Seems to me looking at the rules, that rarity only comes into play on how hard it is to find the item. Has nothing to do with cost unless your are trying to sell it.

Using table 5-2, If I was on the outer rim, lets say Tatooine (R+2) a heavy blaster rifle (R6) would cost the same compared to if I was buying it on a Primary core world, like Corellia (-2), But if i BOUGHT it on Corellia, and went to someplace like Tatooine, if i found a buyer, I could sell it for up to 4 times its worth (Table 5-3).

Shouldn't the reverse be true?

I think Negotiation Skill talks about increases to sales values but I don't think it is quite that lucrative.

Using table 5-2 is ONLY for when engaged in trade. Good you buy for the SOLE PURPOSE of trading them.

A player does not get to sell there personal blaster at 4x the cost...

For typical players rarity is just used for scarcity of finding items.

When doing trade rarity can affect costs

I think the table was written with the assumption that players wouldn't abuse the system and buy stuff for the base cost on one planet and then go to a planet with a positive rarity increase to sell for a quick profit.

Thus they only wrote rarity as effective the probability of finding the item and not the effect on price.

Yeah, Table 5-3 is for trading, not just buying and pawning your personal poop. Selling your personal kit follows normal sale rules.

As a side note this is why Black Market contacts is actually functional. If you have the skill rolls to back it up you can turn a bigger profit on trading black market goods then you can moving legal goods due to the rarity modfiers.

Quick note - I am a trader so that table is my life!

Here is an example from my last game of how we use trading and the chart

We apprehended a smuggler and part of the "loot" was 4,000 credits worth of legal trade goods rarity 3 core world (MSRP - this is important)

What that means is on the street a seller could make 4k on a core world for this gear. We don't get to sell at those rates obviously we are more like distributors selling to shop keeps who need to make money, but how much of a deal can you get selling, is the fun part!!

I wanted to turn it quickly as our next mission was moving some heavy cargo that was going to take up our ships cargo space (think the gm planned that? yeah...I do!) so I didn't have time to wait till we got to a world where it was super rare so I sold it at the next station we came across.

It went like this in my group

Knowledge core world to find a good buyer (average check) I told my gm I was looking for someone desperate who needed goods to sell that would be more influenced by me, so we added a hard computers check as I piled through station data and I succeed getting 2 boosts on my negotiation I would be going into with this guy as I had researched his business thoroughly.

Bit of **** good role play later and a negotiation roll with 4 successes!! I was able to sell at 75% of the value base (highest you can get with 3 succeses) plus 3 ranks of wheel and deal for 30% bonus to my final price (we do wheel and deal AFTER the base percent)

So I sold that trade cargo for 3,300.

IF I had been able to sell it somewhere the rarity increased say outrim for 4x the value it would have been worth 15,600!!! But we are not playing Scrooge mc duck the rpg, so we don't just get to fly to the best planet and sell like that our gm and I are having fun. He does stuff like...going to the outerrim the checks to find and negotiate are much harder since you are out of your element. He also will give me the value in things other than credits that I then have to sell elsewhere (like a real trader) then I try and sell it thinking it's worth bank and roll a failure with a despair and find out its value is ONLY worth that much to that one culture and a few very rare collectors and not the open market.....OR!! the adventure getting there costs us more than it's worth when we take heavy asteroid damage and lose a weapon mount...cool stuff like that. I am finding you can make lots of money but gms have LOTS of money sinks. Wait till your wookie with a big honking superior repeating blaster coverED in attachments and mods breaks his toy....those things are not cheap!!

Lots of fun to be had as a trader.

Seems to me looking at the rules, that rarity only comes into play on how hard it is to find the item. Has nothing to do with cost unless your are trying to sell it.

Using table 5-2, If I was on the outer rim, lets say Tatooine (R+2) a heavy blaster rifle (R6) would cost the same compared to if I was buying it on a Primary core world, like Corellia (-2), But if i BOUGHT it on Corellia, and went to someplace like Tatooine, if i found a buyer, I could sell it for up to 4 times its worth (Table 5-3).

Shouldn't the reverse be true?

Anyways it really hasn't been an issue yet especially considering page 150 says they're already selling for 1/4 so unless they're buying core then flying to an uncivilized world to sell or something of equal +4 rarity they're not going to make much without nailing some good negotiation checks do to things like docking fee's, fuel and food restocking for such a long trip, any potential taxes by imperials along the way, etc. It could be exploited I'm sure but it would take a lot of time and effort to do so and my players have been good enough not to do that making only small profit between missions to places they where headed anyways giving them some more smuggling experience for contraband.

After all this is not only easily mitigated by the already low quarter resale price in place and things like docking, fuel and possible local taxes but also by the simple fact that if your selling anything in bulk you're most likely selling to a merchant who is going to, typically, be a good negotiator making any negotiate checks against him a bit difficult and he'll likely be better if he has earned enough money to buy something of significant value, after all no business man becomes successful let alone long lasting if he pays top dollar for his goods.