I hear ya, shady lying over-greedy dealers suck. They're somewhat self-regulating though: once word gets out that they're dishonest, their clientele moves on to someone with a better reputation. And once you find an honest dealer, you tend to stop looking for others except as emergency backups.

I've had the same dealer for 17ish years now. I don't actually buy from him anymore, as I supply myself. I do let him get some of my excess though, which is always a 'name brand' strain. Of course, I'm taking the word of the seedbanks that when I order a strain, that's actually what I end up getting. And my dealer friend is taking my word that when I hand him a QP or whatever of a specific strain, that it actually IS that strain. But we've known each other long enough that there is trust between us.

He does charge what the market will bear (to an extent anyway), but I don't blame him for that, and his customers are always very happy when I've dumped a load on him, because high quality stuff, named or not, is just super rare around here, and rarity adds to the price. Most of his customers buy his mids, then every couple months they get the opportunity to have a very high quality named treat, thanks to me. That high quality stuff is so rare around here that even when I drop him off a QP, he won't LET anyone buy more than a quarter ounce, maybe a half ounce tops, even if they throw piles of money at him, because then fewer people would be able to smoke the good stuff, and his customers are pretty much all friends too. He's the best, coolest, most honest dealer I've ever known, which is why his customers have remained his customers for decades. I let him get whatever I have excess of, for $200/ounce (no quantity discounts). He could sell it for more than $400/ounce, but because I'm nice with my price, he's nice to his customers too, and doesn't try to gouge too hard. So everyone is happy, me, him, and his customers.

That's really the ticket: find a good, honest dealer and latch onto him forever.