What to do with all that hard earned gold...
In UXO, we've taken the basic idea of buying and selling items from shopkeepers and expanded on it, resulting in a dynamic selling environment where transactions are easy, and where finding the perfect NPC item can be an adventure in and of itself.

On each vendor, you'll find a large and unique assortment of items, spanning all level ranges (from 1 to 100). The items are generated randomly, each with its own magic properties. Some items may be only moderately powerful, while others may be simply amazing - you'll never know what you'll find until you look!

Our shopkeeper system encourages players to hunt in search of good loot, while also ensuring that items purchased from shopkeepers are actually useful. Equipment sold by UXO's shopkeepers will be of equal quality as that found on monsters, but with one major difference: items looted from monsters will never decay over time, while items purchased from shopkeepers will eventually decay through use.

Shopkeepers in Ultima X: Odyssey
You'll find specific NPCs designated as shopkeepers in towns, identified by the shopkeeper icons over their heads. There are three types of shopkeepers, each of which will offer a wide variety of items for sale, although you'll be able to sell any item to any shopkeeper, regardless of type.

Any time you access a shopkeeper, your inventory will open along with the shopkeeper's inventory, making it easy to see everything at a glance. While shopping or selling, you won't be able to move or perform any abilities, but you'll still be able to chat and access the various interface pages, and your character will have a small icon above their head to let other people know you're busy selling or browsing for items.

Selling Items
When selling only a couple items, you can drag the item into the vendor window straight from your backpack, or you can use hotkeys to sell items without dragging. To protect against accidental loss, you'll be asked if you're sure you want to sell before proceeding. (If you're certain of your keystrokes, you can live dangerously and turn those confirmation boxes off!)

For those times when you've been out adventuring for a few hours and you've built up a good number of things to sell, we've addressed the tedium of selling dozens of items one at a time by allowing you to sell an entire backpack full of items at once! When you choose this option, you'll be told how many items you're selling, and given a value for all the items combined before confirming the sale.

The value of an item in gold is determined by the character level needed to use that item, and will be visible at any time along with the item properties. Values will also not change based on an item's intelligence or Virtue slots. This, combined with the fact that shopkeepers will not sell intelligent or Virtue-imbuable items, should help maintain a healthy market for player-to-player trading and selling of these rare and valuable items.

Shopkeeper Items and the Condition Property
Often, items purchased from shopkeepers in massively-multiplayer games are made of a lower quality than items found on monsters or traded by players. This is usually done to ensure that there's still a good reason to hunt monsters for loot, as opposed to simply buying everything you need in the safety of town. However, what usually happens is that players simply avoid buying items from NPCs, since those items don't perform as well in the heat of battle.

We've created a different system - one that still encourages players to adventure in search of good loot, but that also makes sure that items purchased from shopkeepers are actually useful. Equipment sold by UXO's shopkeepers will be of equal quality as that found on monsters, but with one major difference: items looted from monsters will never decay over time, while items purchased from shopkeepers will eventually decay through use.

Shopkeeper items will have the same appearance as normal looted items, with the exception of a small symbol on the item icon and an additional variable on them called "condition," which starts at 100% and eventually wears down to 0%, at which point the item breaks and is no longer usable. Items can't be repaired, but they'll take a lot of wear before finally breaking, and your equipment won't lose any its effectiveness due to condition loss.

Just as with selling items, players can buy items in one of two ways - by either dragging the item from the vendor window into the player's inventory, or through the use of hot keys. It won't be necessary to worry about having the right amount of gold on hand, since gold is carried on the character, rather than stored in banks.

Finding the Right Equipment
In many games, NPC shopkeepers are static, meaning that no matter how many times you visit them, they'll always have the same things for sale. This means that once you've bought what you need from a given vendor, there's not much reason to go back to that vendor again for the lifetime of your character. But in UXO, you'll want to visit vendors again and again, because their inventory may be different every time!

There are three types of shopkeepers, each of which sell a specific type of item. The three types are:

• Weaponsmith - melee, staff and ranged weapons
  
• Armorsmith - all armor types (except robes) and shields
  
• Magician - robes, rings, necklaces, cloaks, etc.
  

On each vendor, you'll find a large and unique assortment of items, spanning all level ranges (from 1 to 100). The items are generated randomly, each with its own magic properties. Some items may be only moderately powerful, while others may be simply amazing - you'll never know what you'll find until you look!

To keep each vendor's inventory fresh, and to help the most powerful items keep their rare status, vendors will feature only one of each item. This means that if another player buys an item while you're browsing that shopkeeper's wares, you'll see that item disappear, to be replaced after a few seconds by a brand new randomly generated item in the same level range as the one that was purchased. Don't see anything you like on a particular vendor, and don't feel like going to another one? Just wait a few minutes, and see what new random items appear as the vendor's inventory changes.

You'll be able to tell at a glance which items your character can use, as well as which items you can't afford. As a note, you'll still be able to buy something even if your character can't use it. You'll also be able to drag items into your chat bar from the vendor's inventory, in case you make a great find and want to check with your guild on whether or not anyone wants it before someone else snaps it up.

Shopping Made Easy
Ultimately, UXO's shopkeepers have been designed to satisfy several goals. Selling items will be simple and uncomplicated. Monsters will drop better items than what players can buy in town, while still keeping shopkeepers' items useful. Shopkeepers in UXO will feature a constant influx of new equipment choices, extending the thrill of discovery throughout a character's entire lifespan. All this adds up to gameplay that is - like the rest of Ultima X: Odyssey - unique, intuitive, and fun.