Like Aecius, I do not speak for Oakstone, however, I would like to clear
up a few misconceptions, if I may.

As has been observed on a number of occasions, Oakstone's pricelist is
not entirely Oakstone's. The prices in it are and always have been, to
the best of my knowledge, dictated to Oakstone by the forestal guilds.
Oakstone doesn't enforce it at all, and rogue forestals are not bound by
it. It is enforced, if necessary, by the guilds themselves upon their
members. The reason for having such a standard is, among other things,
to make sure these concoctionists are getting a fair price for their
efforts. In order to do so, we needto determine exactly what a fair
price would be, and that is what the pricelist is.

I know there's a fair amount of dissatisfaction with this, particularly
by nonforestals, and one could argue pretty accurately that the
pricelist doesn't change fluidly with the market. I don't think that's
because Oakstone or the forestal guilds are out to get you, I think it's
because it's very difficult to stay on top of these changes, determine
what would be a fair price for each item, and then coordinate that with
other guilds. I was witness to part of the Sentinels' efforts in this
latest change, and I can tell you it is really quite a headache, and
those involved ought to be congratulated for their efforts.

As far as comparing concoctions to other trade skills such as foraging,
milking, and enchanting, etc, I don't think that's a very fair or
accurate comparison. These skills are each unique in their own ways and
have to be dealt with differently. For instance, forging has varying
degrees of success. If I wanted to buy 5 suits of chainmail from a
Paladin, I would not expect to pay the same price for each, because some
offer more protection than others. In contrast to that, a concoctionist
either succeeds or fails to make a health elixir. The failures are
discarded, and each success is the same as the last, so why shouldn't
there be a fixed price for them?

I do also suspect that many of the guilds that have the trade skills
that Sir Brinn mentioned do in fact have a list of standard prices, even
if they don't publish them to the public. The only difference with
concoctions is that every guild with that skill has come together to
decide on what is a fair price. The reason other guild don't do this
with their trade skills is, I suspect, because the different guilds of
the magi or snake classes, for instance, do not have the same goals, and
have no real interest in working together in such a way, as forestals
do.

Farret Wildfang

Penned by my hand on the 9th of Mayan, in the year 374 AF.