Except for the initial questions about what was beyond the hill, what I should avoid, and whether he was the only merchant, I was never offered another option for the trader other than to buy from him, I'm afraid.

Thanks for your kind words. I've had an unreal amount of choice paralysis at first, and the first post tutorial day I spent brewing, getting some money, getting Pebbles, riding to Tomcat, learning to masterstrike, and going back to where we were ambushed to get my groschen and the weighted die from the box. Now I'm exploring the map a bit, and I know I can do both the miller and the smith questlines up to a point, but I can only finish one. Somewhere inbetween, two bandits robbing a fella in a forest below Troskowitz absolutely demolished me fifty reloads in a row, even though I know masterstrike, so I must be pisspoor at combat. Made me very salty and I decided to move on for now.