My wife and I were playing last night trying to go for the skill point in Hidden Lake (which I understand now is bugged), but had enormous difficulty playing due to over-spawning bandits. There is 1 merchant in the area, and we would have maybe 30-60 seconds to talk to her and sell items before 4-5 new bandits spawned in the immediate area and killed the merchant. We kill the bandits, rez the merchant, and have another 30-60 seconds before another group spawns.
We were on Darkhaven server, not in overflow, but no events were active and the total number of players in the area at any given time was maybe 8, but never more than 2-3 players were around the merchant.