(06-14-2013, 05:31 PM)Soul Reaper Wrote: You're not looking it at for a comparison scale.
Samura might be incredibly huge and encompass most of the kusarian economy, but that does not mean in the slightest that it could go on par with the other houses, why? Because for Liberty, you have USI, DSE, Ageira, IC. Bretonia has their gigantic Bowex as well as BMM, Gateway and let's not forget Planetform. Then in Rheinland there's DHC, Republican and Kruger. Samura might be larger than one in any house, but not a whole house's.
Each faction has it's own thing, either resource gathering, technology and/or shipping (shipping being the real source of income) and are somewhat evenly distributed within that House's respective economy.
Economy is -not- a one sided thing, it doesn't work one way and if people think it does then they should read up on some general economy. While the other houses have more or so open trade (other than their war fronts) and with multiple groups, Kusari is one sided and as you've said yourself, is mostly Samura. Samura alone cannot compete with the rest, not even close.
And as I said, economy isn't a one sided thing, when you practically have no foreign imports, the economy -will- crumble because the other houses are doing free-trade, while one isn't.
Kusari seems to be ok at the moment because of forced trade with Gallia which brings them quite a bit of resources and income because Gallia is easily self-sufficient. But going back to old-kusari pretty much screws that over.
So yes, Kusarian economy is strong as a single entity because it's a house. When compared with the others Houses however, it has severe disadvantages that would put them on the lowest of the scales, because the rest (especially Liberty) are much more powerful in that aspect.
Liberty is the only house that is economically more powerful then Kusari and thats due to the dom kavosh technology bunker too, giving Liberty monopolys on gates and all that stuff.
And samura is not just one thing mind you, you are looking at it wrong as Samura / Kishiro do everything. (this isnt to make a powerplay but actually lore again) It has resources gathering (gas, ore, aliens, transportation, ship building, terraforming, technology development, just about every economic sector. etc etc) Kishiro does as well just differently.
This is from the simplistic Samura Rep chart
Quote:Samura Industries is one of the great Kusari keiretsu -- sprawling, vertically integrated companies that control whole industries.
When you look at it
Liberty:
USI: Shipping
DSE: Construction (to simplify it) and mechanical research)
Ageira: Jump gate construction / Parts and general FTL research
IC: (IC isnt even liberty anymore but w/e) Insurance
Bretonia:
Bowex: Shipping Conglomorate
Gateway: Similar to above just smaller scale and tends to focus on niche area's. but succesfully I might add
BMM: Mining, Manufacturing, kinda self explanatory
Planetform: Terraforming and technologies related to that
Rheinland:
DHC: Mining, Manufacturing.
Republican: Transporation
Kruger: Mining.
ALG: industrial clean up (kinda unique in that regards)
I could add gallia but it would just be the same. Samura and Kishiro are unique in what they do (everything) They try to make themselves self suffecient in every area they can exploit themselves into. This even includes insurance. As Samura has its own insurance brand as well, granted it is mostly used to insure corporation assets.
Note: I did ask a bigger Kusari buff then me to take a look at this and correct me if I am wrong but I believe this is accurate
Actually from what I've seen, while all the factions do concentrate on one particular lane of expertise, they also do a bit of other things on the side, I mainly say this from observing the factions both ingame and on forums. And yes Samura is unique in the way that it does everything at a close scale, as in, their ship construction level is on par with their shipping and other things. That's probably the only reason Kusari is able to survive. However this also gives a disadvantage as they don't center on a single industry and can't grow as large in that lane.
That is why the other houses have stronger economies, because there are multiple groups doing different things. Their objectives do overlap sometimes, but rarely and not at a high standard.
To put it in picture, let's say Samura has 50 points in ship building, resource gathering, technology creation, shipping.
DSE would have 80 points in ship building, resource gathering but only 10 in shipping technology creation, while Ageira would have 80 in technology creation, 20 in shipping and 10 in ship building and resource gathering.
And USI being good and shipping and so forth. See what I'm getting at? Samura has a higher average of doing everything, but the other factions are more focused on one particular industry, and then combined with the others in that specific house, they make the economical power of that house, which should be quite a bit higher than a isolated Kusari.
Oh and just to clarify a few things:
DSE is not only construction but resource gathering as well, in fact they're one of the best. And while Ageira might be known as the creators of FTL tech, they're also a general technology group and do not only focus on FTL technology. And IC is not only insurance but also plays kinda like the Sirius bank, and right now has a very strong presence in the "shipping" industry.
Bowex and Gateway differ in the way that Bowex focuses on general shipping while Gateway is more focused on shipping of raw resources (hence their friendliness and business relationship with IMG or even BMM)
