(]c[) Zoners Trading Consortium

[werner]

As a prospective member of the ([c]) I have to say I am also concerned by the attitude towards guard systems shown. I am a firm believer that one should get permission to enter any guard system that is not affilliated with your character, and even then its better to have a bloody good reason to go there.

[font=Palatino Linotype]Yes, we are aware of that (after the incident from last night - even more), and actually every member of our organization is obliged to establish the conctact with the proper faction with all respect to the rules he should be according to. Let us remember that this is only the initial contact, required for some frequency tuning of the IFF module - so it can be achieved both by contacting an NPC if noone is there, or asking a guard (if there) for the contact. So I think (based on the fact that we did it for 8 times without any significant incidents), it is feasible.

There are certain guard systems that can provide invaluable shortcuts to traders and smugglers, and whilst I have used them sometimes, I find it's always prudent to spend as little time as possible in such sytems, so no loitering, docking or code-hunting. In all cases its good to get permission from an associated player if one can be found.

If the reason you require neutrality with guard factions is to expedite trading then I suggest you begin earnest negotiations with the respective player factions and try to draw up some agreement with them regarding passage through these systems. I would also suggest any agreements be made public so as to avoid any confusion from any non-faction players.

[font=Palatino Linotype]In fact, establishing neutral relations with the guard factions has nothing common with the trade or weapon searching activities of ours. These activities we perform officially, compliant with Zoners profile. Neutralizing reputation of all the factions of Sirius serves two main purposes: filtering (filtering out young impatient pilots) and symbolic (full neutrality towards all the people in Sirius). I have covered this a bit more in detail in my previous responses.

As you are primarily a trading faction I'm sure such an arrangement could be made based on financial incentives, but I would also suggest that you draft a strict and enforceable code of conduct for your ([c]) members to ensure respect and proper behaviour when in such guard systems (and in others too!)

[font=Palatino Linotype]A very good point regarding the code. This is exactly what we are working out right now - we ammend the instruction for recruits, to describe the rules of proper behaviour while doing the initial training. In the nearest future we also plan to elaborate some separate document containing the codex of behaviour for our pilots also beyond the training stage.

Best regards,
dr Werner Mazursky
CEO, board member
Zoners Trading Consortium Ltd.