Oolite Bulletins

Rock hermits usually offer pretty low prices for furs, but occasionly I can get around 100c/t so I take note of their fur prices when buying metals/gems.
Tonight though, I pulled into a hermit and the fur price was 0.0c/t. None available of course, but I think that's the first time I've seen a commodity anywhere at 0.0!

I've picked up some free things at Seedy Space Bars before now - only a couple of tons, but free nonetheless. I think it was in the middle of the screen, so 'twas probably either Liquor/Wines or Machinery.

I once picked up computers at 0 Cr / tonne at a Wasp's nest. Link for reference:

SandJ wrote:

Hey, I've just bought 14 tonnes of Computers for 0 Credits per tonne at a Wasp Nest.

If this is what Elite is like, I'm happy enough now!

Once every few years there's a real world story about a supermarket or web site selling something for a penny or something daft like that in error. I once cleared out a Co-op selling Badger ale at 49p per bottle in error.

Who knows what happened that they need to get rid of this stuff? Was it irradiated? Infested with Trumbles? The Hermit took a wife and she insisted on a clear-out?

It is such a rare event in Oolite that I reckon it should be left as is as one of those "weird computer game foibles" that become legend.

All of these are obviously cases of price overflow, and therefore probably results of bad commodities.plist writing. In other words, I'd call them bugs.

I am interested, however, if there is an OXP that ships with a buggy commodities.plist for Rock Hermits? Because I don't think this should be possible with Oolite's built-in plist for Rock Hermits. The other examples are clearly from OXPs.

Commander McLane wrote:

All of these are obviously cases of price overflow, and therefore probably results of bad commodities.plist writing. In other words, I'd call them bugs.

Agreed!

Commander McLane wrote:

I am interested, however, if there is an OXP that ships with a buggy commodities.plist for Rock Hermits?

Unless RHL fiddles with commodity prices (I don't believe it does), that hermit price must be Oolite's!

El Viejo wrote:

Commander McLane wrote:

All of these are obviously cases of price overflow, and therefore probably results of bad commodities.plist writing. In other words, I'd call them bugs.

Agreed!

Commander McLane wrote:

I am interested, however, if there is an OXP that ships with a buggy commodities.plist for Rock Hermits?

Unless RHL fiddles with commodity prices (I don't believe it does), that hermit price must be Oolite's!

Hm. You're right. It is possible to get 0 Cr. for furs on Rock Hermits, although only under special circumstances (otherwise it would've happened sooner).

I have to admit that I hadn't even noticed the price overflow. Obviously I'm not trading much in furs on Rock Hermits.

What do we do? File a bug report? I think the numbers could be tweaked in a way as to still allow the overflow (there may be hermits who are really freezing), but prevent the exact 0.

Commander McLane wrote:

What do we do? File a bug report? I think the numbers could be tweaked in a way as to still allow the overflow (there may be hermits who are really freezing), but prevent the exact 0.

I'm with SandJ on this one.. leave it alone.. it adds flavour, and just needs some handwavium to explain, which SandJ provided quite nicely..

SandJ wrote:

Once every few years there's a real world story about a supermarket or web site selling something for a penny or something daft like that in error. I once cleared out a Co-op selling Badger ale at 49p per bottle in error.

Who knows what happened that they need to get rid of this stuff? Was it irradiated? Infested with Trumbles? The Hermit took a wife and she insisted on a clear-out?

It is such a rare event in Oolite that I reckon it should be left as is as one of those "weird computer game foibles" that become legend.

I don't mind occasional quirks in-game (like dustless systems, for example), but 0.0c/t? Hmm...

El Viejo wrote:

I don't mind occasional quirks in-game (like dustless systems, for example), but 0.0c/t? Hmm...

None of these Rock Hermits will be selling furs at 0.0Cr, since they won't have any in stock ... all this really is doing I suppose is indicating that the Hermits have no interest in buying any. If a player is desperate to offload some on the Hermit for whatever reason, they can, but they won't get paid.

Disembodied wrote:

None of these Rock Hermits will be selling furs at 0.0Cr, since they won't have any in stock

Aye, true enough. So Sheba's Secret had no interest in buying furs... maybe I'll go looking for Victoria's Secret instead!

El Viejo wrote:

Aye, true enough. So Sheba's Secret had no interest in buying furs... maybe I'll go looking for Victoria's Secret instead!

There might well be a Rock Hermit out there by that name, you never know! Although to be honest Sheba's Secret sounds more exotic ...

Disembodied wrote:

There might well be a Rock Hermit out there by that name, you never know!

Just a roll of the 'furry' dice away, eh? As is another 'famous' 'roid!

Zero Cr.. MMM
I've came across 0.1 for some. But never an actual 0.0
Maybe for spice there could be a seller that pays to take the goods away?

Alex wrote:

Zero Cr.. MMM
IMaybe for spice there could be a seller that pays to take the goods away?

Even in real live you get sometime strange values. The dutch government always needs money and retrieves it on the capital market. Because the Netherlands are seen as a safe country, they have to pay very little interest for it. But, last december, people were so eager to lend money to the Netherlands, that they accepted a negative interest for a short period. So they actually payed us to lend us money
Probably from countries that expected their own currency to devaluate in the near future.

Alex wrote:

Zero Cr.. MMM
I've came across 0.1 for some. But never an actual 0.0
Maybe for spice there could be a seller that pays to take the goods away?

In Frontier there was one planet (Cemiess) where previous metals and gems were illegal, and you were paid to remove them.

Also:
- fuel could be sold, so you could scrape together credits by sun-skimming, docking and selling the fuel. That ought to be possible in Oolite.

- you were paid a couple of Credits for taking away 1 tonne of rubbish. You would the fly out to deep space and jettison it where nobody was looking. Being caught do so resulted in a fine. A very poor way of making money, but if there was nothing worth buying, it paid for the fuel for the next trip. (I can't see how to achieve this in Oolite.)