I'm on team "You silly." for this one, except for the suggestion that you can steal infinite times but restricted by the weight\value limit so you don't feel pressured to only steal at the end of your stay in the area.
HOWEVER, for thyne amusement, a 5 level difference in gear vendors offers makes you get some funky values.
(Common) Full Plate Armour from lvl.10 to lvl.15 is a phys armour value difference of 184 (72 vs 256), meaning that your purchased gear could be almost four times better than contemporary equipment. Five levels down however, the armour only grants 23 physical armour. That's three times lower than contemporary gear.
But armour is pending rebalancing, right? But let's assume the weapons work as intended. Let's say you saved up your pennies and got a legendary weapon. (Divine) Dwarven Broadsword:
lvl.5: 11-12 dmg (0 rune slots)
lvl.10: 21-24 dmg (2 rune slots)
lvl.15: 50-55 dmg (2 rune slots)
All of these can spawn with strength, cleave, and life steal; the lvl.15 version having 2 strength instead of 1. Now, for every AMULET you have with a venom rune in it you can get up to 16% extra accuracy per slot. You know, to off-set the -50% to-hit you get from the lvl.15 sword. OR you could just put 10 points in single-handed and become the world's greatest duelist at a whopping 0% penalty to your hit chance without rune supplements. Not that it greatly matters because those 8+8% accuracy points you get from two large venom runes will already offset you by a whole three levels, so you can even put 3 points in warfare.
Wouldn't live be wonderful with gear 5 levels higher than your intended? I can't wait to go from 68-112 ma\pa to 243-396, with +2 skill and attribute modifiers across the board.
AH, FUN WITH MATHEMATICS!
