Trader tokens

[myhv]

Seriously, you need to balance the demand for them. You need trader tokens for pretty much every influence item, often asking for 3 at a time, an they are pretty aids to get. You almost never see traders outside of town, so the only reliable way to get them is to go on assassination missions in to a hostile settlement. My inventory is overflowing with guard and gatherer tokens (thankfully you can at least mass dump the latter ones in to cataclysm scrolls) yet I'm constantly looking for merchants to slaughter.

[cassiels]

No need to slaughter. Go to a friendly village, put a sparkler trap behind the trader, he drops his stuff. And the others do not mind. Those are the easiest tokens.

[myhv]

Even with that method it's much slower (and expensive) to get trader tokens over either of the remaining three. And at the same time trader tokens remain in high demand for the actually useful influence scrolls. Unlike, for example, raider tokens, that are just thrown out, as you can get unlimited amount of them simply by clearing out any of the capitals, and waiting for endless raids that the original owners will launch. Without suffering losses at any other outpost, I must say, that also needs a look at.

[SgtSausagepants]

You can also drop a trap on the path as a Trader runs by to the tradepost. Trader NPCs will run up to it to deliver. Stand far enough away to avoid aggro and then go grab stuff after they are gone.

Or just pick a path between two friendly factions, wait for traders to come by.