Trading - Brainstorming Changes

[Athenian]

Trading.

The game needs it. The game needs a lot of it.

Trading generates profits. Profits generate pretty much everything else on the server - the first step usually being a bigger trade ships, and then it's bounties, more characters, bigger ships, armour for your cruiser.

It all relies on buy low, sell high.

There's only one problem. Trading is roundly dismissed by many experienced players as "boring", "a grind" or even "tedious enough to make me want to stick forks in my eyes just to alleviate the boredom".

So the question is - how can we make trading more enjoyable?

Now, I should point out that this thread is not about how to play Disco in windowed mode so you can <strike>indulge your taste in animal porn</strike> watch films while your ship chugs along. Nor is it about boosting the profits for every commodity so that a run from Station a to Station b yields 500 million in ten minutes.

I'm talking about how the game could be altered in such a way as to actually make the buying and selling of commodities something that people would choose to do when they logged on.

One other thing - could trading be changed in such a way as to make it as attractive an option to fly a 600 cargo freighter as a 5000 cargo advanced train? These smaller trade ships need more love. Could we change the mod so as to make these ships not just be a convenient intermediate purchase on your way to a super freighter?

Imagine you could alter the mod significantly to achieve your suggestion. Now think hard, and respond please.

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Former member of "the most paranoid group of people in the community"
Discovery Community Forum Rules

[Tenacity]

make mining more profitable.

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[n00bl3t]

Stop whinging about power-traders.

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Anything I say is not intended as offensive, and to try and deliberately misinterpret it as such would be an attempt at trolling via misrepresentation.

It's not a conspiracy, it's localised bias. They're not intelligent enough to form a conspiracy.

[Athenian]

Excellent and well-developed answers so far!

make mining more profitable.

Trading! Trading! Not mining! Trading! Do people actually enjoy shooting rocks?

Stop whinging about power-traders.

But is power-trading even that enjoyable as say hopping in your other ships? Could it ever be anything more than a means to an end?

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Former member of "the most paranoid group of people in the community"
Discovery Community Forum Rules

[Galacius]

Id say try smuggling. It is either want to stab yourself boring or just praying they wont catch you.

Otherwise I cant think of much that you could do to fix it, its this games grind. A select few will love it but the general populace will hate it since it (if no one is hunting you) has very little rp little combat and is generally the same route so you know everything about it and cant be suprised. I dont see how it can be improved unless you try smuggling but its not to much different.

[Quorg]

Meh. Beats me why so many people loathe trading.

Most of my time on the server is spent on a single back-and-forth route, and it's been great. As for making it as desirable to fly a 600-cargo freighter as it is to fly an advanced train, it would be interesting to hear how you propose to do that without stepping on people's toes.

Adding more trade routes- great! Just don't nerf the existing ones.

And trading only presents itself with "very little RP" potential if you choose to avoid it. I have more RP interactions per hour on my trader than on most of my other characters.

Same for combat- learning to fight back in a trade vessel is not only challenging, but can even be successful on occasion.

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ATTENTION SMUGGLERS
The Midnight Express: A Slaver <strike>who doesn't completely realize what he's doing.</strike> (video)

Quorg, you're officially a moron.

...mongs like Quorg being like a malignant little cancer...

Way to be useless, Quorg.

[Kadaeux]

I'd say, though I doubt it could be implemented, a flexible economy, if somewhere isn't receiving the ship panels it needs it should be offering higher prices for them.

Whereas if an area is getting TOO MUCH of something the price should plummet, not saying it should happen but with the number of Slaves being shipped to Malta the price should be damned pitiful by now.

In short, the prices should fluxuate, not stay fixed. As the poster above me makes it clear, most traders find a run, and unless its infested with pirates that day, they stick with it under any circumstances. They take a back and forth route of most profit to least time taken.

I mean once a solid route is scoped out the Pirates don't even really have to work to get their prey anymore.

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In the darkening lights of Sirius space even the dead need a voice, even the dead need respect. And more importantly, the dead need to be taken home: Undertaker, Steward of the ++Tombship++

'Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels, it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it. '

&quot;In a society that has abolished all adventure, the only adventure left is to abolish that society.&quot;

[Quorg]

I'd say, though I doubt it could be implemented, a flexible economy, if somewhere isn't receiving the ship panels it needs it should be offering higher prices for them.

Whereas if an area is getting TOO MUCH of something the price should plummet, not saying it should happen but with the number of Slaves being shipped to Malta the price should be damned pitiful by now.

That's the best way to kill trading. Make it impossible to get used to a route before it gets eliminated.
Not that slaves die or anything.

Heck, I get intercepted on a daily basis. It's part of what adds excitement to a trade route. Perhaps people get bored of trading because they work so hard to avoid running into people out of fear of piracy.

Besides, the special trade events are a great way to introduce variety and time-sensitivity to trading.

People just choose not to use it for some reason.

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ATTENTION SMUGGLERS
The Midnight Express: A Slaver <strike>who doesn't completely realize what he's doing.</strike> (video)

Quorg, you're officially a moron.

...mongs like Quorg being like a malignant little cancer...

Way to be useless, Quorg.

[Belco]

prettier ships!
i never get bored transporting passengers in my luxury yacht, i just keep circling round in turret view admiring how damn good it looks!:P

but in all seriousness, this is a really important question.

pretty much all traders are power trading (i'll admit i am, though i do try RP to keep myself entertained) and as such, we look stupid compared to the NPC's in their 2 transport 4 fighter escort convoys.

If i could change something dramatically without worrying about the complexities of the game engine and lag, i'd make it so you could buy NPC wingmen from your faction to protect you, buy another transport to follow you around, and collect the profits from it's cargo as well as your own, it'd be like doubling your cargo space, except it hangs some 200m off the end of your ship is is very likely to be destroyed halfway through your run.
screw spending 200mil on a battleship buy a whole convoy!

I'd wander around sirius having conversations with myself and be entertained for hours and hours.

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Ingame: Luxury Liner PGL-Winfield | Sal_Paradise | Victor.Fane

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[Exsiled_one]

I don't think it's fair that you make the forum post like this.

The topic name itself, and previous numerous topic names, daily topic names suggest that something is crap and boring.
not everyone agrees. I see it as necessary evil. And if you add a touch of rp into it, I see it as fun.
So, sorry, I think trading isn't boring. I can see how could it boring, and I have few ideas on how to fix it. Stealing your topic for second, but cmon... you can't be opening topics like this. after you say a untrue thing 10 000 times, it starts to sound like truth to people.

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<span style="color:#33CC00">I AM GIVING AWAY MONEY TO CREATIVE MINDS*</span>