Ship Depreciation & Other Questions

Sendraks · Post by **Sendraks** » Mon Jul 06, 2009 12:02 pm

I'm currently the owner of a shiny neolite Fer-De-Lance and happily pootling about Galaxy 2 hunting the elusive Constrictor. Impressed as I am with the handling and appearance of this re-imagined ship, I can't help but notice that its value appears to be plummetting despite regular maintainence. Even though I've got more credits to hand than I did after buying this ship, the total trade in value is now less than 400k.

Are ships supposed to keep depreciating in game over time? I don't recall having this problem with my Cobra MkIII or my Python.

Ideally I'd like to save up for a Wolf MkII (SE if I can find one, but I've only see one for sale to date), but that isn't going to work if the capital I've invested is bleeding away. Is the only recourse to trade back to a Python and milk run for a bit to get the capital together?

Rustybolts · Post by **Rustybolts** » Mon Jul 06, 2009 4:42 pm

Wait for a maintenance overhaul before you sell you will get your price back.

Sendraks · Post by **Sendraks** » Mon Jul 06, 2009 6:34 pm

Rustybolts wrote:
Wait for a maintenance overhaul before you sell you will get your price back.

Erm thatas my point, the price isn;t going back. After maintainence, the ships value is still less than when I bought it.

Rustybolts · Post by **Rustybolts** » Mon Jul 06, 2009 6:38 pm

sorry just scanned your message quickly never read through properly

CptnEcho · Post by **CptnEcho** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 3:29 am

Sendraks wrote:
Rustybolts wrote:
Wait for a maintenance overhaul before you sell you will get your price back.
Erm thatas my point, the price isn;t going back. After maintainence, the ships value is still less than when I bought it.

Price of a used ship will be less than an equally equipped new ship.

Would you pay more for a used ship? I wouldn't.

Post by **Cmdr James** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 7:29 am

I think there is a maximum of something like 75% of the full value. This is, of course to cover sales and marketing, fees of the vendor, taxes, refurbishment (full valet service), testing of the ship, including full electrical, navigational and combat systems and certification, together with various component guarantees that may be needed under local laws, etc.

If you dont like it, you can take your business elsewhere :p except, you cant really, unless you want to create a SecondHandCarDealership.oxp

Sendraks · Post by **Sendraks** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 8:56 am

Thanks, that does make sense.

Dammit, I should've bought one of those hybrid ships, they have nearly full resale value.

Post by **Cmdr James** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 8:59 am

The calculation of resale value is indeppendant of ship type. All ships are capped at the same percentage, and all depreciate in the same way.

Equipment attached to the ship adds to the value, but may not depreciate in the same way, I can't remember ow this is handled.

Davidtq · Post by **Davidtq** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 9:57 am

CptnEcho wrote:
Sendraks wrote:
Rustybolts wrote:
Wait for a maintenance overhaul before you sell you will get your price back.
Erm thatas my point, the price isn;t going back. After maintainence, the ships value is still less than when I bought it.
Price of a used ship will be less than an equally equipped new ship.

Would you pay more for a used ship? I wouldn't.

Im not sure many of the ships we can buy are new ships at all, the cobra mk1s for example as far as I know are out of production? and the design well over 250 years old? The pythons some will be over 400 years old

.

I guess it could be seen as ships have a "house like" price, based on utility, they have long usefull lives, where as long as they are serviceable they will cost a lot, unlike cars where "newness" is a big factor in their price, because a car is 99% unlikely to make it past a few decades.

Perhaps the Darwinian nature of space travel means that if a ships still in use its likely mostly fit for purpose. As we know poor maintenance leads to catastrophic failure.

I would guess that the difference between retail price on the ship and part exchange value is because people dont trust private sales of ships so much and "dealers" have strict legal standards about the quality of the ships they sell.

I would see it as a "house like", long life span \ utility price but with "car dealer" sales structure. Sure there may be cheap ships on the private market but "caveat emptor" and with a ship its not likely to be a trip with the RAC its likelly to be your life

Basically the difference between the price you pay and the money you get back ISNT new vs secondhand. Its Dealer Profit margin \ refit costs. A dealer HAS to allow for a lot of work being needed on every ship they buy in, as they have to return it to perfect condition before being allowed to sell it. BUT its a price you pay for peace of mind and a fully working ship

.

Of course the "lazarus" story and others show the pitfalls of bargain priced ships from "private sales". The deals would be out there, but you take your life in your hands in an unregulated market.

Website · Post by **DaddyHoggy** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:09 am

Of course the "lazarus" story and others show the pitfalls of bargain priced ships from "private sales". The deals would be out there, but you take your life in your hands in an unregulated market.

I keep promising but there is a part IX (soon)...

Sendraks · Post by **Sendraks** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:33 am

Davidtq wrote:
Basically the difference between the price you pay and the money you get back ISNT new vs secondhand. Its Dealer Profit margin \ refit costs. A dealer HAS to allow for a lot of work being needed on every ship they buy in, as they have to return it to perfect condition before being allowed to sell it. BUT its a price you pay for peace of mind and a fully working ship .

This is a great descriptive bit of text on this issue, should probably added to the text for new pilots somewhere.

Nemoricus · Post by **Nemoricus** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 12:19 pm

The only problem with a used spaceships dealership OXP is that as far as I know there's no way to change a player's ship via script.

Any other method would run right into Oolite's own pricing system.

Davidtq · Post by **Davidtq** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 1:52 pm

Nemoricus wrote:
The only problem with a used spaceships dealership OXP is that as far as I know there's no way to change a player's ship via script.

Any other method would run right into Oolite's own pricing system.

There was the "rusties" pack, where you could buy versions of the standard ships that whilst functionally "safe" werent at peak performance any more with a discount for their less than ideal performance \ appearance.

However me being me would love to have a "private trade" station where you could pick up ships cheap, perhaps via an auction or similiar, but had random chances of getting a good one or a lemon, perhaps a chance of getting one which was past its service due date. Completely impossible as far as I understand the way the game \ save file works but still a fun thought

[Cheating]
If you are friendly with the dealer you can get decent test flights. Ive been known to take a ship for an extended test drive before, up to a few days. Before returning to try out another ship.

The dealership require a deposit of the full price of the ship naturally, but if you return it still in pristine condition they will refund the full ammount against another ship from their showroom. Its possible that the better dealerships out there might offer a goodwill gesture when trading up if a recent purchase was a dissapointment...

You could simulate this in game by editing the appropriate plist's and editing up the base cost of the ship the tradein value will be calculated as a percentage of the current price not the actual price paid...

Of course you could probably also use a similiar price changeing affecting trade-in value to simulate ship "rental" as well. Perhaps you currently have a anaconda but need something small and nippy for a few missions? seems a shame to lose so much money when you are only going to change back again at the end.

Bah its cheating, but I dont view it as much worse than saving the game test buying a ship then reloading the original commander. I just take more than a few seconds to make up my mind some times on ships. If the move was "longterm" then Id leave the devaluation in place, But often I will try out a ship for a few runs before deciding its not for me.
[/Cheating]

KZ9999 · Post by **KZ9999** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 1:50 am

I do like the idea of a specialist chain of shipyards for getting a better deals on ships. It may be easy to tie in as series of missions and perhaps a Carrier Market style ship transportation market in a OXP.

Do missions for the shipyard and earn a preferential customers discounts on various upgrades and ships. The more you do the better the deal but only at that shipyard chain.
Car dealers shift their stock around the countryside to meet local demand, so I see no reason why it wouldn't be the same for starship dealers.

Look on the Transporters Market and see a list of ships to be moved: (ship type and equipment set-up, destination and due date, transporters fee, required experience (Elite ranking.) (The more expensive the ship and the greater the distance to travel, the higher ranking required.)
If you take on the contract, your ship is put into storage and you get a new ship to play with. Fly anyway you to the destination just like a carrier contract.
Pick up another ship to be transported back and fly back to where you started and get your original ship back.
if the ship gets damaged along the way, you might lose your fee or even have your ship sold to cover the cost. No gain without risk after all.

There might only 20-40 odd shipyards in a given chart, as you need a fairly developed and stable world (tech level 7 and dictatorship or better) to support a independent shipyard. It would be a great way of trying out other ships without risking your own and having a bit of a tiki-tour at the same time.

This sort of thing that would be the cornerstone of Uncle Blix's whole business.

(Follow this thread to find out about who I'm talking about.)

Nemoricus · Post by **Nemoricus** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 2:00 am

The only problem is that there's no way to change the player's ship via script. Also, cargo is another problem as you can't read how much of each type the player has. If you regularly fly an Anaconda and get a contract to move an Adder, there's a lot of cargo that needs to sit around for a while.

I'm going to put in a request to do both of those things.

Oolite Bulletins

Ship Depreciation & Other Questions

Ship Depreciation & Other Questions

Taking it in a slightly different direction.