Pirharri the Smuggler improvement

Billium813

Can Pirharri please just remove the 35% Smuggler's Fee already? None of the Merchant Assistants charge a fee, so this isn't a usual Assistant mechanic. It would hardly break the game to allow players to sell stolen goods through Pirharri for full cost, right? Pirharri design is like 8 years old at this point, as is Treasures/Stolen goods in general.

Billium813

While you're at it, remove the Items Sold and Items Laundered limits from Thieves Guild fences. It was a safe design back in 2016... but in 2023 it looks antiquated

Amottica

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

Necrotech_Master

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

if the fee is going to remain, then the assistant needs FULL fence ability, right now we can only sell to her, not launder

having the 35% cut + only sell ability heavily limits the use, because in most times i would rather launder than sell, which you would have to go to a fence anyway to do

i dont mind the daily limit, as its generally not a problem, but the assistant lacking half of the functionality of a fence + the 35% cut means shes basically never used

Billium813

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

What "risk of of thieving" are you talking about? I mean, it's not like Thieves Guild entrances are all in the center of town, surrounded by town Guards. It's not exactly hard to get to a Fence, so that "risk" is already incredibly small. I get it, I get the idea of the design conceptually, but in practice it just doesn't work that way. Maybe if random NPCs could nark on you and summon guards... but there just aren't enough guards in the game to create a real "risk" and Thieves Guilds are already positioned out of town.

Also, we are talking 10's of gold here. No on is getting rich selling Stolen Goods to Fences. All the Fee does is make no one want to use Pirharri at all.

tsaescishoeshiner

I do agree that it would take the risk and secrecy out of thieving, but the cut practically makes her pointless. I have an alternative suggestion.

What if Pirrhari had NO fee, but could only buy like 20-30 items each day. Then she would be convenient for thieves in a pinch or people who randomly steal some valuables they want to offload once or twice a day.

If they wanted to make her useful, selling to her could have a separate limit than selling to a normal fence. Then she'd be a convenient and enticing reward for thiefs.

Necrotech_Master

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I do agree that it would take the risk and secrecy out of thieving, but the cut practically makes her pointless. I have an alternative suggestion.

What if Pirrhari had NO fee, but could only buy like 20-30 items each day. Then she would be convenient for thieves in a pinch or people who randomly steal some valuables they want to offload once or twice a day.

If they wanted to make her useful, selling to her could have a separate limit than selling to a normal fence. Then she'd be a convenient and enticing reward for thiefs.

the problem still is most things i would consider valuable are stuff i need to launder, which the assistant cant do at all

i dont really care about the sellable junk

Holycannoli

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

There is no risk, just the few extra minutes to get to an outlaw's refuge. You can use the safer entrance outside town if you want.

She's a useless assistant, and yes I agree the daily fencing limit is useless too.

I_killed_Vivec

She's useless because if I find myself wanting to get rid of stolen goods then I can safely port o near a den for a couple of hundred gold at most (and usually a lot less than that). Chances are I'll recoup that immediately because of the 35% tax.

And to be honest the only reason I care about getting caught is because I have something I want to launder, and she doesn't help with that.

Gargath

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

What's risk you see in travelling to a fence if most characters built for thievery have probably -1 to guard detection range resulting that we can stand in front of guard without being detected in a bright day? There is no risk. Anyone can flee from guard thanks to their predictable mechanics.

I agree that Pirharri was abandoned by ZOS. During last few years I probably used it one or two times. Current limits to number of fence interactions per day let me earn maybe 20-30k from thievery. It's really nothing, such rewards in gold are not worth the time and potential troubles, in my opinion.

Considering how much one can get from selling items in guild stores without wasting few hours on stealing, it's a robbery to allow the cat to steal from us 35% of time we spent in stealth.

Necrotech_Master

the only use ive seen with pirharri is when im trying to speed level legerdemain and i dont want to take time to go to the outlaw refuge (such as farming sheep in khenarthis roost hat drop provisioning ingredients considered stolen)

since the value of the item does not matter for legerdemain xp you could just pull up pirrhari and offload everything until you max out the limit then fill up again and then go to a refuge to launder the remainder

evan302

I agree, as a reward for maxing out your Thieves Guild Pirharri is a real let-down. I think I've used her once since getting her and when I saw she couldn't launder goods and the size of the 'tax' she charges, I dismissed her and went to the nearest refuge instead.
She might be useful for an alt levelling ledgerdemain, but there are places very close to refuges for levelling.I had ledgerdemain levelled way before I got Pirharri, so I assume that's the way it is for most people. So, for anyone who doesn't play alts, she's completely pointless.
I'd very much like to see her re-worked so she's actually useful.
@Necrotech_Master Something along the lines you've suggested would be a big improvement.

tincanman

The 'fee' of 35% can be completely negated by having all the relevant legerdemain and thieves guild passives (not including cp, I think).

I expect the developers made Piranha (or whatever) with that in mind.

Amottica

Billium813 wrote: »

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

What "risk of of thieving" are you talking about? I mean, it's not like Thieves Guild entrances are all in the center of town, surrounded by town Guards. It's not exactly hard to get to a Fence, so that "risk" is already incredibly small. I get it, I get the idea of the design conceptually, but in practice it just doesn't work that way. Maybe if random NPCs could nark on you and summon guards... but there just aren't enough guards in the game to create a real "risk" and Thieves Guilds are already positioned out of town.

Also, we are talking 10's of gold here. No on is getting rich selling Stolen Goods to Fences. All the Fee does is make no one want to use Pirharri at all.

The risk is clear and obvious. Granted, I don’t find it hard to avoid or run from a guard but there is still a risk that is very evident.

As you indicated, it’s not hard to get to a den so there is little reason for Zenimax to change their mind on this as the design seems to have been created on purpose.

richo262

Scrap the assistant and if you completed the Thieves Guild line, your companion, Mirri, Ember or Sharp can smuggle for you.

This would explain why the fee is dropped to say, 10%, to cover their costs on their trip to a fence, but ultimately they are doing it because they are a companion.

Ember is what the Smuggler should have been anyway.

omnidoh

1. Guards are a joke.
One has to practically TRY to get caught by them as they're so easy to escape from.
The only time I've ever been caught and didn't run away was when I deliberately chose to for the achievement.

2. There are several homes that are literally right next to a den, hell there's one with a backdoor (Markarth) built directly into the home itself.

I'm in agreement with the OP.
Pirharri serves no useful purpose, and is at best a house decoration, though arguably isn't even worth the slot.

Luckylancer

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

This dont make sense because if you can sell to her you can also teleport to a safe thieves guild. %35 fee just makes it grindy to turn items in.

rpa

If someone has bounty, they can travel outside of Sugar Bowl Suite or Snugpod for no recall cost, check no guard is passing by and enter nearby Outlaws or take wayshrine with no risk. The service Piharri offers for 35% fee is a way to dump stolen inventory and keep stealing without leaving the area.

Billium813

Just to play devils advocate for 1 moment...

What if they did remove the Smuggler's Fee, and they added Laundering to Pirharri! Why would a player ever go to a Fence in an Outlaw Refuge again?

See, look at Merchant Assistants. I bet players would love Merchant Assistants to fix armor, and sell lockpicks! But ZOS refuses to let Merchant Assistants do everything a "real" merchant can. Why? I think ZOS just doesn't want Assistants to make existing things in the game 100% obsolete. Which... I actually think is admirable. Even though some players claim they would want it, it would be a bad thing for the game ON THE WHOLE to have players shut up in their houses, using assistants to do everything, never needing to go into town themselves.

That all being said... I think there are better designs for Pirharri (and Stolen Goods in general) to make this work. TBF, Fences have Haggling Bonuses (which could be expounded on) and Fences can allow you to pay off your bounty. Should Pirharri get those features too? Where is the line between "a useful Assistant" and "a replacement Fence"?

I would REALLY like to see a new Thieve's Guild DLC that expands on all of these existing mechanics. Make Treasures actually worth something in the game. Have Fences provide Thieving Contracts, similar to Antiquity Leads. The real issue is that Thieving is such a minor mechanic, and Fences are so limited in usefulness already, that Pirharri HAS to be crap just to force players to go to Outlaw Refuges.

Also... Fence's should sell Lockpicks, not Merchants.

Ishtarknows

Billium813 wrote: »

Just to play devils advocate for 1 moment...

What if they did remove the Smuggler's Fee, and they added Laundering to Pirharri! Why would a player ever go to a Fence in an Outlaw Refuge again?

See, look at Merchant Assistants. I bet players would love Merchant Assistants to fix armor, and sell lockpicks! But ZOS refuses to let Merchant Assistants do everything a "real" merchant can. Why? I think ZOS just doesn't want Assistants to make existing things in the game 100% obsolete. Which... I actually think is admirable. Even though some players claim they would want it, it would be a bad thing for the game ON THE WHOLE to have players shut up in their houses, using assistants to do everything, never needing to go into town themselves.

That all being said... I think there are better designs for Pirharri (and Stolen Goods in general) to make this work. TBF, Fences have Haggling Bonuses (which could be expounded on) and Fences can allow you to pay off your bounty. Should Pirharri get those features too? Where is the line between "a useful Assistant" and "a replacement Fence"?

I would REALLY like to see a new Thieve's Guild DLC that expands on all of these existing mechanics. Make Treasures actually worth something in the game. Have Fences provide Thieving Contracts, similar to Antiquity Leads. The real issue is that Thieving is such a minor mechanic, and Fences are so limited in usefulness already, that Pirharri HAS to be crap just to force players to go to Outlaw Refuges.

Also... Fence's should sell Lockpicks, not Merchants.

Totally agree, and to add to the collection of "assistants who don't offer the same services as NPCs" I'd add Bankers. Tythus et al don't offer full banking services like access to guild banks or the ability to list items and browse guild stores, so I doubt we'll see Pirharri offer full Fence services any time soon.

ADarklore

I can understand if people have a bounty and need to get to an Outlaw Refuge but are worried about the guards. However, a trick I learned, if you're AD, is teleport to the Harborage and go around the shore to the entrance to the Vulkhel Guard Outlaws Refuge. OR, buy the Emissary's Enclave house which has a private entrance to the Necrom Outlaw's Refuge... so you can just teleport to your house.

TX12001rwb17_ESO

They should just remove it, no risk of theiving when you own two homes that had direct entry to the outlaw refuge and wouldnt you know, one of them is the new house in Necrom that you csn buy with gold.

Amottica

Luckylancer wrote: »

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

This dont make sense because if you can sell to her you can also teleport to a safe thieves guild. %35 fee just makes it grindy to turn items in.

If one can just teleport to a safe thieve guild or den then cannot be all that grindy to turn items in.

Luckylancer

Amottica wrote: »

Luckylancer wrote: »

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

This dont make sense because if you can sell to her you can also teleport to a safe thieves guild. %35 fee just makes it grindy to turn items in.

If one can just teleport to a safe thieve guild or den then cannot be all that grindy to turn items in.

It is grindy. Both teleporting and using the asistant is risk free but one one of them wastes time, other one takes a huge fee. No need for such time waste.

TairenSoul

The 35% fee is larceny! It should be lower. No one else charges a fee to decon, etc. I get it, that it's a thief thing, but that's too much. I never use her. Waste of a cool assistant.

Foxtrot39

Only good to dump goods that are already worthless to begin with that people usualy just auto sort and destroy via addon

She is effectively a totaly useless addition and serve no purpose beside house decoration

If she fee stayed but anything sold to her didn't count towards fence limit, she woudl be an ok trash good seller giving a bit of gold instead of none via item destruction

vsrs_au

I just got Pirharri today on a character, then after seeing the 35% fee, thought "what a pointless reward that was". The only thing Pirharri is good for now is to add some character to a house as a houseguest.

DenverRalphy

Wow, necro post almost a year old. But I'll contribute.

If Pirharri didn't have the 35% fee, and could launder, then the entire Bounty System would simply become obsolete.

Thieves could simply pick a pocket, sell the loot. Crack open a safebox, sell the treasure and launder the big score. Get stopped by a guard? pffft... take the death because there's nothing to lose because you've already sold/laundered everything and you get a free bounty reset and the junk/trash items are confiscated to clear your inventory slots.

And if that's the case. Might as well just go back to Pre-Justice system and everything is just lootable.

BretonMage

A necro post for an issue which has not changed is fine. It should be a lower fee anyway. A 35% fee makes her absolutely useless. I've never even considered using her services. If the fee was closer to 15%, then I might be tempted.

Jaraal

Billium813 wrote: »

Just to play devils advocate for 1 moment...

What if they did remove the Smuggler's Fee, and they added Laundering to Pirharri! Why would a player ever go to a Fence in an Outlaw Refuge again?

See, look at Merchant Assistants. I bet players would love Merchant Assistants to fix armor, and sell lockpicks! But ZOS refuses to let Merchant Assistants do everything a "real" merchant can. Why? I think ZOS just doesn't want Assistants to make existing things in the game 100% obsolete. Which... I actually think is admirable. Even though some players claim they would want it, it would be a bad thing for the game ON THE WHOLE to have players shut up in their houses, using assistants to do everything, never needing to go into town themselves.

This is exactly why Pirrhari doesn't fence, banker assistants don't have guild access, and the merchant doesn't repair armor. ZOS wants people to have to go to towns, so they look busy and vibrant, and the game looks like it's thriving. Which is also why you'll never be able to do writs in your house, too.

Araneae6537

Amottica wrote: »

I doubt they will remove the fee our assistant charges since doing so also eliminates the risk of thieving.

Basically, if someone has a bounty they can dump their ill gotten loot via the assistant without risk of guards taking it. If they want full price then they need to risk traveling to the fence. It seems to be a clear design.

What risk? Port to outside Sleek Creek and go to the fence at your leisure. The benefit to having an assistant is ease of access, not having to interrupt what you’re doing, but of course every other assistant is Crown store — no one would pay Crowns for Pirrhari. I guess the 35% cut is in the place of Crowns? Idk