Well here's two things you need to understand before proceeding further:
1. The economy is not just balanced according to RP, it's also balanced according to what's best for gameplay. Now that may not be the actual case in certain situations, but it's the driver behind some of the changes which may look slightly bad from the RP perspective.
2. What matters is not the actual profit, it's profit over time. Also summarised by the phrase: time is money.
Both of these points have been made before, and I just want to remind people about them before rage burns away all hope. If you have a problem with particular routes, give a statement of not just what the problem is but also how you would fix it (also called constructive criticism).
For the record I agree with a few of the points made in the preceding posts (not going to state which to encourage participation instead of a back and forth), would like very much to see what ideas these people would have that we can use to improve on the situation.
The "profit over time" part is balanced as if your ship is completely automated, there are no pirates, no random lane disruptions, no NPCs, acceleration is instant, and you're invulnerable.
I timed a route recently. I found it was impossible to actually get the profit per second that FLCompanion suggests you should be getting due to those factors not being true.
I have occupied my day with learning how to modify game files, specifically those governing commodities. It's not rocket science but i had to dig up a lot through old forums and had to find mirrors for old downloads.
Now i think that with a little cooperation we could help balance the economy and make it more lore and player friendly.
What i want most from this new balancing is the implementation of trade highways. To show what i mean by that i made a crude sketch on the map with all the 5 houses and the zones where i think these trade highways should be. Map
The 5 purple zones should be where all the trade passes through and where all the pirates should wait for their targets. I am not forgetting zoners and unlawfulls, it's just an early sketch.
I also want every faction to have a specific commodity to haul to another zone and one to haul back (theres that rep variable we can play with). This should be made according to lore and commodities should be produced and sold in places that respect logic and common sense. Processing plants should buy ores and sell refined metals. Advanced refineries should buy metals and sell products and alloys.
All profits/time should be equal but longer routes/contraband/mined ores should have a bigger raw profit/slot. And there should be a weekly/monthly rotation of raw profit/slot increase for some commodities around the houses. It's not difficult to do.
The general idea is: Make it simpler, i don't want to see newcomers asking for trade routes, these should be known and the piracy hot spots should be known too.
@Scumbag: I am pretty sure that something like your basic concept is already in place.
I however like your idea that every faction should have their special route that is perfectly irp and encourages "streamlining" of faction traffic through the bottlenecks. Sirius is huge, so we need to concentrate interaction to make it happen. Giving each faction their 2 favourite goods would help in managing the traffic.
(10-22-2013, 10:25 AM)Thyrzul Wrote: These things were enough for me to be sure you are only here to QQ.
I am not only here to QQ, and I'm going to have to ask you to remain out of the thread for the rest of the duration if that is what you believe. Thank you.
And as stated by Kazinsal, the credit/sec thing is extremely inaccurate, because again, it's assuming that everything goes perfectly. It rarely does, and especially when you're an organized convoy, time goes up rapidly because you're ensuring the pack moves relatively close together.
And yes Blodo, I understand it's not *just* balanced according to roleplay and story mechanics, but unless I'm missing something, it's all only loosely based on what the faction sells, and then nothing else.
And as for credit/sec? It's very, if not entirely impossible to take part in 80% of most of these routes because they're either undockable bases for a corporation (pirates, junkers), don't make any roleplay sense, or they're contraband that you'd rather your corporation avoid.
I guess if we gave up on corporations and made everyone a freelance trader, I wouldn't have any reason to complain though.
So yes, you guys are absolutely correct, there's a bunch of high credit/sec routes that a neutral trader could take advantage of and make out like a bandit.
Except House corporations cannot take advantage of this in any way, shape, or form, unless we're removing rephacks and most RP rules. There's still wars and embargos making trade extremely difficult, there's still the Laws of Sirius, and there's still the server rules and IDs.
Since I'm more familiar with Ageira, I've been using it as an example. Though I suppose if you think credit/sec is the end all and be all, I've missed the best route in all of Liberty.
Gate/Lane to Alberta, which is all of two jumps from Colorado. A whopping 1290 (258 when divided by 5!) credits/sec!
And then I could take bio-neural processors to Rheinla-- Oh. Gall-- Oh.
Obviously there's more thought to it than that, yes. I'm aware.
I am surprised by everybody is using/becoming relient on FLCompanion to work out their Trade Routes. I find a lot of enjoyment is in Discovering what each base sells and where it sells best. I have been 'Testing' Trade Routes that I have put together by timing the runs myself. I don't always take my commodities to the best buy, but one that allows me to but a Commodity that I can shift to somewhere else. On one route I even buy Oxygen at one base and sell it for 1 Credit more, at the next base, just so I can buy a more profitable Commodity to run from there. This is how economies work. You have to go out there and find the 'bargains' and not rely on somebody making it easy for you. This is more in RP than relying on a non-RP device to do the work for you. In RL commodities are held up in Traffic Jams, Rail Strikes, Airline Strikes etc. That is all part of the fun, we have NPCs shooting Trade Lanes, slow docking and Pirates and other people who hold you up for one reason or another.
I agree that the Commodities dispersal seems to be very mixed up. Prices of Commodities within Gallia that were in the 200 credit ballpark, to buy, are now in the 3000-4000 credit area.
I have logged, within Gallia, 92 Commodities, this doesn't include Food, Oygen and Water or the Base Building ones. I see it as a Traders Dream looking for the Ultimate Trading Route. My Routes are, so far, ranging from 23 minutes to 67 minutes and I will be testing more as I probe the Trading System.
'I would like to be half as clever as some people like to believe they are' Life is full of disappointments, it is how we handle them that helps to define us, as a person
I'm pretty sure the idea behind making items sell high in Gallia was to help promote activity/travel there, probably not necessarily focusing on logic and RP. Which makes sense: if devs want Gallia to stay, you gotta give folks a reason to fly there.
This should also promote more avenues to pirate traders coming through the Taus, so the Outcasts, Privateers, and corporate hit-men will get to have fun with that.
When it comes to creating an overall picture of time versus profit, you really can't include the random events. FL Companion is a simple and effective means of working out the numbers. I always base my own calculations on the assumption that the lanes stay up and nothing gets in my way, which serves to give me a maximum value. When it comes to balance, it is indeed the maximum attainable profit which needs to be considered because everything is relative that way.
I do agree though that there are some serious incompatibilities with RP. For example, it makes no sense whatsoever for somebody to be able to take Black Market Munitions from Detroit and supply the Gallic occupation at Leeds because both Liberty and Bretonia have a big problem with Gallia. Ageira would simply not permit this, but the ridiculous profit only encourages players to neglect RP in fixing their Gallic reputation and running this route.
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