Boat vendors MIA
by Eliah Hecht 
Dec 7th 2007 at 5:30PM
One of my favorite little additions in patch 2.3 was the boat/zeppelin vendors. Sure, there's a whole crew there, but after talking to them once to see what gossip they had, the vendors were the only ones I went back to. Since Blizzard refuses to take me up on my suggestion to allow fishing from moving boats, it gives me the one more thing to do while waiting for that zone-in screen, aside from chatting and making bandages. Being able to sell trash, stock up on reagents, and sometimes repair during this downtime is really nice.Unfortunately, the boat vendors have been disabled in a hotfix to the live realms, for vague reasons. Nethaera clarifies that there are "propulsion issues" that necessitate the vendors being out for the time being, but that they'll be "back on duty" as soon as the issues are fixed. Possibly related is a note that the entire boat crew is gone on the 2.3.2 PTR, "for testing purposes." Hopefully the vendors will be back soon; until then, my boat rides will be (even more) boring.
Filed under: Patches, News items, NPCs
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Warlock Dec 7th 2007 5:39PM
They were pretty buggy, I assume they are trying to fix them. I noticed many times they just weren't there. Something about the zoning must cause them not to spawn at times or something.
CthulhuCalling Dec 7th 2007 5:42PM
Had some bad problems with them. Talked to one of them once, and I was immediately disconnected from the game. Tried logging in with that toon for 15 minutes and was immediately disconnected each time. Other toons, no problem logging in, so it wasn't the realm. Had to get a GM to rescue him.
Xeren Dec 7th 2007 5:43PM
I'm gonna guess that someone was able to figure out how to make free money by selling something just before the boat switched zones or something.
When gold comes into it, that's generally when blizz jumps into action.
Nails Dec 7th 2007 5:55PM
that sounds like a reasonable guess. you are probably on to something
Ariaeko Dec 7th 2007 6:45PM
The most interesting thing I ran into with the boat vendors is when I had sold some items to one of them and zoned to the next continent, all of my buyback items were gone. Good thing I had not sold anything accidentally but something to be aware of!
Perseus Dec 7th 2007 8:16PM
That is because everytime you zone into an instance or another continent, all of your buyback list is reset.
Verit Dec 7th 2007 7:19PM
Vendors made it harder for me to stealth onto a boat and take horde zeplins all over the place.
It used to be useful on a pvp server - if all the vendors were dead/missing - probably shouldn't get on.
vlad Dec 8th 2007 2:38AM
guess no one heard about all the duping that was going on eh?
awa64 Dec 8th 2007 12:35AM
Aw, rats. Now I'll have to plan ahead if I want to get rip-roarin' drunk during boat rides.
Rydolomo Dec 9th 2007 9:14AM
Used to be, an effect you generate like a portal or rain of fire or something on a moving boat would cause it to remain stationary relative to the water rather than the deck of the boat, so it would go whoosh towards the back of the boat and be gone.
Not sure if this has been fixed or not. Might have been a bug at some stage.
Rydo.