Times have since changed when it comes to buying characters and items. In early EQ times you'd get made fun of for buying character or platinum. Those days are gone now that a more casual WoW crowd is here. If you didn't have time to get mats in highend WoW you simply bought gold from IGN, or other places. Casual people do it, and hardcore alike. It was openly talked about in my WoW guild. No one was ashamed of it, people did it because it saved them time they could better spend everywhere. The problem I see for you Smed is this following chart.
A lot of the views on this board are going to vary here on this point. But I've personally always been against no drop/binding/bop items. I've always believed that it creates more of a market when you can buy any item if you can find a seller for it. You won't be able to get the best dragon loot if there are no sellers. But if there are and you've saved the money, why not. Most dev's seem to be strongly against this. Standing firm on the you have to put in the time to get the reward. You have decent sales for both money and characters but very little in the way of items. Most likely for the reason I stated above. There simply are not many hot items which you are allowed to trade. There is alot of money to be made by SOE if you'll be able to sway future developers from the no drop religion.
