covering your gimp clothing if you're like me, but for the 5 slices of cake that he gives you. these will give +10 to all attributes for 30 minutes, making a huge difference in the lower levels. these cakes cannot be traded, do note, so if you do the quest, you'll just have to use them, as you can't sell them off turning in each extra 10 seedlings will offer you the choice of a Silver Conqueror's Chest, or a set of 3 Conqueror's Keys in the color of your choice. a very nice reward, making the seedlings themselves worth 1,000 each on the standard (10k/10).
- White Shadows Masks and Relics: these are used in a collection quest. i never really killed white shadow mobs that often, and i don't see them being sold, so i don't know what you can get for a price. refer to General Guidelines section for how to price something when you don't know what it's worth.

Several years later...: (aka as you begin to travel)

by the time you only visit your starter town to finish quests, you've probably already used up all the items that you'll need from the beginning area. anything you have left over at this point can be sold to other players, if you know that it's used for a quest, or to the merchants if you know that it isn't. if not, just hold on to it, as the difference in prices that you can get can be large. in the secondary towns (Shi Zhang and Zhengzhou for White and Black clans, respectively), you'll start to get higher weapon drops, as well as some of the other rare items like Conqueror's Chests and Keys, and Skill Manuals. these are definitely something to tuck away to sell later if you don't plan on using them. also, somewhere along the road here, you'll eventually gather up enough money that you can feel comfortable buying storage space, especially if you already have three bags and you still can't hold everything you pick up i personally always advise saving up and buying the best of the lot for things of this type, mostly because if you spend the money now, then have extra down the road, it would be an annoyance to just "waste" the gold on the rest of an unused lease. so, if you're running out of space in your inventory, buy an extra bag. the cheap ones cost 2,500 and offer nothing less than a different look than the expensive ones, that cost 6,000 if i remember correctly. bags can be bought at the same vendors that sell the basic clothing, just look for the item that says "Backpack" in the name.

items to watch for, and collect, while leveling:
- Bloodwolf Skins: Thieves and Wu-Tang get these in their starter area (Shaolin too! thank you LandShark), but as far as i know, other clans have to visit their secondary town. the skins are used in quests (and the claws too, for Wu-Tang), and sell for 100-300 each. bulk amount depends on the version of the quest being done.
- Red Fox Skins: collection item, 50-70 each for 5-7k/100
- Red Fox Tails: collection item, a tad bit rarer than skins. 70-90 each for 7-9k/100
- Leopard Skins: collection item, but also a quest item. the quest NPC only requires three, though, so most people will take the time to just kill the 3-5 leopards for them. on top of that, leopards are easy to find, and aren't generally over-camped. 50-80 each for 5-8k/100
- Giant Spider Shell: collection item. mobs generally not over-camped, despite being in a quest as well. likely 40-50 each for 4-5k/100
- Tough Cobweb: same deal as the Giant Spider Shell, 40-50 each for 4-5k/1001
- Bear Skin: a relatively heavily camped mob for those getting xp at the OC10-RC2 range. the skins are a collection item, and usually fetch 80-120 each for 8-12k/100

And he lived happily ever after: (aka General Guidelines)

- vendor what isn't used in quests
- sell to other players what is
- when in doubt, don't toss it out
- when you make a stand to sell quest items, it's generally best to sell them in the amount necessary for the quest, and then if you have more, about half of the quest amount. the reason why i say this is because some people will start the quest, and then look for someone to buy the item from, and they will usually buy it from the most convenient merchant (since if you're buying an item for a quest, you're looking for convenience), and don't want to waste time looking for more than one merchant that's selling the item. then there are the people that start camping the mob, and realize the drop is rare after picking up 2-3. then they go back to town, looking for someone selling enough to cut off a large portion of the time necessary to complete the quest. they aren't going to just throw money at the first person they see, so they don't want to waste money buying more than what they still need for the quest.
- when trying to sell items, price them based on what you're looking for. if you need quick cash, always go just under how much items will normally sell for. if you're looking to get money, and you don't mind waiting, go ahead and price it a little on the higher end so that when the other people's stock runs out, there is no choice but to buy from you. note: this normally only works if you have very large amounts of an item (so that you save people time), or if the market isn't already flooded with the item. for example, i see people trying to sell one blood essence for 60k, when there are probably 50 others in the marketplace for 40-50k; 12 hours later, that single blood essence at 60k is still there. unless you have 9 blood essences (the most that can fit in a stand), you're not going to be able to demand that much more than everyone else.
- when you want to sell weapons that you've looted, you want to sell it for less than the shop, but for more than how much the shop will give you. well, if it's not in the shop, how do you know how much it's worth? simple, shops will give you 1/5th the selling price of a weapon. meaning if you have a Worn Aluminum Baseball Bat, and the clothier will give you 3580 for it, that means the blacksmith would sell it to you for 17,900 if he had it. generally speaking, people will sell regular weapons (no slots - those big empty boxes that will appear at the bottom of the items description when you click on it, you'll know it when you see it - and no added attributes) for anywhere between 1.5-2.5 times what the shop offers. meaning, when you put the baseball bat in your stand, a reasonable price would be 7k. now, if a sword adds wisdom (a useless stat for classes that use swords) or a bracer adds strength (same deal), just sell it for the same amount. but if you get dex/str/con on a warrior/hybrid/sometimes healer weapon, go up towards the higher end of that scale, something like 2.5-3k. same deal if you have a bracer that adds wisdom/essence/con. anything that adds max life and max vital energy is excellent as well. going off the previous example, our Hawk's Eye Worn Aluminum Baseball Bat (yes i'm making all this up) now adds 2 strength and 50 max life. you could make 10-12k off of it now.
- if you don't know how much an item is worth, do what you'd do with a weapon, if it's a normal loot. most of the quest items will sell to other players for something like 2-3 times what you'd get from a vendor. the exception is of course rare loots, which will go for anywhere from a couple hundred each to a couple thousand each. this is where the next point comes in:
- when you find a rare item, and you have no clue what it sells for (much less what it does), take a trip to Hefei. i know, the lag there can be horrible; it is for me too. but grin and bare it, and take a look through the shops there and try to find the same item you're selling. usually one trip isn't enough to find some of the more obscure loots you can find, so come back in a few hours, after having a chance to get a few levels, or check right before you go to bed/work/school. also, if you do find the item you're trying to sell, and when you check back, it's still there, that means it must be priced too high, unless you only came back after 30 minutes or so. some things, even at the right price, take a couple hours for the person who would buy it to check the shop.
- after some time, you will have enough money that you will want to buy something from another player, and it usually doesn't take long to get to this stage. how do you know, though, when you're paying a fair price? well, it's exactly the same as when you want to sell an item, check Hefei, and check it again. then for good measure, check it again later. i don't wait until i want to buy something to start shopping though. if by the time i need an item, like a weapon, and a quick look through all the stands in Hefei doesn't turn up anything, i'll just buy it from the vendors, or i'll try to go without it until i can check the stands later. when making a large purchase, such as a lightfoot tome or an elixer, never buy the first one you come across unless you're absolutely certain that if you leave the stand for more than 5 seconds it will disappear. there is usually a better price for anything, but if you start planning to buy something that you know you will need well before you need it, you can usually get the best price possible. not only that, but then you will also have a reason to keep playing, because you have an item that you spent money on that you might as well get the level to equip
- taalon927: If you have items for opposite color clan sell it in a stall in Hefei, and i do not mean at your clan portal entrance... use some common sence, why would i run all the way over there to check a stall when i do not use those portals to go level. IE if your a black clan setting up shop in Datong (take note its a black clan only area) sell only black clan items. Because the possibility of someone buying a white clan item for a alt is more remote then someone checking your stall to see what you have... (kixor says: on this note, sell Shaolin, Wu-Tang, and Beggars items [being staves, polearms, and swords] on the north side of town, and Heavenly Demon, Sacred Lotus, and Thieves items [spears, axes, wheels, daggers, and sabers] on the south side. of course, that's if your stand really contains just that item, otherwise you might as well just plop down in the Hefei marketplace just like everyone else )

i will of course add to this when i learn something new, or think of something else that's handy to know. i myself am relatively low level, RC4, but by doing the things that i've mentioned in this guide, i've already made enough money to buy my Heavenly Demon lightfoot for 110k, more than a couple magical weapons along the way (which i then refined as well), some x3-5 skill xp manuals to help me level up my horridly slow-leveling heals (but that's a topic for a completely different board), and then still have 50k left over. of course, some people will have more than this, especially if they took the time to just camp money. i've just looted items through grinding, and the best rare item i've ever found was one blood essence, besides that it's been all normal loot. (and people say there's a lack of money in this game... )

feel free to add any information, and i'll edit it into this post, and give proper credit. also, please let me know if this was helpful, as i can always write more guides on other things i've found. until then, see you in Hefei

[Source] Official Forum