Proposal for 1.82: support for economic changes

[Fatleaf]

... A whole industrialized planet should be able to fabricate more than this.

Yup, it just goes to show how small and insignificant the player truly is in the Ooniverse.

[Disembodied]

A whole industrialized planet should be able to fabricate more than this.

It undoubtedly can - the question is whether it's there for you to buy. The market you have access to as a small independent trader is very much just the scraps from the big boys' table: most of the bulk trade is tied up by the big shipping lines, and they don't want the hassle of dealing with small-scale competition. That said, if you have the cargo space, you can take shot at a few cargo contracts, too.

[Smivs]

I was thinking about standard milk runs by trading between RI/PA systems - just to earn money as fast as possible, which is how economy in general works.

I'm not sure that's true, really. Yes, early on the milk-runs are about the only way a new trader in a smal ship can earn a living, but look at the real economy where (as Big D says) it is the big corporations doing most of the trade, mostly unseen by the masses.
In the more human-scale economy it is the entrepreneurs making the money. The Arthur Daleys, the guy with a white van and a lock-up full of stock who buys cheap and sells later at a profit. This is what the freighters are so good for - white van and lock-up rolled into one that goes wherever the money is to be had.

[ralph_hh]

Well, thanks all, after reading this, I do not feel so bad anymore, blowing up innocent freighters

[Diziet Sma]

Another bit of handwavium sometimes offered to explain the 127TC limit is that it's not actually all that's available.. it's all that's available FOR YOU. If a single 'Conda could buy up everything available, there'd be nothing left for all the NPC traders to purchase.. so GalCop limits the amount any single Commander can buy.

[Cody]

Well, thanks all, after reading this, I do not feel so bad anymore, blowing up innocent freighters

So vicious! Poor innocent traders!

[Smivs]

Well, thanks all, after reading this, I do not feel so bad anymore, blowing up innocent freighters

So vicious! Poor innocent traders!

Poor Arthur Daley

[spara]

I made a secondary market to test legality_export and legality_import parameters. What do these do exactly? I tested all combinations with a behemoth parked next to the main station and they did not seem to do anything except filling the Legal column with Lm, Re and Ex. I was able to buy & sell whatever I wanted and launch & dock without interference. Was I just really lucky or have I misunderstood something?

[cim]

Check the market_monitored property. For compatibility with 1.80 this defaults to false for non-main stations. So, it's illegal to sell X there, but it's not as if anyone actually checks.

[spara]

Check the market_monitored property. For compatibility with 1.80 this defaults to false for non-main stations. So, it's illegal to sell X there, but it's not as if anyone actually checks.

Now I figured it . I had the property configured to 1, but since it seemed that nothing happened, I was a bit puzzled. Actually something was happening, there just was no notification other than seeing my legal status go down. I noticed that when I docked and launched a few times and the behemoth opened fire at me .

This might need some work to be intuitive for the player. Maybe a warning report when docking for the first time letting you hand over the contraband like illegal_goods oxp does and something to warn you when you're about to launch with contraband.

[phkb]

Question: In 1.81, am I correct in assuming you have to use trade-goods.plist now, not commodities.plist?

Maybe some conversion script could be written to update the old plists?

Has a conversion script been written for commodities.plists?

[cim]

Question: In 1.81, am I correct in assuming you have to use trade-goods.plist now, not commodities.plist?

trade-goods.plist for defining new trade goods or overriding the core definition for a trade good.

shipdata.plist (the new market_* properties) for defining secondary station markets with respect to the existing (or potentially existing) trade goods.

planetinfo.plist (the market_script property) to make JS-based market rules for the primary system market, either extending or overriding the data in trade-goods.plist

Maybe some conversion script could be written to update the old plists?

Has a conversion script been written for commodities.plists?

Not that I know of.

[spara]

Maybe some conversion script could be written to update the old plists?

Has a conversion script been written for commodities.plists?

In the current Behemoth OXP I use a js script that has the old commodities.plist defined inside and uses the legacy formula to calculate the prices/quantities. You might want to check it out.

[Ranthe]

I always wonder what sense it might make to purchase a freighter ship wilst the local station supplies only a fraction of the tonnage needed to fill this ships cargo hold...

You can buy more than one commodity at once, you know. Say you're heading out from a rich industrial, buy up all the computers and luxuries and anything else that looks cheap. This can often amount to well over 100TC of cargo. If your next stop is a poor agri or similar, sell for a big fat profit. If not then hold on to some or all of it until you can show a good profit. Even buy more computers etc if your next call is another RI. In other words you have the space to hold stock for a while to maximise your profit from it.

This approach is basically how I operate Atomic Annie to build up the "Ranthe retires in luxury on Esdi" fund

Well, thanks all, after reading this, I do not feel so bad anymore, blowing up innocent freighters

So vicious! Poor innocent traders!

Poor Arthur Daley

I resemble that remark!

[spara]

I've been fiddling with secondary market definitions quite a bit now and overall it's quite nice. To be able to set prices in relation to the system prices is very nice indeed. There's one thing I'm missing though. I would like to be able to set a fixed price in market_definition. I don't think that's currently possible. I know I can do it in marker_script, but then I would need to define other goods there too. Have I overlooked/misunderstood something? If not, could this be added, if possible?