Smuggling Mechanic Revamp, FR5, Freighter Docks - A discombobulation and suggestion

[sindroms]

Hello, my peeps and peep-ettes.

A positive feedback loop.
That is what Discovery used to have back in the ye-old days. While it was in no small amount boosted by the sheer amount of players on the server, it was also aided in how moneymaking and, specifically, smugglign was preceived.

You see, back in those days we did not have a FR5. And I will talk about that topic more in just a second, but first I wanted to specifically tell you about this feedback loop itself.


Smuggling was Very profitable.
Smuggling was done by lawfuls as well as quasi-lawfuls. Unlawfuls - wasn't exactly smuggling, just regular trading between unlawful sellpoints.
The ''idle'' amount of Smugglers - aka, players you encounter over a period of time, was relatively high.
The ''idle'' amount of Lawfuls, - players willing to interact with said smugglers, was relatively high.
This constant presence of lawfuls prompted unlawful activity and raids.
Raids prompted the creation of emergency chats and the systematic boost of lawful players to repel raids.


Things changed over time for better and for worse, but now we are stuck in a very odd situation, where the lack of smuggling not only is killing police factions, but also the way we deal with it. Below are my points.

1. Discouraging smuggling is bad for your activity.

This has always stuck to me as something odd. The only thing you can do as a lawful when nothing is going on, is either interact with other local lawfuls, or - keep an eye out for smugglers. Discouraging smuggling as a concept takes away half of your online gameplay during non-raid times and further makes Tlagsnet and Nodock commands unitilised.

2. Smuggling consequences.

Faction Right 5 was introduced due to a early 2010s spike in mercenary groups, resulting in a need for a mechanic that would allow targets to turn them hostile to their faction. This mechanic was NEVER intended for dealing with smugglers. It does not represent roleplay consequences in any way, but instead is used to punish the player behind the character. The result is a stifling lack of smuggling groups and as such - the earlier mentioned lack of idle time for lawful players.

3. Smuggling should be an option and should be encouraged for both lawfuls and quasi-lawfuls.

Jumping off of point 2, smuggling should be an activity that is profitable and available enough to be risked by any ID as it allows lawful IDs to engage in even more potential interactions.
Illegal weapons, risky and dangerous cargo for lawfuls, drugs and human trafficing for shadier organizations. We have seen the House Laws reflect the desire for lawfuls to interact with other lawfuls for such cargo, especially if we look one of the more recent additions for human passangers in non-liners. There is a demand for these interactions, factions have attempted to provide more chances for such interaction already.

4. Smuggling profit should be the highest in the game, with initial purchase cost adjusted.

While moving cargo between unlawful bases should be adjusted slightly above the level of regular lawful cargo, moving smuggling goods to Capital Planets in particular needs to be at the same level of Ores, while the addition of Freighter Atmospheric Entry Points for all capital planets could allow for sellpoints well beyond ore levels due to its unique gameplay. However, smuggling commodities need to retain this level or profit at the added expense of initial purchase, similar to ores bought from POBs.

---

Constructive Elaboration on key points of the proposal.

1. Smuggling-related process for FR5 must be reviewed.

FR5 process should be applied only if a character refuses to pay a fine.
If a player is caught smuggling and their ingame reaction is to resist arrest, their character needs to be sent an offline PM regarding them being contacted about a fine. The player must be made aware of the consequences of their actions and the upcoming punishment if they do not roleplay their way out of it. FR5 is carried out ONLY if the time allocated for the response is up, which must be kept reasonable. FR5 submissions must include a screenshot of the offline message being sent to the character.

The same approach must be taken to official and unofficial factions. For smuggling specifically, the actions of independent players may not be fined upon their respective official factions.

2. Paying a fine (ingame or forum) is a roleplay consequence.

And if a fine is payed, no further action may be taken. If a player/group pays a fine, this roleplay encounter is complete and closed and may not be used for any further FR5 related requests. Fines need to be enforced by the server rules to be reasonable and may not be infinetly increased during repeated encounters. The size of the fine must be reasonable just like any extortion demand, and must depend on the immediate context of the encounter, instead of the history of the faction/individual. This will allow tagged factions to engage in smuggling without worrying that less successful members will put their faction at risk. This will also encourage smuggling and - as such - lawful activity.

I think I do not need to explain what would happen if increasing the fines was allowed and what sort of abuse it can lead to.

3. Demanding cargo or a fine needs to be specified as a Demand in the server rules.

When encountering a smuggler, any ID that may enforce fines should adhere to our existing extortion rules. Aka - All demands must be reasonable and a player may only be fined once for the sake of Fairplay. While it makes small sense in roleplay, if a smuggler pays, they must be allowed to deliver their cargo on the pretence that once they land on their destination - their cargo will be confiscated by the docking crew. If a player is told to drop their cargo - they should not be fined additionally. If a monetary fine is chosen - it must, as previously stated, not be unreasonable.

---

Speculation.


If the key arguments for this change are addressed correctly, we might have a potentially much more active server during non-events, as the moneymaking tendencies directly offer potential reasoning for players to log. Especially during low times, which many of you have recited as the prime time for powertrading/smuggling, while at the same time every person doing so being so very obviously doing that due to the information provided by the player list.

Many of these points and suggestions will need to be reviewed more closely. I would like to think we can allow ourselves a testing period to see how the rule-inforced lack to crippling roleplay consequences will benefit smuggling and factions that could be doing it, though choose not to at the risk of other factions waiting for a reason to put them in a bingo book. Overall, it is rather boring without smugglers trying to make a run for the mooring fixture. We need to bring those days back, especially with all the new toys we currently have on both sides.

Admit it, you miss it as much as we all do

---

--------------
PSA: If you have been having stutter/FPS lag on Disco where it does not run as smoothly as other games, please look at the fix here: https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...pid2306502
----------

[Major.]

The idea is great and it gives me the feeling that we are moving the smuggling finally into the right direction.

You get a +1 from me.

---

[Lythrilux]

Maybe just add something in the rules where FR5 can't be used on transports?

---

[Thyrzul]

The main inRP issue I can find with this is that the role and methods of honest police towards smugglers was always on par with terrorists towards traders (no compromise), while a pirate-like approach (open to compromise) fits corrupt police more. Apart from LPI and GRP, enforcing a pirate-like approach by rules would require reforming the lore of the faction itself quite significantly. I don't exactly know what to think about the rule-regulated fine system yet, gotta think about it a bit more.

Other than that I have no issue with buffing smuggling routes and encouraging smuggling for lawfuls as well (perhaps police could have some sort of leniency towards (domestic) corporations), but if you present your ideas with comparisons like "smuggling commodities need to retain this level or profit at the added expense of initial purchase, similar to ores bought from POBs", I'd rather leave the exact numbers for those who can math and understand the system. FYI, ore profits don't (can't) calculate with PoB prices, those in fact decrease default trader profits to then turn that cash into miner profits. Commodity profit comes on top of base price in the form of margin times travel time.

---

[sindroms]

I did not mean to imply they should be set to pob prices, which are awlays changing.
What I meant to say is that the initial payment and potential loss should be increased, similar to ore haulers pay a large sum up front, if they do not mine their own ore.

---

--------------
PSA: If you have been having stutter/FPS lag on Disco where it does not run as smoothly as other games, please look at the fix here: https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...pid2306502
----------

[Praxor23]

I'll +10 this idea.

For me smuggling would always bring out the most unique and memorable conversations and moments when I was trading, both when chatting with people on the way to the sellpoint and trying to wriggle my way out of the eventual cargo confiscation/fine (attempts at making lawfuls to take bribes is always fun). It was nice to see what tale I could tell to justify the reason I was hauling said contraband and it was a good chance to "network" (though I will count only one instance where I successfully managed to bribe a Liberty lawful and convinced him to tag along with me, he knows who he is, miss those days buddy).

Any attempts to increase smuggling activity and lawful interaction with said parties is a welcome addition in my opinion.

[Rvg5]

I can get behind this. One of my side roles is as the Russian Weapons Dealer. I like transporting Black Market Weapons etc to places that need em. Thing is, it does not make much when you are using a small freighter (faster and easier to land more places). I totally agree and think it smuggling was up there with ores for profit you would see more people doing it. And I totally understand how police can get bored. Back when I played Arma 3 as a Police member, it was easy to get bored driving around doing nothing. So strong +1 from me.

---

DHC-Kiel (Vincent Stiglitz - Daumann Heavy Construction)
DHC-Hammelburg (Vincent Stiglitz - Daumann Heavy Construction)[
[RM]Fl.Hugo.Oppenheimer (Hugo Oppenheimer - Rhineland Military)
RNC-Essen (Rhineland Military Reserve)
Russian_Weapons_Dealer (Freelance Weapon Smuggler)

[Antonio]

I skimmed through the thread and while I agree with most of the things stated, there's one good reason why smuggling isn't and wasn't profitable for all these years, and it's the same with PvE missions - the main goal of smuggling is to not interact with anyone. You want to ideally get from point A to point B without meeting a single player, unload the 4.3k cardamine on your pirate train and quickly smuggle back without getting spotted. In theory it's nice to get viable smuggling routes, but in practice people'd fly offplane, use alternate routes or simply log off if it's too hot.

You might ask "the ore traders can do the same?", and the answer is yes, they can, but luckily they don't because they don't expect the pirates as much as a paranoid smuggler expects -anyone-. The ore powertrader has to only concern himself with pirates, who are in low count nowadays anyways, while the smuggler has to concern himself with almost anyone - even his rogue "friend" who'll betray him for the sheets and giggles.

Same with PvE missions - you make money by shooting NPC caps, and while it's fun, it directly discourages player interaction by making you fly 30k in the middle of nowhere where you won't be found or interact like if you hauled ore, and even if someone finds you, you will want to get out of that interaction ASAP because you're likely taking hull damage and aren't in a position to defend from a player.

The way you make police factions work is to get more pirates. The way you get more pirates is to get more traders to pirate. The way you get more traders to pirate is to make better connections between systems so there are actual choke points where you know something's gonna pass rather than there being 4+ entrances between any systems on the route to make bottlenecking impossible. Again, we go back to poor connection of systems relative to the amount of players we have.

---

SNAC Montage Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Thruster SNAC

[SnakThree]

Antonio is absolutely right here talking how most smugglers are more desperate to avoid interaction in comparison to regular traders. This is due to drop-all-contraband vs pay-20%-of-your-ore-profit.

On another point, if faction is caught smuggling over and over without end, why should there no be roleplay consequence? While it might be good activity for gameplay, only spiteful roleplay comes out of it because patience has a limit unlike someone's greed.

---

[Karlotta]

I skimmed through the thread and while I agree with most of the things stated, there's one good reason why smuggling isn't and wasn't profitable for all these years, and it's the same with PvE missions - the main goal of smuggling is to not interact with anyone. You want to ideally get from point A to point B without meeting a single player, unload the 4.3k cardamine on your pirate train and quickly smuggle back without getting spotted. In theory it's nice to get viable smuggling routes, but in practice people'd fly offplane, use alternate routes or simply log off if it's too hot.

You might ask "the ore traders can do the same?", and the answer is yes, they can, but luckily they don't because they don't expect the pirates as much as a paranoid smuggler expects -anyone-. The ore powertrader has to only concern himself with pirates, who are in low count nowadays anyways, while the smuggler has to concern himself with almost anyone - even his rogue "friend" who'll betray him for the sheets and giggles.

Same with PvE missions - you make money by shooting NPC caps, and while it's fun, it directly discourages player interaction by making you fly 30k in the middle of nowhere where you won't be found or interact like if you hauled ore, and even if someone finds you, you will want to get out of that interaction ASAP because you're likely taking hull damage and aren't in a position to defend from a player.

The way you make police factions work is to get more pirates. The way you get more pirates is to get more traders to pirate. The way you get more traders to pirate is to make better connections between systems so there are actual choke points where you know something's gonna pass rather than there being 4+ entrances between any systems on the route to make bottlenecking impossible. Again, we go back to poor connection of systems relative to the amount of players we have.

I was going to say the same thing Antonio said, which I've already said many times.

If you want positive interaction feedbacks you must start with one thing: Making interactions happen in the concentrated places, by not spreading activity out. Not only smuggling, trading, mining, but also missions by making them available in one concentrated place (like Minor, Gamma, and Alpha used to be).

Yes, the start in doing that, which is the easiest and fastest without any extra work is changing jump hole connections. And you all can contribute in doing that here:
https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...tid=157354

Even if you think devs wont do it anyway, and even if devs have said they wont (without giving a valid reason, I may add), doing nothing to convince them isnt going to help either. The best way to convince them is to offer a concept that many people can agree on, leaving little of the work for them by helping doing it / deciding details for them. In the case of smuggling, putting in faster connections will already buff the profit without need for price adjustment, to compensate for the higher risk of getting caught that comes from less alternative routes.

---

User was banned for: https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...tid=200950
Time left: (Permanent)