Similar things like this have already been requested, but they weren't exactly the same, nad there are probably threads or better places to post this, but I couldnt find them so...
Thoughts about the trade system:
1: No priviliged trade routes
A big problem that keeps re-occuring is that everyone always flocks to what gives most credits per minute.
Have you considered aiming for a standard amount of creds per min that a trader should be making, and adjust the prices for certain trade routes that you want peopel to take to be exactly that amount, none will be muc more lucrative than the other.
That way, you would decide what are good logical RP routes to take, give all those routes that profit, and make all the other routes noticable less good.
Then heopefully, traders will chose their route for RP reasons and safety, and not everyone will flock to what ever is the current hype (be it silver in Penn, slaves to Malta, or the old diamond run form Berlin).
2: semi-dynamic exonomy.
Make it very simple. Dotn think too much about supply and consumption and so on, just make every delivery reduce the buy price of a commodity at a location by a small amount. By a SMALL amount, that only really affects the profit harshly if that route is really being abused.
Then, reset the prices on every server restart to their innitial value. Hopefully this will keep it simple enough to not eat up too much server resources.
Would be nexessary to have the trade routes listed in the commodity prices (the list of stations thte trader has been to) also show the current price dynamically. Would make the trader less annoyed, but not absolutely necessary.
3: more RP cargo
For example:
Liberty Ale
Gallic Cheese
Kusari Sushi
Rheinland LWB potatos, apfelstrudl, and sauerkraut
Bretonian big ben souvenir trinkets
And make luxury foods non perishable so they can be used as RP cargo on luxury liners.
The problem with having every single route give the same amount of cash, is that people will begin to find the shortest route, and use that one only. Why would someone spend more time earning the same amount of cash they could in a shorter route?
I think the trade incomes are rather balanced. Sure, there are some routes that are over-profitable and "famous", but if you take a close look at the income values, you'll notice that by only losing 1-2% of profit/distance you get a whole lot more of options that allow for easy and more diverse RP routes. Powertrading along the good old routes all day usually bores every trader after a while.
Additionally: Pirates aren't stupid and usually have a good nose to pick up the routes that are popular and you get robbed/taxed every ten minutes on the famous routes, so if an alternative gives 3% less profit/distance, but saves you one or two pirate holdups, you again have an economic surplus (considering taxes are usually in the multiple mil range, plus the vast time loss). Same goes for the smuggling routes: They are way more profitable, but usually the profit is tied directly to the "danger" level. And often the danger outweighs the profit, by you having to abandon cargo, being taxed by pirates or simply being persecuted and blown to pieces for committing crimes.
Of course, not every trader thinks that far;).
I don't think special RP cargo is necessary per se. It would perhaps be funny to have special "smuggling" goods between conflicting or blockaded factions, but anything more isn't really needed. Theoretically, all the suggested cargo types are already covered..."Consumer goods", "Food Rations" etc. are fitting generic goods. And if you want to add RP flavor to them, you are completely free to declare them as what you wish them to be. Game mechanics might not reward it, but it's a good base for RP. Boy, were those Farmers' Alliance guys pissed when they found out that the food rations I delivered in Kusari originated from Bretonia and were meant for high ranked officials who liked some English breakfast...
' Wrote:The problem with having every single route give the same amount of cash, is that people will begin to find the shortest route, and use that one only. Why would someone spend more time earning the same amount of cash they could in a shorter route?
Obviously shorter routes would make less money, and longer routes would make more money.
The economy was changed so that lultraders cant get a bs in 2 days.
Therefore Disco went downhill for us nocapspamminglulwuts because
We have to trade for 2-3 hours just to keep all our bazillion fighters/bombers in check for a few days.
Thus making trading ghey.
if A trader wants to grind for a BS, He will grind untill he has the Bs.
if You change the economy or not they will still grind for teh stuffs.
And yus +1 fur RP items.
[22:50:33] ☆ҳ̸̲Ҳ̸ҳEternalâ Nightmareҳ̸̲Ҳ̸ҳ☆(illi): i cyber with leather torps (smoking)
No Cosmos, the economy doesn't suck. It's actually fairly decent all things considered.
Instead of b*tching about things, try it sometime. It took me 30 hours starting from a starter rhino, closed economy (that's not taking money from other characters for those that don't know) to a 5k, with UAU8, and an excess of 200m credits. After 40hrs of trading, I could probably have had over 500m credits. And that's not taking the MOST profitable, or SHORTEST routes, but decent inRP routes for the company I chose (DSE).
The economy is fine as is. What I'm most concerned with is that market prices don't hold over from session to session, and now you have to land on each individual base within that session to update prices. When 4.86 comes out, we're all either going to be FLCompanioning a LOT or we're going to be having a REALLY tough time.
A big problem that keeps re-occuring is that everyone always flocks to what gives most credits per minute.
Have you considered aiming for a standard amount of creds per min that a trader should be making, and adjust the prices for certain trade routes that you want peopel to take to be exactly that amount, none will be muc more lucrative than the other.
That way, you would decide what are good logical RP routes to take, give all those routes that profit, and make all the other routes noticable less good.
Then heopefully, traders will chose their route for RP reasons and safety, and not everyone will flock to what ever is the current hype (be it silver in Penn, slaves to Malta, or the old diamond run form Berlin).
Problem is. People will not always take the RP route,they will take the safest route to avoid pirates/police.
Quote:I think the trade incomes are rather balanced. Sure, there are some routes that are over-profitable and "famous", but if you take a close look at the income values, you'll notice that by only losing 1-2% of profit/distance you get a whole lot more of options that allow for easy and more diverse RP routes. Powertrading along the good old routes all day usually bores every trader after a while.
True that it is a lot better now than it used to be when the penn silver field was the ultimate moneymaker or when everyone was diong the Berlin diamond run or mining nimo in o49.
I think the new trade system was already heading the way I asked for, but sometimes I had the impression that there were still some ultra-secret super-routes that led through some remote systems. Oh well.
About the semi-dynamic economy, doing it the simplidied way which I described would of course make trade more profitabel after the server reset, and less profitable after it. You could of course add everything subtratced from one commodity price onto the other prices, but I think taht would take a lot of system resources. Was jsut an alternative to emulating consumption and demand in a very simplified way.
Quote:I don't think special RP cargo is necessary per se. It would perhaps be funny to have special "smuggling" goods between conflicting or blockaded factions, but anything more isn't really needed. Theoretically, all the suggested cargo types are already covered..."Consumer goods", "Food Rations" etc. are fitting generic goods. And if you want to add RP flavor to them, you are completely free to declare them as what you wish them to be. Game mechanics might not reward it, but it's a good base for RP. Boy, were those Farmers' Alliance guys pissed when they found out that the food rations I delivered in Kusari originated from Bretonia and were meant for high ranked officials who liked some English breakfast...
I used to do the same, for exampls calling the luxury food bough on teh ocean planet Junio sushi. Its kinda like splitting the human cargo into VIP, tourists, vacationers and so on. Or splitting luxury goods into tobacco, wine, and so on. What adding more commodities would do would allow you for example to ship one type of luxury good from A to B and another lucury good from B to A, while keeping a common type of RP trading. I think that is also why passengers were split into groups, because its impossible to make profits in both directions if there is only one passenger type. You would have to make an OORP shipment in one direction (for example passengers in a freighter or minerals in a liner).
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