As I understand it, recommended practice to add items to an NPC merchant or to Creeper for them to sell is to add a container somewhere near them that they own instead of adding it directly to their inventory. When you barter with them, the items in it will be available in their inventory. And that it is 'better' to add a new container so as to minimize the likelihood that another mod would overwrite or have a conflict. Is that correct?

When you barter with them, is there a limitation to the number or weight of items sold? For example, do the items sold to the NPC get put into the container instead of added to the NPC's inventory? I'm wondering if I would have to worry about items sold to an NPC get put into the container I added and potentially exceeding its capacity or if the items sold to an NPC merchant get put into a general list of what the storekeeper has and the physical capacity is irrelavant.

What about gold? I'd like to increase the gold that Creeper has. Currently I load a mod that increases the gold Creeper has for buying goods, but it seems like it might be better to use the container if that reduces the likelihood of a conflict with another mod.

If I put x amount of gold into an 'owned' container, will it be added to the gold that the NPC/Creeper has available for trading or will it be treated as just another item in what the NPC has for sale? For example, I'd want an NPC to have say 10,000 gold instead of 700 for buying stuff. Instead of changing the amount in the AI screen in the CS, could I just place the gold inside their 'owned' container I'd be putting in there and they would have that gold for buying stuff from the player?