Possible Trader "Event"

[looqas]

This came to my mind and I'm pretty sure this is all wheel invention again, but here goes.

Basic idea: A faction representing a big house could hire a trading company to supply certain amount of supplies, like here's the shopping list, go get them.

To make this better than a regular fetch-the-stick stuff I was thinking that this would have to be done in good RP. Three parties are needed. The employer, the trading faction and the party that does not want the supplies delivered.

Example scenario. Can really be applied to any house with modifications.

The Bretonian goverment is forced to get quick help from the shipping companies since the huge shipment vital to the war effort they were expecting didn't make it (someone can write the backstory why). It hires a good and respectable company to come up with the supplies in a certain amount of time (like a week). But alas, the word leaks to parties bent on seeing the goverment/trading companies toppled. Plus that greedy desk jockey sold the info to pirates as well hinting that there will be massive quantities of valuable cargo being moved in the near future. And thus the game begins.

Couple of ideas to make this really interesting. I'd thnk the main point is not to make a lotsa money, but rather get good RP out of the thing.

1) The goods must be delivered to the emplyoer party and to the place they point. Could be defined before-hand or in real time. So no selling it on planets/stations. The goods are paid after the event by the customer IF the trading company has fulfilled the whole contract, so the company is operating on a risk here also. Or pay for goods only that meet the quota.

2) Employer gives a fixed amount of cash for fulfilling the contract. It's upto the trading company how it decides to divide up the money. It might be a reasonable for the employer to have a transport where the goods are being delivered to. Then the employer can sell the stuff and in this way finance the event.

3) Make a thread where the employer updates the goods delivered. The obtaining price should be lower than the price paid by the employer. Also make the traders report where they got the stuff and for what price. This makes the game even more fun and people can use the knowledge to their advantage.

4) Very important: The employer must not pay the top price per unit for the stuff. The prices have to be reasonable but not easily obtainable for the price they pay. In case of Bretonians being the employers it would be interesting to see commodities that are obtainable for the required price in Kusari. This would lead to using middle men to get the stuff.

5) Why not require also small amounts of contraband?

Anyway. I think this could be a very interesting event if done right. I'm open to suggestions how to make this better.

I was thinking a premilinary list like this:

Commodity quantity / price per piece (lower than the selling price anywhere in Bretonia for example)

Engine Components 15000 pieces / 250
Diamonds 10000 pieces / ???
Boron 10000 pieces /
Light Arms 10000 pieces /
Plutonium
Food
Water
Ship hull panels
Optronics (the ones needed to be bought from Kusari to meet the price limit)


etc.

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Flying under radar.

[Jinx]

depends how you stage such an event. - there have been "convoy" events before - with start and destination - but maybe not a fixed route, but valuable cargo ( like several millions credit cards ).

for example, i remember an event where there were several transports protected heavily by escorts that had to make it to a distant place. - the attackers were announced before, but it wasn t said which route the convoy would go, so it wasn t clear how the attackers would ambush the convoy.

the attackers had to choose to spread out and maybe be caught one by one by the escorts, or try to stick together and attack as a big team - but that could have meant that they miss the whole convoy. - such events are fun. - and its a great event for new people especially, cause the roleplay is "simple" - you haven t got all the politics around, but oyu have a clear good and bad, and a pretty clear setting about attacking and defending with the goal to stay alive ( dead escorts cannot get their paycheck ) - and making sure at least parts of the convoy reaches its goal.

its a good incentive to say - the attackers get all they can loot. and wahtever reaches the destination will be shared among the defenders. - but such an event is expensive for the people who organize it.

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Shipdesigns made for DiscoveryGC

[looqas]

I was thinking of more a prolonged event, not a single run. Time frame a week perhaps. That's why I put the event in quotation marks. Jinx's idea is good and tested but I envisioned this to be a little different.

The problematic thing on the scheme I presented is the employer presence at almost all times. Or at least stated "open office hours". And for that reason the employer should be a quite active faction.

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Flying under radar.

[DarkSaber]

These both sound like excellent ideas, the sort of thing I've been watching the forums for and never seen organised! I like the suggestion of making the client Brettonia and requiring things that can be only found in Kusari, because like you said, if it's a Brettonian company with the contract they may have to use sub-contracting to get them, meaning Hector can cut himself a slice of that pie! He does advertise himself as a blockade runner after all!

EDIT: loogas, the main depot for the items could always be a shared ship, with 3-4 vouched-for people across timezones. This is more complicated though, so office hours might be best, be still runs into a problem for people outside of it's time-zone. Then there's the depot itself. Would the third party be allowed to attack THAT? Seems to me they should be able to, after all you would attack it if you found the opportunity to. Why pick off traders when you can let them do the hard work and then attack one large target? This means that the depot would have be positioned with this in mind, and maybe even force the depot to have to relocate every so often, just to keep people on their toes a little bit more during the week, as the traders would need to keep in contact with each other to pass on the location, and the pirates would be able to mix things up by deciding if they'd rather disrupt the supply, or destroy the supplies at it's source.

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<span style="color:#FF0000">Remember Citadel...</span>

Hector Norweb - Transporter of stuff. - Currently available for hire! (Armored Transport)
H.N. Shpping - Bulk transporter of stuff. (BW Transport)
LH~Franz.Sanchez - Lane Hacker

[cmfalconer]

I was thinking about something similar to this for personal RP. I am working on some RP for buying a cruiser, and I've worked up a small datasheet on what materials it would take to build one (IE SuperAlloy, Optronics, etc).

My ultimate goal is to purchase and haul all the commodities to the shipyard who OK's my purchase request (in RP petition to governments). You would have to pick up all the commodities throughout Sirius and deliver them to the shipyard, accepting whatever the shipyard "pays" for them. The actual cost of the Cruiser would then be, in RP, the Labor Cost for building the ship.

Haven't fully completed it yet, but hopefully soon. Anyway, it's basically the same idea, only yours is scaled up to include many people. I'd like to see certain factions propose a "reward" for hauling certain items, but only pay them out to appropriately tagged traders as well (read: no "Police" traders). Even the Hispania Clans can get involved here, hiring out-of-zone traders to pick up needed materials.

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[looqas]

I could sponsor this event by donating 10mio of my own cash to the employer and organize the event with backstories, commodity list with prices, book keeping and general stuff forum-wise, but I don't have time or the needed RP to be the employer alone.

The problem with Bretonia being the client is that there is no very active trading faction in it. And using completely indies with their rag-tag assortment of IDs and reps would make obtaining some of the hard to get stuff too easily. It would be ok, for the faction hired for the job to use third party to obtain stuff, but the faction should not have access to all the commodities. Or indies having the proper RP to assists the trading faction.

Fundamentally this event needs a rather active authority and trading faction in the same house.

So any major house authorities willing to step in as an employer or trading faction responsible for obtaining the goods? I can screenwrite this for you. Once we get to know these players the enemies are clear. Also any pirate is sure to rob the transports blind if given chance, so it's under trading factions discretion to hire help if they feel they need it.

The main thing for the traders is not to make money, but have fun. But of course maximum profiting from this should be a major goal.

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Flying under radar.

[Slavik]

I think the Jupiterguild would be willing to participate in such event. Our specialised tradewing are the best of the best in escape and evasion techniques, besides that we can deliver our own security measures in the form of fearsome fighters and bombers.. but ofcourse this would have to be a weekend event then.


edit:
Our special trade wing is all IFF'ed and ID'ed Interspace commerce, they also have an extra IC tag at the end of their names besides the usual JG logo

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There used to be pictures here

once known as Richard Farbridge, OBE and Ronaldo Benitez

[DarkSaber]

I agree with your point about the IFF, I'm currently working on fixing mine, and fixing it to take part in an event like this certainly motivates me to get it done quicker! Would some sort of Liberty/Rheinland scenario be better (and plausible of course!)?

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<span style="color:#FF0000">Remember Citadel...</span>

Hector Norweb - Transporter of stuff. - Currently available for hire! (Armored Transport)
H.N. Shpping - Bulk transporter of stuff. (BW Transport)
LH~Franz.Sanchez - Lane Hacker

[beander2]

The problem with Bretonia being the client is that there is no very active trading faction in it.

I respectfully beg to differ on this. :)

I'm not sure what your standard of "very active" means, but HGL has been operating for a month, and we have members on every day. Also, our relationship with IMG can easily entail some sort of trip into Kusari, if authorized by the Bretonian government, which this, of course, would be.

Let us consider this, and we'll get back with you ASAP. Here's our "comm system" (message dump) if you want to check us out, but please, loogas only:

HGL Comm System

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Sir Alisdair Buchanan, KBE ~ Gateway)Trafalgar

[looqas]

Anything goes really. All that is needed is a client and trading faction that does not have straight access to all the goods easily. And then all the opposive forces are invited to the feast.

The main thing for proposing a prolonged event is to get more people to participate and to give the opposing side chance to react. Plus a longer term action gives people a chance to see this thing develope properly on it's own. So no strict screenplay would be needed, but things would play out on their own and maybe inspired a few side quests for terrorists/pirates etc.

I'm fairly sure this kind of relatively open and prolonged event would present a lot things that could have been better or more enjoyable in a one day event. But we all can think this a beta version of which, if the event is successful, to improve on in the future.

But like I said I'd like to stress that a fairly active client is needed to be able to receive the goods and post screenies of the delivery.


EDIT: I was not aware of the HGL. Be seeing you in your dump.

EDIT2: If the BPA/QC are willing to play the customer (or any two client/traders factions) I think were are on to something here and I can seriously start to draft something in events section.

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Flying under radar.