Actually, some of the harder working merchants are the ones I think will fall foul of resellers. When you've dealt with these reseller folk in small doses, you know what to expect if they have a new search engine to make it easier. One persistent reseller can be troublesome, several at once...no thanks. New search engine = more resellers at a time + new customers. Expect some shop owners to get fed up of restocking constantly.
I initially rejected auction houses and searches because I happened to have made a lot of gold on the WoW auction house when I played WoW - certain things are needed by certain groups on certain days, and I would make it a point to constantly buy out those things and then set the price on those days. It helps that there are auction house add-ons that help you track prices, including over time.
I also felt that it would remove player interaction.
I've since changed my mind for a few reasons. I don't necessarily support an auction house, and a vendor bazaar kind of fits into that, because I think it removes some player interaction. The vendor bazaar is probably going to happen, and because of what's involved, I think it will not be as appealing to the scripters as some think and I think it might change things up a bit. I think the New Magincia houses will still be more popular than the vendors in the vendor bazaar.
I do support a vendor search however, provided it makes the players visit those vendors, whether they are in Luna or outside of Vesper. In that instance it's no different than somebody dropping runes at a bank, it's just a little more organized. If I drop runes and log out, there's not that much player interaction anyways - no different than somebody finding my vendor through a global search.
I also support a vendor search because there is a search engine right now, if you live in Luna or Zento or have vendors there. They will probably add New Magincia as well. Either the devs shut those scripters down that are powering those search engines, or they offer it to everybody or preferably both. We can't pretend like it doesn't already exist and that people aren't benefiting from it.
If they shut down the scripters powering those sites and
don't offer a vendor search, that would be okay as well as far as I'm concerned, because at least things would be fair.
It's a tricky situation. The devs want new players and are working on the changes needed for new players. New players are going to be used to global interaction (auction houses, messaging, etc.) and I think it needs to be looked at. UO doesn't have to be turned into a clone of any other game to bring in new players, but given that many games borrowed from UO, I think UO should borrow a few things from them, that players have come to expect and benefit from. The EC is an instance of UO borrowing from other games and it was very logical - new players are used to interfaces that they can dramatically customize to fit their own needs and tastes.
I would actually place a true communication system at the top of the list after graphics/new player stuff/revised quest system. As I said, the beginnings of one are in place - the New Magincia plot winners got a glimpse of it. That is something that the crafting folk could benefit from - it would allow them to more easily take orders and interact with customers.
Right now, spamming general chat, bulletin boards, and the containers masquerading as mailboxes are a poor substitute for such a system. A good in-game communications system would help out many crafters and could build many relationships. I know there is ICQ and other forms of chat, but those are out-of-game and new players are going to be used to true in-game communications systems.