MrZork wrote...
Panda, appraise is an INT skill, CHA does not affect it.
There are several HotU merchants who will buy the same item for more gold than they will sell it for, if you have a high enough appraise skill and/or a lucky enough roll when opening the store. Getting gold that way is typically very tedious, though.
All that being said, is there a particular reason for rekindling these threads that have been cold for so long? It had been over a year between the last poster in this thread and your post above. It's quite likely that the original participants are no longer following this thread.
Appraise is determine by INT, but not all classes set it as class skills, so many classes need 2 skill points to raise 1 level. I remember thief can raise 1 level by 1 skill point. However, not all classes has so many excessive skill points to spend into appraise. Normally a WIZ or SOC require 2 skill points to raise 1 level in appraise.
If you try to use a SOC with CHA=23 to shop and a BARBARIAN with CHA=8 to shop the same merchant, you will find the different. This is why a SOC is prefer if you have plenty of things to sold during the game. So, CHA also affect price of selling but not very large.
The price your player got can also affect by feats of your player, for exmaple, Silver palm(only available at first level of player, Epic reputation (add several trade/communication skills to your player). And I found the price you got may also affect by your alignment!