At some point in time one of the devs or admins, I cannot remember which, mentioned that your personal belief is that pirates (Outcasts, Corsairs) should not have an equally good trade route because of balance reasons.
Is this true. If it is, could you elaborate what was the point of the Tlagsnet if we do not have smugglers anymore.
--------------
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
----------
TLAGSNET is primarily a tool for police to stop smugglers. Note that the latter party are a liason between the lawful and unlawful economies. The actual unlawful economy is the consideration of pirate base-to-pirate base trade routes, as opposed to pirate-to-lawful routes.
(Stolen cargo-to-pirate base counts as unlawful, stolen cargo fenced to lawful/neutral counts as smuggler.)
So, the TLAGSNET is not primarily a tool for preventing the flow of the pirate economy, as said economy usually involves routes not involving the Gate/Lane network.
Posts: 2,122
Threads: 244
Joined: Oct 2007
Staff roles:
I think Echo's post plus the new economy adequately answer the original question, but here's my response: the unlawful economy is between unlawful bases, such as one Outcast base to another Outcast base. Since much of this trade traffic would flow off the trade lane network, it is going to be largely invisible to other players, and thus a net negative to interactions. The point of trade is twofold, to earn money to spend, and to create the foundation of other interactions (pirating traders, pursuing pirates, etc). Unlawful trading does not contribute as much to those interactions as lawful trading and smuggling (trade with contraband).
In addition, without providing unlawful bases with unique commodities of their own, they can only resell commodities whose origins are at lawful bases. The geography combined with math naturally create a situation where profits from resales are going to be less than profits from origins. Thus, unlawful trade will naturally be less profitable than lawful trade, without even having to purposefully make it that way.
Check out my Trade Development Blog
for all the latest news on Nerfs and Final Nails, or to request trade changes.
Darn Xoria, if only I had read that BEFORE I paid that 1000$ for that bottle of pills that cost 11$ to get legally over the counter. It all makes sense now... Drug runners make LESS than normal truckers who woulda thunk?! (not)
...no but really why isn't smuggling from unlawful to lawful bases the most profitable system in the game? It'd make things fun.
Remove FR5's, allow engage on sight on smugglers for lawful factions. You get big fun
ALSO, a note to everyone. Spazzy IS talking about unlawful>lawful base trade. If he didn't he wouldn't mention both Tlagsnet and smugglers in his summarized question at the end of his post.
====
I don't think the Devs or anyone are at any fault, but I do think that making smuggling the most profitable trade system will be beneficial and just hasn't really been truly thought through yet.
I agree with Xoria in most parts here.
Any activity that includes avoiding interaction purposely cannot be buffed too much.
The only interaction that is likely to take place is on the last 14k to the dropoff point. And we know that an armored transport does not die to fire in 14k if the player knows what he is doing and flying a suitable ship.
Quote:Remove FR5's, allow engage on sight on smugglers for lawful factions. You get big fun
Removing FR5s is a bad idea. It is the only consequence that smugglers have to fear and that forces them to actually play carefully, which is in accordance with their role.
Allowing KoS on lawful side against smuggler would also kill a lot of roleplay. That's not what Disco needs.
However, I would like smuggling to be buffed.
The Leeds Planet smuggler docking ring is interesting. Capital planets should have such a "freighter only" smuggler ring with decent prices for black market goods.
The problem is, that no one can stop a freighter anyway, even if caught... which kind of takes the danger out of the equation, and thus automatically has to result in this kind of activity being less profitable, as it does not contribute as much to player-player interaction.
(10-08-2013, 09:20 AM)Jack_Henderson Wrote: Any activity that includes avoiding interaction purposely cannot be buffed too much.
The only interaction that is likely to take place is on the last 14k to the dropoff point. And we know that an armored transport does not die to fire in 14k if the player knows what he is doing and flying a suitable ship.
Quote:Remove FR5's, allow engage on sight on smugglers for lawful factions. You get big fun
Removing FR5s is a bad idea. It is the only consequence that smugglers have to fear and that forces them to actually play carefully, which is in accordance with their role.
So keep FR5's which encourage hiding from interaction or make it a "run the gauntlet" type of play where the smuggler get's in sight of the base and makes a run for it (maybe with a defense wing or group of other smugglers at his side?) while dodging capital fire from the left and right in a crazy blaze of glory!
I'd much rather see this become a group effort/focal point of conflict/profit that makes it fun, exciting, explosive, and profitable for both sides.
Perhaps this is somewhat out of topic but i remember a nice experiment, couldn't this be applyed also too smuggler routes once the game is out of beta?
So both lawful and smuglers could have some kind of "fluctuating economy"
I think this would make temporary boosts without breaking the balance economy thus the insane time devs has dedicated to this update. ( the boosts don't need to be consecutive, after a boost of a specific comodity the prices can be default during some weeks until another "unlawful good" becomes boosted)
Of course this means more work for devs/moderatos, but i think the efectivity of such work could be great.
Edit: I remember to read somewhere also the sugestion to rise not only the profit but the initial price when it comes to smuggle - this could be also aplyed to such boost to give a risk factor to smugglers and a nice bounty for police).
Posts: 2,122
Threads: 244
Joined: Oct 2007
Staff roles:
(10-08-2013, 03:24 AM)Veygaar Wrote: ...no but really why isn't smuggling from unlawful to lawful bases the most profitable system in the game? It'd make things fun.
Remove FR5's, allow engage on sight on smugglers for lawful factions. You get big fun
Smuggling from an unlawful to a lawful base already is the most profitable trade network in the game.
And I agree that a FR5 against smugglers is a bad idea. Too many people around here think that punishing people is more fun than interacting with them. As a pirate, when I rob a trader I hope he does come back, not that I robbed him of so much that he changes his route and avoids me from now on. It's too bad that lawfuls don't feel that way about smugglers.
Check out my Trade Development Blog
for all the latest news on Nerfs and Final Nails, or to request trade changes.