Two questions:
 

Not sure when I'll actually get hooked up, but I'll get there eventually, in the meantime...

1) Is there merchant mining in this game? More specifically, do merchants have hidden items as they did in the original? I really hope so, as this was something I enjoyed immensely when I first started playing.

2) Does experience from mobs scale according to their relative con as it does in the current eq or is it a consistent amount as long as the mob cons blue or higher? Or to put it another way, do you get an exp bonus for killing mobs closer to your level. I'm hoping not. Oh also, is there a group bonus? Again I'm hoping it's like the original and not like the current.

Thanks.

1)As a Merchant Farmer myself I'd say its a pretty healthy market (its all about knowing where to shop). Since a majority of P99 players are experienced players its a little more challenging to find those unique little treasures. In regards to Merchant inventory, I don't know if Fodder sales obscure certain item(s) queue.

So... you don't want a group bonus exp bonus?

If you sell an item to a full merchant, than buy out junk items from the merchant so s/he is not full, the original item you sold will not appear. I know because I accidentally sold a Ravenscale BP this way thinking it was Bronze.

Ahh well. I was hoping for hidden items so that there could be actual merchant mining, not just farming.

And in response to your previous reply, yes I was hoping for no group bonus, but I phrased it vaguely because I know there was a 20 percent bonus for a full group fairly early on, but I just couldn't remember whether it started that way or not.