Con Store prices seem broken

[mr_homn]

Hello, I just started playing Oolite today and I'm loving it. Pretty amazing stuff.

I started doing some simple cargo runs after installing all the oxp's that I thought looked cool...

Well it appears the "Your Ad Here" oxp adds convenience stores, which I thought was cool at first, but within a few mere hours of playing, I discovered I can buy food from Diso at 3 credits or so and sell it at the Diso Con Store for 101 credits... This seems awfully broken, especially since it's within immediate range of where the player first starts. I've made well over 10,000 credits just doing runs back and forth in the Diso system.

This really needs to be fixed. It shouldn't be this easy to advance in elite when you first start. I would remove the Your Ad Here oxp, but I simply LOVE the advertisements everywhere, as it adds so much flavor to the game... But the fact that I know I can abuse this exploit at any time really hampers the "elite" experience.

Please let me know what you all think.

[Disembodied]

Hi, Mr_Homm, welcome to the boards! Friendliest, Riedquat, etc. ...

I think you're right: 101 Cr for food is a stack overflow in the food prices. It's random, and not dependable: but when you encounter it it can be exploited. Best advice at present is to resist the temptation, but really the commodities.plist needs tweaking!

[Cody]

Please let me know what you all think.

Con Stores are basically a 'cheat', in my opinion - remove them! Oh... and welcome aboard!

[Smivs]

Hi mr_homn, and welcome.
Yes, those con-stores do tend to skew the economy of the game a bit, don't they? It's one of the reasons I stopped using that OXP some time ago, and we normally recommend that new players avoid too many OXPs (particularly those which have major effects on gameplay) in the beginning so as to get used to the 'basic' game first.
I agree with you that the 'ads' are great fun though, and I suspect if an OXP was released that only added the billboards (without the stores) it would be very popular. You don't have to visit the con-stores, of course, so one option is to leave the OXP installed and just ignore the stores - pretend they are not there

[Switeck]

Yes, there's pretty bad economic/game-balance problems with the Con Store's commodity prices.

Here's my personal commodities.plist for YAH:

Code: Select all

{
	constore = (
		("Food", 0, 0, 22, -2, -2, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Textiles", 0, 0, 22, -2, -1, 0, 3, 2, 0),
		("Radioactives", 0, 0, 78, -3, -3, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Slaves", 0, 0, 22, -2, -4, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Liquor/Wines", 0, 0, 108, -5, -4, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Luxuries", 0, 0, 233, 3, 1, 0, 1, 5, 0),
		("Narcotics", 0, 0, 200, 7, -4, 0, 6, 2, 0),
		("Computers", 0, 0, 184, 10, 1, 0, 1, 5, 0),
		("Machinery", 0, 0, 140, 6, 1, 0, 1, 5, 0),
		("Alloys", 0, 0, 94, 1, 1, 0, 15, 5, 0),
		("Firearms", 0, 0, 149, 13, -2, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Furs", 0, 0, 221, -9, -4, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Minerals", 0, 0, 38, -3, -4, 0, 1, 2, 0),
		("Gold", 0, 0, 65, -1, -1, 0, 31, 2, 1),
		("Platinum", 0, 0, 128, -2, -2, 0, 63, 2, 1),
		("Gem-Stones", 0, 0, 34, -1, -1, 0, 15, 3, 2),
		("Alien Items", 0, 0, 120, 1, 0, 0, 15, 0, 0)
	);
}

It "needs some work", but it puts prices closer to the main station yet still retaining some character.

[mr_homn]

Thanks for the warm welcome, everyone! I've never seen such a large community that is so cordial. Looks like I've finally found the right game.

Switeck, I will try your tweak and see how it goes! Thanks! I might even tweak it myself if I can figure out what all those numbers correspond to...

Edit: Okay, first time back to Diso con store and the food was 2.8 credits, instead of the usual 101 credits. So this fix should be suitable at least for the time being. Thanks again!

[Fatleaf]

Thanks for the warm welcome, everyone! I've never seen such a large community that is so cordial. Looks like I've finally found the right game.

Switeck, I will try your tweak and see how it goes! Thanks! I might even tweak it myself if I can figure out what all those numbers correspond to...

We here pride ourselves on being friendly

If your having problems finding out what to do with those numbers PM me and I will give you a hand with it. But have a try yourself... you replace the ones Switeck posted with the ones you find in the commodities.plist in the Config folder of the oxp.

Let us know how you get on.

[Thargoid]

Hi mr_homn, and welcome.
Yes, those con-stores do tend to skew the economy of the game a bit, don't they? It's one of the reasons I stopped using that OXP some time ago, and we normally recommend that new players avoid too many OXPs (particularly those which have major effects on gameplay) in the beginning so as to get used to the 'basic' game first.
I agree with you that the 'ads' are great fun though, and I suspect if an OXP was released that only added the billboards (without the stores) it would be very popular. You don't have to visit the con-stores, of course, so one option is to leave the OXP installed and just ignore the stores - pretend they are not there

Or, as I had a bit of spare time on my flight home, try either of my two new subtract-ons (well I can't really call them add-ons, as they remove things).

YAH Constore Remover 1.00 OXP and YAH Witchpoint Override 1.00 OXP.

The former basically removes the constores (and their nav-buoys) from the game, and the latter does likewise for the witchpoint billboards (replacing them with the default buoy, or any other buoy model OXP you may have installed).

You can install either or both, and of course you also need YAH installed with at least one ad-set (well OK actually you don't, but without it the other two are rather pointless ).

[mr_homn]

Hi mr_homn, and welcome.
Yes, those con-stores do tend to skew the economy of the game a bit, don't they? It's one of the reasons I stopped using that OXP some time ago, and we normally recommend that new players avoid too many OXPs (particularly those which have major effects on gameplay) in the beginning so as to get used to the 'basic' game first.
I agree with you that the 'ads' are great fun though, and I suspect if an OXP was released that only added the billboards (without the stores) it would be very popular. You don't have to visit the con-stores, of course, so one option is to leave the OXP installed and just ignore the stores - pretend they are not there

Or, as I had a bit of spare time on my flight home, try either of my two new subtract-ons (well I can't really call them add-ons, as they remove things).

YAH Constore Remover 1.00 OXP and YAH Witchpoint Override 1.00 OXP.

The former basically removes the constores (and their nav-buoys) from the game, and the latter does likewise for the witchpoint billboards (replacing them with the default buoy, or any other buoy model OXP you may have installed).

You can install either or both, and of course you also need YAH installed with at least one ad-set (well OK actually you don't, but without it the other two are rather pointless ).

Fantastic! More options are always preferred! I'll definitely be using the YAH witchpoint override as I prefer the Deep horizons nav bouys. I might also use the con store remover, haven't decided yet. On the one hand, I love the con-store models as they are beautiful and very blade-runner esque. On the other hand, they make illegal goods smuggling a little too easy, thus allowing for easy money...

Maybe a good compromise would be if I could use the constore model in place of the hoopy casino model. Is that possible? If not for the hoopy casino, another type of station?


Edit- ooh just found out about the Illegal Goods Tweak OXP. This solves the problem of illegal goods smuggling being too easy with con-stores. Awesome

[Smivs]

Or, as I had a bit of spare time on my flight home, try either of my two new subtract-ons (well I can't really call them add-ons, as they remove things).

YAH Constore Remover 1.00 OXP and YAH Witchpoint Override 1.00 OXP.

Nice one, Thargoid.

[Cody]

<nods>

[Thargoid]

Maybe a good compromise would be if I could use the constore model in place of the hoopy casino model. Is that possible? If not for the hoopy casino, another type of station?

It is, although given the adverts on the store I'm not sure it's the best fit. Plus it would need Griff's approval to do.

It's the joy of OXPs, most anything is possible to merge, split, tweak and alter from existing components.

[mr_homn]

Maybe a good compromise would be if I could use the constore model in place of the hoopy casino model. Is that possible? If not for the hoopy casino, another type of station?

It is, although given the adverts on the store I'm not sure it's the best fit. Plus it would need Griff's approval to do.

It's the joy of OXPs, most anything is possible to merge, split, tweak and alter from existing components.

Yeah, I decided it was a not so good idea anyway.

Especially now that I found out about the illegal goods tweak. With Switeck's con store commodity list tweak and the illegal goods tweak, now I have no problem with the con-stores or any other stations for that matter, since they can no longer be exploited for easy risk free smuggling money! More joys of OXPs! Learning about new ones every day that are amazing.