Cargo Piracy

[Croft]

I'm currently working on a set of PoB's to act as blackmarkets, buying and selling smuggled goods and pirated cargo. The details of it can be found in this thread.

The problem is we already have unlawful/quasi-lawful stations that buy ores and goods for roughly a quarter less than their lawful counterparts which at first glance would make my idea a bit pointless. However since these would be PoBs the goods wouldn't vanish back into the code when sold but remain allowing for a supply chain to form, the length and profit would vary upon the bases distance to a lawful sell point.

Thats where you come in. Since this would open up opportunities for both lawful and unlawful pilots I would like your opinion on what to do next:

Plan A: Copy the buy prices of the unlawful sell points within 1 jump of the PoBs.

• Pros - No difference in sell prices, much easier to do, offers choice of sell points.
  
• Cons - Quarter profit may not interest traders, no incentive to sell at PoBs, unsold stock may clog storage.

Plan B: Buy for lower than the unlawful sell points within 1 jump of the PoBs.

• Pros - Better prices for traders, higher chance of creating an outgoing supply chain.
  
• Cons - Less incentive to sell at PoBs, lower chance for an incoming supply chain.

Plan C: Don't bother, stick to smuggled goods until a request for a buy point is made.

• Pros - PoB idea can progress quicker, less work for me in the short term, offers RP in form of requests.
  
• Cons - May lower interest in PoB idea, possibly more work for me in the long run.

Plan D: Don't bother at all with cargo piracy even if a request is made.

• Pros - PoB idea can progress quicker, less work for me.
  
• Cons - May lower interest in PoB idea, no additional RP in the form of requests.

Other: Post your suggestion.

Sadly there is no perfect option here and I'm certain there are more pros and cons I've overlooked but the ones listed are what came to mind first. Feedback, suggestions and discussions are welcome (as long as its civil).

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Jimmy The Rat | Croft's Feedback | The Rat Pack

[Hannibal]

First of all..i wont consider using unlawful sell points due to low profit generated for other players or for yourself,ergo it may be a smart thing to consider to open your POB to all kind of peoples(different ID/IFF)
Here's a way of calculating i was planning to use on a similar project(aka a smuggler base) //replace only the cells of which does not contain colors//

Code:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sW3MTSmMKRiX0RwcBuenDH49XtmPzlEBYp89qbyq8q8/edit#gid=0

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People want to believe that God has a plan for them.
They don't wanna believe that anyone else does..

[Stoat]

Myself, I'd love to see this done. I've been a cargo pirate since, well, forever, and there's such a massive lack of places to sell your ill gotten goods. Ore has always been the biggest problem. Used to be you had to sell it to a junker. Now, at least, the junker bases close to the high sell points at least give you something for your stolen ore. But there needs to be a much more detailed network of sell points, and PoBs certainly give this option. Thumbs up from me, at least

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My Stories

[moebus]

Hi,
this is indeed a great idea you have.
My suggestion is something like plan B but the price would depend on a trade route used as a reference. Here is an example to understand.

Let's say we can buy commodity A for 100 credits/unit in Planet New-Berlin and sell it for 2100 credits/unit in Planet Manhattan. Let's say it takes 10 min to fly from Planet New-Berlin to Planet Manhattan. And suppose the POB is in a system between these planets. Then you can compute an added value for transporting the commodity from Planet New-Berlin to Planet Manhattan depending on time (see the picture below): the added value being 0 near Planet New-Berlin and 2000 near Planet Manhattan. Then you just have to add the New-Berlin price to obtain a market price all along the trade route between New-Berlin and Manhattan.



So some people would bring commodities to the POB and some others (maybe the people living in the base) would ship the commodities to the relevant places.
Note that to optimize the trade activity of the POB you would need to build it on a crossroads of several trade routes.

Note also, you can have a POB price different from the market price in order to make some more profits (after all the POB provide a service). And finally, you can of course specify which commodities are bought/sold on the POB.

Let me know if you are interested in this approach and need help to implement it.

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[Hannibal]

@moebus
1) Possible locations that crosses all the major/most used routes are Magellan/Cortez + Keppler/Galileo + Bering
2) Profits..i guess he could try and use my given example..of .. $5,000 per second from POB location to the sell point or modify it for each commodity sold on his POB
3) Why not set up a route for daily consumables to be brought back to your POB by the trader at a profit of ..let's say atleast $9,000/second so that it could self maintain ..sort of speak
PS: Excluding liberty from your 3 base projects is a bit..no scratch that..a lot silly since it's a major activity hub,one that you should consider it as a first option,atleast until you'll get more support[players] so that you can maintain 3 bases because doing it alone..will fail to quickly

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People want to believe that God has a plan for them.
They don't wanna believe that anyone else does..

[Pel]

The thing about cargo piracy is that you get something for nothing (except time), so Plan B might work as long as the POB location was convenient to a piracy location (or several). Also, the pirate often can't dock at any of the most profitable trading locations, so cargo piracy becomes the best option.

The thing about traders buying goods from a POB is that ores will always give you the most bang for your buck-- unless you have a steady supply of some specific commodity (from cargo piracy-- meaning the NPCs consistently drop this commodity) like Crew in Sigma-13 with a very short hop to Atka Research station. This means the profit per second will offset the lower value of the commodity itself. And you will be providing a concentrated amount of it for a lower price.

In addition, if the base gets clogged with that particular commodity, you could conveniently offload it (for a profit) to Atka yourself.

This is just an example. I opened up FLC and looked at the items repository for a commodity I've seen dropped by NPCs and found a station that is near a possible piracy route that pays a high price. You would still need to do some cargo piracy and find out what the NPCs actually drop in your area, then design your location and prices accordingly.

Otherwise, setting up a trade in ores will almost always be more profitable.

EDIT: Also, another thing to think about is the existence of capship cargo piracy, including just shooting the NPC cargo pods to avoid losing rep with that faction.

So those players can pirate cargo very effectively due to their firepower and cargo capacity and don't have the docking limitations of most pirates.

[Croft]

I should clarify, these PoB's will have unrestricted docking. Every faction and ID, RP permitting, will be able to dock. Their primary purpose is to create more activity for smugglers which is why they are placed in three systems that sit in the middle of the majority of routes, those being Hokkaido, Leeds and Stuttgart.
I should also say that these bases will not generate any profit for me, the intention is to make them like a normal base but supplied by players. Immortality is out of the question but hopefully a very large cargo and limitless credits are on the cards.

Reading your comments there are certainly some excellent ideas, I believe time based calculations is how Xoria did the economy (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) so it's worth considering.

If there is enough interest in cargo piracy I'll place another PoB somewhere around Liberty dedicated to buying stolen cargo. I'm hoping the three systems already listed are in good enough positions to serve cargo pirates in those Houses, if not please let me know.

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Jimmy The Rat | Croft's Feedback | The Rat Pack

[Jack_Henderson]

I should clarify, these PoB's will have unrestricted docking. Every faction and ID, RP permitting, will be able to dock. Their primary purpose is to create more activity for smugglers which is why they are placed in three systems that sit in the middle of the majority of routes, those being Hokkaido, Leeds and Stuttgart.

Unrestricted docking and bases inside House space, aiming at boosting criminal activity sounds like... difficult. Cool, but difficult to make. Will be interesting to see that concept work in reality.

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[Croft]

It's going to be a stretch, no doubt about it. I'm hoping once I have the idea fleshed out a little more I can come to an agreement with the various lawful factions to keep the bases off the kill list. If these bases do manage to kick start smuggling and bring more pirates to the lanes then everyone is a winner which, fingers crossed, should keep the "lets kill it because we can" mentality away.

As for the RP permitting, since these are illegal bases it's doubtful you'll find the navies, police or intel factions on the docking list. Saying that there are a few who play corrupt characters, the kind of sort who would impound a smugglers/pirates cargo and sell half of it off at the blackmarket before reporting it in, that's something I really want to see happening.

One thing I would ask all of you, above the ideas and suggestions is to tell people about this. The more feedback I get the more streamlined the project becomes and the better the overall effect.

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Jimmy The Rat | Croft's Feedback | The Rat Pack

[Pancakes]

Copy the buying price. The edge of the PoB is that semi-lawfuls could buy the stolen cargo and sell it at the lawful position.

Or if I understood you wrongly, and you've meant that you wanted to copy the lawful sale price.

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