Tnx, I'll remember it for the next time I play Morrowind!
If I am not mistaken, best gear/weapons can be found in major cities of Fallout 2, but mobs around those cities are really brutal. Best armor is only obtainable from Enclave bases though.
It's not that I particularly like to exploit them, it's just that I was obsessed over getting perfect 3x5 or 2x5 +1 Luck in attribute raise per level, and I needed trainer services for that. Those are expensive. And I like how game allows you to play it that way without artificial limitations like some other TES game (cough*Oblivion*cough).

The issue of getting perfect stat gains at level up is one thing I don't like in Morrowind and Oblivion, to the point where I'm willing to mod the game to make things work better. The Morrowind/Oblivion level up system is one of the worst I've encountered, and that's coming from someone who has grown tired of the level/XP system. Specifically, the Morrowind/Oblivion level up system has a very bad case of missable stats, which just like missable items, I consider to be sloppy game design.

Bringing this back to in-game economy, I wish more RPGs (and games with currency systems in general), if they're going to have missable items, would provide a way to buy those items you missed later on. Shovel Knight (not an RPG, but does have currency) has the right idea, except that the normal locations of the items aren't actually missable because you can replay levels. (Shovel Knight isn't perfect (I don't like the lack of a way to get and keep small amounts of money in a short amount of time), but it does get that right, at least.)

I'll first tackle Mortius1's post and say that being unable to sell everything at a normal value is awfully frustrating, and that also includes option 3 from there. But I think there's one more option to include, the barter system, like in Gothic, so the store may at times have less money than you'd like, but will have other stuff you can nevertheless trade for. Still consider option 4 as the only reasonable one in a game, and with no other restrictions, nothing wrong with ending up with tons of money. Since I'm playing for escapism and power trip, the story and atmosphere do the escapism part, the gameplay should do the power trip part, and while that primarily means character/party/army's power outpacing the challenges, having to spare ever less thought for... resource limitations, including money, as you go along also factors into it.

Past that, out of the 3 purchase options in the OP, 3 is the most annoying. Level scaling in anything is an awful design choice, and in this aspect on the one hand doesn't allow you to jump ahead and on the other just adds one more aspect of the world that appears to just revolve around the PC, which breaks immersion. Option 1 seems tied to the idea of gameplay taking precedence over story and atmosphere, so I dislike it, but can put up with it in some games, if they're linear like that. But clearly prefer option 2 whenever it exists, obviously, as it both adds a more "realistic" aspect to the game world and also favors and rewards planning and being frugal early on, to be able to jump ahead.

That restriction is one thing that annoyed me about Avernum: Escape from the Pit; all stores only give something like a paltry 20% of the price of an item. This is one of the reasons I decided not to play it and instead play Avernum 1, where some stores sell for a decent value.

50% of the price is the typical standard amount of money you get for selling an item; some JRPGs actually give you more (Dragon Quest 2 is an example IIRC, as, I believe, is Dragon Quest 3), but I'm not aware of any offhand that give you less. WRPGs, however, have cases where you get almost nothing from selling an item. (On toe other hand, the one RPG I'm aware of where sell price = buy price, Ultima 3, would be classified as a WRPG, unless one considers that what I call a proto-RPG.)

The barter system is precisely how Morrowind operates. Merchants have limited money, but you can buy and sell in a single transaction, even if the amount you'd get for selling alone would exceed the amount of money the merchant has. Hence, even if the merchant can't afford your filled soul gem on its own, you can pick up some items the merchant has in the same transaction and not have to pay extra for them.

Incidentally, there's one other game I can think of that does buying and selling in a single transaction; Star Ocean 2 (PSX JRPG). While this usually doesn't matter, the game actually has one item that sells for a negative amount; the Bounced Check, which is obtained by using a skill that is used to do things like forge documents and failing. If selling would put you into the negatives, the game actually won't let you sell it. (That game doesn't limit merchant funds, so it doesn't lead to bartering being necessary.)

Lennus 2, which I'm playing right now, seems to offer 60% of the price when selling items, and there's a mercenary you can recruit who reduces purchase prices to 75% (which is huge when there are powerful, but expensive, items available early in the game). The catch is that that particular mercenary, whose recruitment fee is -500 gold (in other words, he pays to join your party), won't leave your party if you try to dismiss him, and he isn't good in combat. (He only leaves if he has 0 HP at the end of a battle.)

How would you feel if the game has a Mercantile skill (or similar) that you can improve in some way (like with skill points or by buying and selling in shops), and it is that skill that affects the items available for sale?

Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song has shop levels; as you buy items (I don't remember if this happens when you sell), the three categories of shop levels will improve, and as they improve, shops will offer more items. (This game is open world, which is not typical of a JRPG.)

Disgaea has a shop level, which affects the most powerful items that the game's only store will sell you. However, to actually get the stronger items to show up, you need to go to the Dark Assembly and have them pass a (fortunately easy) bill; there's also a bill that does the reverse. (This game, a SRPG, has a base area from which you embark on combat missions; it is in the base area where you have the shop and the Dark Assembly, as well as a hospital that gives prizes.)

[url=https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Tribunal:Gaenor] And the game even makes fun of that! [/url]

I think this level-up system makes more sense than the 'freely distribute X skill/attribute points upon levelling-up" system.
More importantly, you can't really mess your character progression in Elder Scrolls games, whereas many (mostly older) titles let you try a build that will turn out to make the game unwinnable. To me, letting you play hours, if not dozens of hours before flipping you the bird is not even sloppy game design, it breaches the tacit contract between designer and player.

The... 'arthropod connection' east of Vivec allows for improved cash injections. ;)

I don't like the mechanic of tying the amount of stat gains at level up to your level. So, the system would be better if any of these fixes were made:
* Points can be freely allocated at level up.
* Stat gains at level up are still dependent on skill use, but your total stat gain is guaranteed to be exactly X points. (If the most used stats are maxed, they could be given to luck, or if that's maxed, maybe favor lower stats.)
* Get rid of stat gains at level up, and instead have stats increase as skills governed by the stat get used. In this case, we might even be able to get rid of levels entirely and use a SaGa-like growth system (unless one really wants Skyrim-style perk picks).
* Have stats increase by an entirely different method, like paying for stat increases (like in Ultima 3 or SaGa 1's humans), based on current equipment (like SaGa 2's robots), or stat boosts found throughout the world, in dungeons, and as quest rewards (the way Zelda and Metroid handle character growth). Skills can still increase by use.

Also, while we're add it, maximum Health should be a pure function of the character's *current* level, stats, and active effects; none of this nonsense where characters who wait to raise Endurance end up with less health long-term than those who put an early focus on that attribute.

Economically wise one of the things I miss a lot in modern titles is the coin management feature of games like Pool of Radiance or Darklands and, I do not remember exactly, probably Realms of Arkania. The existence of three different kind of coins you can change to free space; or put your money in a bank in exchange of a credit paper to travel safer like you did in Daggerfall...etc.

This feature plus a dynamic flow of prices depending stocks etc... could make very interesting variations in the management of inventories. and why not, in the philosophy, atmosphere and politics of a RPG world, the monetary realities of each society or lack of them etc...

Like?

One of the things I love about the game is that there is usually an explanation for it. A contract might be given by someone in a poor village torn by war... and yes, they can't pay much.
Sometimes you find valuables in people's homes - and most of the time -if there's something valueable - a note or letter which shows that they were dealing in Fisstech, or hawking to the Scoia'tael, hiding their valuables from the approaching armies or sometimes only saving up for their children to have a better life.
Also you never "need" to take that stuff. There's enough to be found in smugglers' caches and the likes. More than you'll ever need.

I have about 1k hours in Witcher 3, and there is stuff to complain about. But not this.

Oh, didn't mean that, I'm fine with getting a low amount for selling, as long as that's what the game considers to be the "right" amount. I was referring to the badly limited money thing, like in Morrowind, where no shopkeeper in the game has the money for even a single piece of top tier gear, and with all the respawns you'll always have tons of stuff to sell, little to no reason to buy (so barter becomes useless), and nowhere to sell to.
If stores would typically just sell gear, I'd ignore the skill and stick to drops, and therefore the whole thing would be as if it wouldn't exist and I'll end up saying store items quickly become irrelevant in game. If they also sell permanent improvements, like spells or attributes, I'd likely focus on that skill till I'd max it assuming it'd be possible to do so, end up with too little in combat or other relevant skills, likely consider the game awfully hard as a result, and maybe give up if I just can't get through, or if not end up with too weak chars and feel it's all wrong anyway. Either way, nothing I'd care to see in a game.
Also annoying, forcing you to buy junk to see whether anything better pops up. If it'd apply to selling too, might be tolerable.
But, either way, no such limitations please. Just have everything there from the beginning so I'll know what I'm planning and saving up for, and if I'm frugal and calculated I can skip steps and jump straight to the really good stuff the moment I have enough.

Incidentally, currently playing Lionheart, and this is a case of level scaling of shops, better stuff just becomes available as you level. Annoying. But there's also the fact that inventory is decided when you check, so can just save before talking to shopkeeper and keep reloading to see what can show up, see how it falls with all the random pieces of gear and stats on them. Tedious to find something good, but at the same time if you sit there for a (possibly very long) time and keep trying, you should be able to find just the thing you want eventually. (Stock is saved for a while after you check it though, so if you want something else of a similar type right away, have to either go to another shopkeeper that sells that kind of items or wander around for a while before returning.)

I recently replayed Dragon Age 2 and it had weapons and items for sale in Act 3 that cost 100+ gold pieces, but I don't think I ever had that much gold the whole game (and I did almost every quest). That felt a little off to me. I guess you could save a ton and avoid buying other things to get ONE of those items, but there's like a dozen or more of them.

Secret of Evermore (another non-RPG with an economy) also does the multiple currency thing.

By the way, in games like the Dragon Quest series (starting with DQ3), there's a bank that serves a different purpose; when your party gets wiped out in these games, you lose half your money, but the money in the bank is not affected.

(There's no interest in this game, however.)

Interestingly enough, Might and Magic: World of Xeen has a similar bank usage; the "Mr. Wizard" feature, which teleports you back to the start of the game, will cause you to lose all your gems, but those in the bank are kept. (This doesn't work in Isles of Terra, as Mr. Wizard instead takes one level from each party member.)

What if stores just sell gear, but said stores offer better equipment than what you can get otherwise (so that the skill isn't useless in the long run)?

Personally, I think I prefer it when shops don't have any randomness, and instead have a fixed selection of gear, which never runs out no matter how much you purchase. One observation is that JRPGs often have fixed shops, while WRPGs have random shop inventories. (Exceptions apply: The Baldur's Gate series appears to have fixed shop inventories, while Disgaea has random shop inventories, for example.)

(Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song actually does work this way; it's just that some items aren't available before you raise your shop levels, and I believe they are listed as a bunch of question marks, so you can tell if there's anything that will be sold later.)

So I've been thinking about barter, and am struggling to think of it as anything more than a simultaneous buy/sell action.
Everything has an intrinsic value and sales happen when the buy tally exceeds the sell tally.

The same outcome can also happen by performing a buy transaction followed by a sell transaction. It is functionally equivalent to bartering, but comes with one additional constraint - The store's state (money, items available) persists long enough for the subsequent transaction to occur.

This is another aspect of the economy - how the player influences it.
1. Is the store willing to resell the rubbish you've just given them, or does it go straight in the bin.
2. Is the store willing to use the proceeds from previous transactions to fund future transactions. "I'm sorry, just because the last customer spent 1 million gold pieces, doesn't mean I can afford to buy your 100 gold piece trinket."

Point 2 is common. Point 1 is also common, but limited to the store being willing to sell the goods back to you for a markup. I'm unaware of a game where you see NPCs walking around with distinctive items you've sold to the village store earlier in the game.

Economy is about a flow of money - how it is distributed and hot it changes hands and who has them and who hasn't. Post#9 has a lot more to do with the economy than OP.

As for item availability, Legends of Eisenwald has it being random. Well, mostly random - there are some fixed items, available in fixed places, there are random items, available on a certain map but at the random shop (and if you go to the next map, you'll never be able to get them) and totally random items, that can be available anywhere.

You are not the only one. In fact, randomized items in shops is one of the most often complaints about Legends of Eisenwald. It's especially frustrating as one of such items randomly popping up in the shops is needed to complete one of the quests. So you have either to spend unspecified amount of time hunting it on the map (and you can't be even sure if it will appear at all) or just not solve the quest this way at all.

But hey, you've asked about the games that defy traditional game design.