Ore Changes, the problems with it.

[Hokan]

- Disclaimer -

The post is intended to be criticism of the recent ore changes that have come into effect, it is not attempting to revert the system but instead point out that while this new system seeks to 'solve' issues of the old one. It primary throws out any good elements it had, in favour of its own preference which in turn also brings a number of its own problems.

In short, the new system seems to have been enacted on the belief it would be better, and did not consider that it could be worse. And here are some points towards that argument.

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- Community Canvassing -

As far as I was able to ascertain, there was no thread to try and discover the problems with the current ore system. There was no canvassing, at least publicly, whether or not the community wanted changes so extreme. The changes were not polled, they were forced on the community with little regard for the community playing on an RP server. And there has been an unfortunate understanding from this change that, “We know what’s best, you do not.” Which is a red-flag incident that ought to have immediate reconsideration.

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- RP Ignored -

It should not really need to be stated, but this is an RP server. And changes to the economy, at the very minimum, should consider RP when they are made. However it has been specifically stated the ore change intentionally ignored RP, because of balance difficulties.

We then need to address why ore specifically, is important to the RP situation.
Currently due to the economic balance, ore is the most valuable commodity to trade in the game. Traders acting as traders do, will gravitate towards the most profitable commodities to trade because they are interested in profit. This makes Ore the prime good to have in your cargo hold if you are a trader. I would also point out that smugglers are just illegal traders.

With that in mind, traders fulfill a role in the community as the ambient civilian activity in game. Or in the case of smugglers, fill the trade related unlawful activity. The current system, as mentioned before, removes entirely some of the import markets in the game and does not consider them a factor at all on the economy in favour of railroading trade routes. This has essentially removed the profit incentive for traders to be the suppliers for a number of factions. Essentially removing a sect of RP from the RP server.

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- Piracy, and Cargo Piracy -

The current change aimed to encourage piracy by putting the sell-points mostly in the centre of Houses, thereby directing the flow. Arguably the change is negligible as it ignored the main interest for traders is profit, which made them predictable for attempts of piracy. Routes from before were predictable even if there were many because of highest sell-point being a target for traders. Pirating was not difficult prior to the rework, if you knew where the highest payout sell-point was, you could intercept. Or as some pirates did, they loitered near the sources. This possible piracy hasn’t changed.

However there are deeper problems with piracy, which is beyond the scope of the ore change. But to acknowledge some of it here:

Firstly, unlawfuls are typically outnumbered, and out classed by ship size, by lawfuls. Especially in Liberty. Unlawfuls then typically have increased risk, and decreased cargo hold sizes. While sellpoints for ores are worse for Unlawfuls in sell-price. While you’re able to make a lawful trader and make more money without such a large risk, there is little need for cargo piracy as a money making endeavor. And since it does make money, it's not commonly done. This change does absolutely nothing to address this problem with cargo piracy.

Secondly, you get a lot of hate being a pirate. In my signature you will see an example of one such encounter where someone was so annoyed that I made the attempt to pirate them, I even failed as he docked, that he eventually said to me that I do not exist in RP. And considered that the pirating attempt never happened. This begs the question, why the hate? - The problem here is obvious. It's because players trade to make money, not trade because they enjoy it, although this is not a universal truth. Most trade is done as a way to accumulate wealth that can then be used on things they enjoy elsewhere in the game.

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- Short Routes and Trade Railroading -

Due to the removal of short routes, trading has been put on rails. As strange as it is, the activity of trading has been made even more boring, more mundane than it was because of these changes.
Without the flexibility of many sell points you’re forced to take X to Y, you’re forced to take a specific route, because flexibility and RP reasons for ores to be sold at particular locations are disregarded in favour of railroading which in turn causes blandness. Traders and Smugglers ought to primarily be encouraged more to do their activities, as they also encourage piracy and the police activities as a consequence. But the current change has made an already boring element of the game even more boring.

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- Closing -

While I understand that @jammi , @Karst and @Karlotta have put considerable effort into cleaning up the ore sell points. I believe the changes may have been rushed and zealous in their removal of elements of the old system. I do not wish to claim the old system is perfect, but the current system is not either and in the true fashion of a centrist, the closest to a perfect system is likely to be found in the marriage of the two systems.

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[Lemon]

What's with these generic "this is wrong" statements

Seriously, say which specific ore route has an issue and address it by proposing a specific solution, nobody's reverting to the old ones
Same with RP issues, we should discuss specific routes and way of balancing/improving them and tweaking the new system the guys are already tweaking on the go.

Not just say "this is wrong return the old thing"

Secondly, you get a lot of hate being a pirate. In my signature you will see an example of one such encounter where someone was so annoyed that I made the attempt to pirate them, I even failed as he docked, that he eventually said to me that I do not exist in RP. And considered that the pirating attempt never happened. This begs the question, why the hate? - The problem here is obvious. It's because players trade to make money, not trade because they enjoy it, although this is not a universal truth. Most trade is done as a way to accumulate wealth that can then be used on things they enjoy elsewhere in the game.

Well missions helped, you can make good money doing tose
And how do you pirate? Do you crack jokes, give good RP, get creative
let people that give it back go for a lot less or free ?

I pirate people to get good RP, not make money, and there are a lot of them that appreciate it believe it or not

P.S. I also miss a stable route for indies with PoBs stocked that leads through waypoints all the way
There is one in scrap/salvage + molybdenum but it leads through bugged gates - it'd be nice if they got fixed
And/Or there'd be more reliable cool PoBs like Bristol and now Salt Lake with committed guys filling them on other routes
I really miss the Bristol = >new london => Isle of skye/pobs next to NL/gold PoB=>bristol route, it'd be nice if there was one like that for beginners and AFK waypoint traders to take

[LuckyOne]

Honestly i agree on most of your points, especially the last one about short routes and railroading trades. It all feels very artificial now, while the last system felt somewhat organic.

However I don't think a revert is needed. Maybe adjust some sellpoints so they make more inRP sense (for example instead of just one station in the destination system you could have several buying).

Even the problem of "short routes" should resolve itself through POB owners realizing this is a great profit opportunity. For example if you have a POB halfway to the sellpoint you could start buying / reselling, allowing both you and your customers to make "faster" trades (for a reduced profit). That way you could still have secondary (tertiary etc.) sellpoints, they would just be player-driven instead of official.

However, the lack of "circular" routes is a bit annoying. Before you could maximize profit by going ore/ore or just ore/short common trade/ ore, but now you have to do long ore / long common commodity routes.

[Hokan]

Both the disclaimer and the closing points express my opinion that the system should not be reverted.

To revert it would just be throwing out this system without incorporating what elements could be beneficial, which would not help reconcile the two 'sides' so to speak.

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[Karst]

I'll try to write a somewhat productive response here, although I must dismiss some of the assertions or their conclusions out of hand.
Particularly, roleplay concerns. Roleplay concerns can be worked with if and only if it fits into the balance. If it does not, roleplay isn't considered.
The fact that it's a roleplay server is primarily aimed at player interaction. Economic balance must always primarily consider, well....balance.

This is also why we cannot realistically base mining development on player opinions and community sentiment. If we did, everybody would present some justification for how their bases should buy ores, and how this and that route to other factions should be viable, and we would end up with exactly what we were trying to get rid of: Everything goes from everywhere to everyone.

This isn't necessarily a design philosophy that everyone will agree with, but for what it's worth I have for pretty much every critique of the streamlined system received a compliment for how we were finally doing something to concentrate activity.

In regards to piracy, not really sure what to say here as the poor attitudes many traders have towards pirates can't really be fixed with mining balance. The fences have been improved, from previously 70% of the main price to 80. That's a substantial boost to unlawfuls wishing to trade in particular, but also pirates looking to sell loot. Of course one will always make more money powertrading than pirating, but that's always been the case and always will be.

As for the last point, I'm afraid there will again be fundamental disagreement.
This isn't a singleplayer game where the maximum diversity of experience should be encouraged, nor a massively multiplayer game so populous that diversity can be encouraged much. Though the server has revived spectacularly from its darkest days, we're still running 50-100 people roughly, which isn't anywhere near enough to populate the environment with truly diverse routes. People inclined to take unusual routes can, as they always could, trade regular commodities - contrary to popular belief, your ship won't get instantly deleted if you ever load anything other than ore into it.

All that having been said, we might consider a public discord channel like the ID rework one for people to contribute to and discuss further mining changes, although given how controversial the topic is, I don't know how productive that would end up being.

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[Mick]

I didn't see much of the old system as i started while it was being changed!

But i will say that i like it the way it is! I rather enjoy just going from place to place trading - As long as a profit is made i am happy!

Ore in itself while being deliciously high in profit my main issue with finding ORE is finding the bases that are stocked but thats just part of the Game the searching, learning and discovering your own trade routes!

I personally am quite content with the transporting and mining of the game and feel nothing needs to be changed!

I think this will always be a six on one and halfa dozen on the other discussion - It is one of those features that the Players just need to trust in the Devs, GM's and Team that have worked hard to bring this together!

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[Sniper]

I had a look at the ore sell points for Gold Ore. They can only now be sold in Rhienland and Kusari.
Is that correct? No more deliveries to Liberty? Or Galia? Or Omicrons?

[Groshyr]

Gallic gold ore route was removed like half of year ago.

[Hokan]

If I remember correctly, one of the reasons that Gold Ore to Gallia and Malta where removed was because they were considered too vacant of players, that is to say the Taus highway. This is prior to quarantine levels of activity.

The current Ore Changes try to address this through railroading routes, however and alternative way to solve this issue can come from the utilization of systems as choke-points. Meaning both sides could get what they want. And inRP the Border-worlds can fulfill that role.

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[LaWey]

Honestly saying, this thing need more statistic.
My problem not with execution, neither with old system vs new.
My problem with wrong approach on the eco problem analysis and ways of it solving. This rework just another ducttape fix.

I don't see that main powertraders routes were anyhow really changed, so i dont expect changes in piracy.
I don't believe that killing of unlawful trading and causing problem with cargo-piracy was needed at all.
I don't think you will achieve anything with streamlining logic behind this rework, especially on background of PVE system success.

Rework just drive away entire categories of people flying transports, left lawful powertrader's gameplay almost untouched. Any economy reworks for ages ignore PoBs, like they arent exist, while they integrated heavy in mining activity and economy.

Of course critical fails of current rework can be fixed, but just killing entire branches of trading for its "streamlining" on background of implementing proper mission rework...

illustration of what my problem with this rework

You have a bar which has vodka and beer. Then you drop beer from the first bar, and at the same time open the second bar with ale and cider right in front of first. And by doing this, you call it a great plan to increase strong alco sells. But in reality, we will have just same vodka alcoholics sitting in the first bar, party drinkers moving at the second bar, and beer-lovers seeking for a bar in other districts.

I do really sorry that i can't right now propose straight mining/trading eco programm, but seriously, those patchwork approach should be changed if you plan achieve anything.