RuneScape: Are Merchant Clans Destroying The Grand Exchange?

Positive

1. It can reward those who skill.

Say you are a miner and a clan starts merching gold ore. The price of it will rise therefore allowing to make more profit and rewarding your hard effort.

2. It makes the Grand Exchange more interesting.

How dull would it be if nothing changed in price? You would like at the Grand Exchange charts and just see one ever long straight line.

3. It provides an additional source of income to non-skillers such as pures.

Everyone and anyone can be a merchant. This means that pure accounts can spend more time pking and less time getting in the way of skillers.

Negative

1. It can cause items to rise horrifically.

Range amulets for example went up to 12k this summer when all other amulet remained at there usual price of 2-3k. Though items which have been merched do drop down slightly below their normal price for a couple of days after being dropped, so potentially a skiller could get an item even cheaper than they first intended if they wait.

2. It may seem like it does not reward skillers

I have 99 woodcutting myself and it takes a lot of hard work to woodcut yews for money, so someone seemly getting tons of cash for doing almost nothing can seem unfair. However the 76k (26k for f2p) trick I feel ruins the game far more, so why is that still around.

3. Those who start merching an item later than the rest of a clan can lose money.

Because some people sell early those who have brought an item late into the merch can end up making a loss.