According to the in-game and wiki descriptions, you get better deals from merchants when you have higher Social skills than they do, but that is not the way it is working.
I have a level 34 toon with full points (66) in both Charisma and Perception as well as 132 in Social. Since I arrived to Traders Flat at level 31, I have been buying materials with full discount from the level 30 merchants there. According to skill planners, a level 30 character can have max. 60 in Charisma and Perception and is capped at 120 in Social, so I get full discount.
I have a crafting/pistols toon with full Perception (for pistols), but no APs spent in Charisma. At level 43, I figured that if I spend a few APs in Charisma to be able to get to 120 in Social, then he would be able to buy at full discount from the level 30 merchants. I did not want to spend APs on Charisma for this toon, but I bumped it a couple of levels to be able to spend 120 AP in Social...then I planned to respec Charisma as the minimum level would increase as I level up further.
But, it does not work as described, because even with throwing another level at Charisma and going above 120 in Social, I do not get the same low prices as my level 34 toon!
Clearly, my crafter toon is not getting discount based on his Social compared to that of the merchant, but it appears that the discount is calculated from his actual Social relative to the Social cap for that character level with maxed Charisma and Perception.
This means that higher level toons are disadvantaged and that spending points in Social is a complete waste unless both Charisma and Perception are maxed. I don't think this should be 'working as intended'!
For my crafter toon I have the choice between spending a ton of chips to respec him out of the APs wasted on Social or go full Charisma and Social. With or without the 120 AP already spent in Social, he can be an average pistolero with some PvP potential, but spending a whole lot more APs on Charisma and Social will make him a total meh PvE toon...but then he will also get full discount when I get to Los Alamos, where merchants are level 40.
