Oolite Bulletins

First of all I have to say that Oolite is one most amazing game developed and kept alive purely for the fun of the game by the fans!
For this I love you ALL very, very much!
Yet there are some major problems we have to talk about.
Please be assured that I do not want to insult or criticize anybody here!
As I explained I am playing Elite since 1986. I took also part (since 2004) in developing Elite IV thus a long time before most ppl. knew that Dave Braben was working on the Elite IV.
Now for the topic:
1) I would like to work on the entire Trading section of the game. I am a trading pro and that was the reason I started playing elite at first place. There is an incredible potential for developing the entire Trading and industrial aspect of the game. I will put up a topic and maybe workgroup later if you like.

2) So facing the fact that Oolite is rather a dogfight/mission game (more or less which is no problem) we have to think about some major problems regarding this topic:
2.1) When I am flying an Andromeda the size of a small moon I expect 2 things: a) That I have to pay about 100 Million credits for it and b) that I will be able to get the damn best and biggest weapons that are out there that will pulverize those horrible pirate packs counting up to 10 ships with one clean strike!
But what I get and how I feel is like being one giant Blue Whale drifting in space equipped with a tiny laser and some insufficient shields while hordes of Giant White sharks attack me while I am only able to drift along in space the giant whale I am.

Thus what I wish for are not only multiple lasers, which I love, but size adjusted INDIVIDUAL lasers and cannons that are REALISTIC considering the size of my space ship. The disadvantage of big ships are otherwise so drastic regarding agility and maneuverability that there is no use at all buying such an expensive and big ship. And while I am aware of the "anti death Star policy" of Oolite aka. "big ships must not be too strong" I demand my big big ship that has the firepower of 50% of the entire fleet of the Empire.
As it is now even with my uber laser and my base gatling laser or my LF Base Cannon, which is by the way merely more than a sting of a mosquito, I am more or less helpless. The best weapon I have flying even the Andromeda is ramming the pirates. And this is not how the game should be. Don't you agree? On the other hand I take the view that the big ships are far too cheap IF you want to get them adequate firepower. Make them EXPENSIVE - also the weapons.
Remember the Panther Clipper? I bought 100 shield generators and the big Plasma Converter. Then I had no more space for trading but that was MY decision! I had fun exploring and I was ABSOLUTELY SAVE from those rebel friends! You get my point?
As it is now Oolite is a dogfight game for small up to moderate size ships. Even with the uber lasers. And yes: I tried them all. I also flew almost all ships while running 300 oxps who are AMAZING and great by the way. Especially the politically non-correct ads!

My wishes are the following:
1) Create real uber size weapons that use up most of the ships cargo space and that suck-up huge amounts of energy and even shield energy when used. Make those weapons expensive and rare! If you are able to buy an Andromeda you are one nasty rich and probably ugly evil criminal bastard anyway - so why not letting ppl. pay for those weapons? Even create illegal weapons, why not?
2) GET ME MY SINGLE BUYABLE SHIELD generators back! If I decide that i want to be a lazy, lame trader and explorer in my whale size ship so let it be! Make those shield generators BIG until they suck up my entire cargo bay. Thus you can only decide to have either a Death Star sized super weapon in your Andromeda while having tiny shields or you have 100 shields on only a pulse laser. You get my point?
3) PLEASE by GOD I do not want to read this ever again: "Weapons destroyed - buy another one before you sell your ship!!" - I am losing my weapons at any anarchy system driving my Andromeda. ALL-THE-TIME because some moron is ramming me every time. If it is not the pirates it is my escort ships wo ram me all the time kamikaze style. Why not getting us some Weapon Stasis generator that secures ONLY the weapons if you are getting rammed? I am willing to lose ANY equipment but my weapons. Those should be the last I am losing. I can't even repair the weapons with my repair bots or nanobots.

Having ranted this much now I want once more express how much I love this game. There are so many amazing things going on in the Ooniverse with hermits, ads, stations, Thargoids and missions that I will never ever stop playing this.

I would love to give you guys input in how to improve the game play more regarding the economy/trading with some brand new aspects like starting your own factory in space you have to supply with raw materials up to the Political career in systems you can run as politician.
I would also love to implement my idea of "shipyards" that are building individual module based ships.
Just one thing: trading objects 20 tons (which means 20 objects) at a time is completely useless to make serious money with. Make it kilo-wise. Or unit wise. We also need far more standard products, people! I am thinking about 200 products you can trade on every system - and I am not talking about the special cargo trading but an significantly expanded standard trading which should enable the development of entire production chains in your own workshops on space stations (you can rent) or factory ships.
More on that later! If you like.

Now I also have to talk about the AI-Problem in general and the Missile-Dilemma.
When I am attacked by 10 pirates at once in my Andromeda they fire with 15 lasers until my 15 energy banks are empty. And yes, my fingers are fast still my powers are low! I have to pick one pirate that is equipped with the well known pretty good npc-AI: you can hit them once, maybe twice, then he will move....you can then hit him again...he quickly moves...and so on. It think about tiny fish in a tank that will react once you touch them with a finger.
This is good for the pirates since they are hard to kill. I have to pump in - and I counted it! - 30 point blank salves of plasma canon fire until I kill them.
Which means you have to maneuver like Han Solo himself only to hit that adder once...while the rest of the 9 pirates happily pump in their triple and quadruple LF90 into your back. The Quirium mine helps to make them leave the formation but it almost never kills more than 1 ship at all. Which brings me to the point:

1) ALL the pirates are pretty smart. They do not react like humans. You hit them once, they will react in no time and change course while I am mostly taking 10 seconds even to realize what hit me if I get hit. There are no pirates with slow reaction rates. They never make mistakes. It is like playing against a chess computer always on the same level - at any game. I miss my Boa-Pirates who lazily fly in one direction and need some time to realize what is going on until they turn or try to escape.
Which brings me to the next problem: THEY ALL rush up and away once they are "damaged"! Suddenly it is injector time. They all act the same: 0.1 second and off they go! Why wont they just continue to fight? Maybe once in a while they try to ram me then? Once they hit the injector I can not follow if you drive the big ships. Unless it is the heart of gold. What I am asking for are flaws on NPC tactic, different individual strategy of the pirates. And please take note that even with the biggest LF Base Cannon or base gatling laser it takes many shots to kill even ONE tiny ship. While 9 other hit me permanently.

2) What use are missiles if only 10% of them ever find their target? And only if it is under 5 miles. The same problem of above: the pirates NOTICE the missiles the second you fire them and all of them react just perfectly the pretty good AI they are. Which is fine! But ALL of them? ALL the same?
They see the missile coming 0.1 seconds after you fire it and INJECTOR TIME it is. Using missiles from 20 miles away is useless. I even RAM my own MISSILES once I injector into the fight. I am FASTER then the missiles!!!! I mean: seriously? This is not how it should be. Avoiding fast missiles via injector speed must be impossible. Period. The same goes for me: either I hit the ECM in time and manage to make a crazy move in space, or I get hit. That is OK. 1200m/s fast missiles is too slow. It should exceed the 0.50 at any case.
I love that the missiles make some damage but not necessarily kill the pirates if their shields are up. That is good. I love how the missiles follow the trails. Nice to see. But it is wayyyy too slow. I also love the great variety of missiles, drones and bombs. Perfect.

3) For one of the REALLY BIG lasers I have one idea in mind: What about the R-Type laser that can be charged the longer you press the button "y", sucking energy and will fire with a giant green, blue or what not FAT STREAM of energy that blinds your monitor!???
You remember the original fat blue plasma converter?
So my idea would be that if you sneak behind those fat and very dangerous carriers who have 6, 7 lasers once you fire at them (AI-Style with no mistake EVER, direct 0,1 seconds response time, all perfectly on target) you press the - let say - y button for 12 seconds which charges your SUPER BEAM to the max which will empty your energy banks maybe up to 80% and will then release a beam with 2000 damage points! In one GIANT, loud, dark noise and some rainbow, red super stream of heat-super laser beam I want my giant laser to look like! You get my point?
**WOOOOOOOOOOSHHHHHHH KAABOOOOOOOOM*****
This is how I want my super laser to look and sound like once I charged it to the max!

Just a little dream I have....

And now look at the size and sound of the base canon....

And finally: when I bring down one pirate to status "damaged" then by god: let him be damaged! And stay that way for more than 10 seconds! He should lose maneuverability and agility. Maybe he even can't use his weapons or injector anymore?
But no...soon he is back to his old prate-state and will hit you with his 5 lasers while you already lost 12 equipment thinggys that cant be repaired.
And once you get him to "weak" he will fire the missiles and inject at 2800 into space and I can only wish him all the best with my slow big whale in space.
Sometimes life is unfair!

Yes, I know that the NPC ships work differently and I certainly like them rather hard to kill then stupid and weak. But we have to give them a random ability module that varies the NPC response time to a more human scale and once in a while also gives us un-organized pirates and pretty dumb pirates.
Fighting against UBER-fast AI with al the same abilities no human can reach is not realistic. BELL CURVE is the key!

Welcome DrunkenPalpatine!

Thanks for all of your reports and ideas. I suggest to continue the OXP related ones in the topics of OXPs, for example Andromeda related ones. Imho there is a room to get more shields and energy banks for high additional cost into this ship, just ask and there is a chance to be implemented once.

You can check a stronger baseship in HardBase OXP.

Weapons can be destroyed when your ship's service level hit the minimum (75%) and [wiki]ShipVersion[/wiki] OXP is installed. You should buy either full "Maintenance Overhaul" or at least some "Small Fix on Service Level" far before your hull become useless for weapons.

You can power up your aim by [wiki]SniperLock[/wiki], combined with Base weapos I think you can beat your enemies very fast.

[wiki]I Missile[/wiki] is something like you mentioned.

The best weapon for you probably an [wiki]OMGLaser[/wiki] which fit into ships with at least 500t cargo capacity and do exactly what you want: a big kaboom in exchange of almost all of your energy, including your cockpit's power! If you seen the Star Wreck movie and remember to the main gun of enemy flagship then you can imagine the effect.

Norby! You are my personal hero, you know that?
Yes, I use the I-missile. It is OK. I have the hardships OXP included and I appreciate all the hard work you put into this.
I know about the Maintenance Level yet when you get rammed by 30 ships at one system - if you like it or not - you will lose your lasers.
It came to my mind that 99% of all long time players most likely never play with anything bigger than a CobraIII or a Python ET.
You do know that I am losing all my escorts with my Andromeda when move only a tiny bit? They all crash into me. All the time. I got used to it.
This thread, by the way, is not meant to be a giant rant! WHO am I to criticize a game developed by fans for fans ages ago? And the FEELING, the soul of the game is so amazing that any dogfight problems become meaningless.

The thing is that if you think about it REALISM is lacking although the opposite might have been the goal of the creators.
- In reality all the pilots who can afford it would have "automatic target acquisition" AI on board that would perfectly maneuver your ship into fighting position permanently, way better than any human IQ would be able to do so. The only thing you would have to do is to pull the trigger. It is 2016 and we have self-driving cars!
Thus the Player vs. AI situation by itself is not realistic.
- In reality MONEY would buy you any weapon that can barely fit into your ship, even custom weapons and engines would be standard. In some realistic universe no pirate pack would ever attack an Andromeda or Boa knowing very well that those ships had firepower outmatching even 100 small pirate ships.
- In reality the big ships would have AI handling turrets and port side, starboard after laser ports while the human could concentrate on the front, if he wants to.
- In reality the Bell Curve would be in effect regarding the skills of the pirates meaning that the cut-off would be way beyond where you put it now. We would have many incredibly bad skilled pirates with excellent weapons and a few outstanding pirates. We now have, as I say, all nearly perfect AI with good tactics and reaction times. Like a chess computer playing at 2000 elo: the pirates never make mistakes like humans would from time to time. There are no slow pirates. Mix it, baby! The more fun the top skilled pirates become to fight against!
In reality many pirates would be probably drunk while attacking you or they would have ridiculously bad ships. Think about the Somali Pirates.
- And since money WOULD buy the average Andromeda or Boa or Anaconda pilot 10 laser mounts with pewpew-lasers or the impassible resolvers handled by scientifically managed AI software in the name of the captain, they would certainly try not to ever get in contact with my Andromeda for all costs. On the other hand, if we put in "real reality" we could have one Andromeda Pirate attacking me in my Andromeda and BOY this would be a space fight generations of Communist system commuter shuttle pilots would talk about: two giant Andromedas, one with 23 lasers hitting on another with 1200 shield generators.
Maybe we would see 120 pirate ships attacking an Andromeda, why not? It would be fun to hit them with my super-uber laser...maybe they find my weak spot before i kill them all?

So what I want to say is that "making the game hard" like "You are thrown into the ocean in a Darwinistic sense" is not the most realistic scenario at all especially if you think about your criminal record or the risk of getting hit by an average looking ship that is equipped beyond believe.
Regarding the older thread called "long rant of a newbie" I would like to agree in most parts with that guy. It is hard and unrealistic, frustratingly hard. Lets face it: in reality money WOULD buy you a ship and equipment that would grant you relatively safe passage no matter how noob you are. And furthermore the computers would enhance your flight-skills close to perfect so you could outmatch any top lever combat pilot right from the start. Thus Oolite is highly unrealistic in dogfight regards.
Yes, I went my way through the one-on-one fights. I know the hit and inject tactics, I even developed my Inject-roll-pitch death cycle that always saved my ass and recharged my shields sufficiently. While I am attacked by packs of pirates I have to take them on one by one while they never miss the spot firing at me. I got used to it although it is unfair because it is unrealistic. I could deal with all of that. But at the boa class, even the DTT's the lack of realism regarding shields and firepower diminished my fun a bit. I had that idea of the old Panther Clipper and the old Plasma Converter that could kill anything even only remotely close to it. And now I have to sink in 20 perfect hits (!), just think about it, even with the top notch weapons, just to see some effect driving a 2.9 million ton ship with 2000 meter lengths. It is very very frustrating trying to hit a 2000 times smaller and faster adder with a laser driving an Andromeda. Or Boa. Or Anaconda. Just think again about the Somali pirates being hunted down by a US-Destroyer...The US destroyer would fire 3000 rounds in 20 seconds from 20 giants guns and the story is over. No matter if the pirates use 20 fisher-boats with Kalashnikovs.

They key question is for the real creators of the game: do you want to keep the game hard for the idea of being hard (comparable to dwarf fortress, a game that is only pseudo complex once you break down the actual development and production trees) yet not realistic or are you willing to allow big ships that you simply cant kill even though you are a 10 years Oolite player simply because in reality a Somali fisherboat would also never sink the USS Lincoln. Yes, this is anti-establishment and so to say very very noob friendly, but we have to face it: money would solve most problems with nasty pirates in reality. And bigger IS better coming to firepower, shields and energy. or in other words: money beats skills. In reality.

So what I actually WILL do is get you all some input on the trading and industry area. Because if money is the key you should be able to make money, very slow at first but faster once your ships get bigger.

Do you guys know that game "Patrizier II"? It is worth taking a look at.
Factoryships to produce valuable goods (the missile machine can do that already!!!) would be a start.
And imagine you can even set up your own SPACE station...as long as the the graphics can be more or less simple the creation of the entire Industrial development of the game should be possible.
The political career is another thing...bribe your way up to become the sector governor commanding your own fleet of military vessels. Or you run a giant advertising campaign to get elected in democracies. Maybe you want to make your way up in the cooperate Systems? If you are high enough you maybe even get the privilege to produce narcotics or trade in slaves legally? Maybe you will get the license to run that gold mine on the planet...

So what I will do is give you some input on the trading, production chains and factory ships, facilities and maybe even stores you can rent on space station to sell your stuff for profit. Establishing and hiring even support crews for transport ships...OH NO, they were shot down, now you are missing the alloys o produce the machinery...

So much is possible.

Norby wrote:

Welcome DrunkenPalpatine!

Thanks for all of your reports and ideas. I suggest to continue the OXP related ones in the topics of OXPs, for example Andromeda related ones. Imho there is a room to get more shields and energy banks for high additional cost into this ship, just ask and there is a chance to be implemented once.

You can check a stronger baseship in HardBase OXP.

Weapons can be destroyed when your ship's service level hit the minimum (75%) and [wiki]ShipVersion[/wiki] OXP is installed. You should buy either full "Maintenance Overhaul" or at least some "Small Fix on Service Level" far before your hull become useless for weapons.

You can power up your aim by [wiki]SniperLock[/wiki], combined with Base weapos I think you can beat your enemies very fast.

[wiki]I Missile[/wiki] is something like you mentioned.

The best weapon for you probably an [wiki]OMGLaser[/wiki] which fit into ships with at least 500t cargo capacity and do exactly what you want: a big kaboom in exchange of almost all of your energy, including your cockpit's power! If you saw the Star Wreck movie and remember to the main gun of the enemy flagship then you can imagine the effect.

And finally, if you make enough money in the Galaxy one, enabling you to buy some fine big ship with good firepower and strong shields you could risk going into the rather dangerous areas of the galaxy. The places where you can buy those REALLY rare goods that are so expensive. You get my point?
It is like it was in 1300: you need some money, some big ships and great captains until you could go to Russia and buy those fine peltz which would make you a fortune once your are back home in case you can survive those really evil pirates with their giants ships that are only lurking behind the next island.
Big risk = big money. You better don't go there with your cobra and LF90. Better get your Boa ready!
-->So by establishing high profit/High risk areas or even pirate Galaxies (think about this: maybe even evil thargoid galaxies you can try to survive trading goods for more than 1 day), your Andromeda super ship with super weapons which was the Top Notch Super thinggy in Galaxy 1 is now nothing more than one mediocre ship barely enough to survive against the uber-class also perfectly equipped pirate ships. Which brings me to the next point: the more deadly the pirate, the more points you get.
I know that this sounds a bit like EVE online (which I never played by the way) but it is not the same. You will get hit by pirates anywhere - but if your galaxy has become too small for your giant ego and ship it might be time to jump into the "evil galaxy 7" that was hijacked by one evil species with giant badass ships. But there you can also mine for gold and diamonds and find the uber-engines, super weapons that you only find there...who knows. BIG risk, BIG REWARD!
Also, if you already have a big ship it makes sense that you should take on big pirates to get more points which would be suicide if you fly anything smaller than a boa - in this case we have to leave the 6600 hits = Elite concept.
I would replace it with an open end experience level inside the Elite rank.

Joining the military at any point directly via application would also be fun. We had that in Elite. You get some easy stuff first regarding your skills. But if you are running the Andromeda, why not jumping into the Thargoid galaxy directly? How bad can it Be? Ohh....so bad! But I have to rescue the princess here in the Thragoid galaxy! OH MY GOD! IS THAT A THARGOID SUPER MOTHERSHIP! IS IT A MOON????

Yes, these are my dreams...just some brainstorming. You can always get some adequate enemies even if your ship is 2,9 million tons heavy and you have 20 separated gatling lasers...

DrunkenPalpatine wrote:

The thing is that if you think about it REALISM is lacking

You're right that realism is lacking, because the goal of the creators was to create a compelling game experience, not a simulation. The Elite/Oolite economy is incomprehensible if you stop and try to look at it from a real-world perspective. So too the spacial distances, the size and cost of ships, so many things. This flows through to some of your other points, eg commodity options. Oolite can now handle the creation of hundreds of commodity items. In my mind though, I think what you'd find though is that the complexities these add to the trading side of the game may not necessarily make the game more fun. Trading in Oolite isn't supposed to be like a reproduction of the stock exchange. Think of it as more "flea market" than "Dow Jones". But everyone is different and enjoys different things. The job of adding hundreds of commodities to the game is just waiting for a willing OXP developer to come on board and make it happen.

Some other OXP's you might want to consider (prepare for shameless plugging):
 Ship Configuration provides a means to add additional energy banks to your ship, as well as improving the performance of your engines, thrusters and shields. There's additional armour options there as well. It might be worth a look. I haven't had the chance to test this on a big ship like an Andromeda so if you're prepared to kick the tires of this one I'd appreciate the feedback (which you should post here. ).
 Smugglers - The Galactic Underworld can make commodities more interesting by making any of them potentially illegal to import. It might make trading a little more complex. As does  BlOomberg Markets (which introduces some random events which affect prices) and  Commodity Markets (which creates different buy/sell prices for all options), and Risk Based Economy (which adjusts prices based on the risk-level of the system). I get the feeling that you've probably tried some of these already, but hopefully something catches your eye.

Thank your for your help!
For the economy and trading it can certainly become significant fun, I can assure you. 3 different size space factories with different sizes of assembly lines you can equip them with.
Different types of goods you can produce depending on the license you buy at the headquarters or the political standing you have.
Easy to create production lines that need three different raw materials to produce one half-product and 3 half half products that will create one final product.
I can suggest Capitalism Lab. This must not be complicated it can be done and handled easily.
You run your small factory to later ship the product to another system or you sell it as an outlet - hermit style. Or in your shop on a space station. Don't forgt you need enough raw materials.
Apart from that ships, pirates and really complex trading with production can be giant fun - see Patrizier one of the most successful games of all times in Germany. That game is like Oolite, just in hansa-times around the Baltic sea.

And there is nothing more rewarding than bringing back lets say 100,000 units of incredibly rare AI-Thargoid Computerchips it took you 30 jumps and 100 fights to get that you will then sell for 20 million Credits so you can eventually buy your first small store in that nice cozy space station around Lave.

phkb wrote:

DrunkenPalpatine wrote:

The thing is that if you think about it REALISM is lacking

You're right that realism is lacking, because the goal of the creators was to create a compelling game experience, not a simulation. The Elite/Oolite economy is incomprehensible if you stop and try to look at it from a real-world perspective. So too the spacial distances, the size and cost of ships, so many things. This flows through to some of your other points, eg commodity options. Oolite can now handle the creation of hundreds of commodity items. In my mind though, I think what you'd find though is that the complexities these add to the trading side of the game may not necessarily make the game more fun. Trading in Oolite isn't supposed to be like a reproduction of the stock exchange. Think of it as more "flea market" than "Dow Jones". But everyone is different and enjoys different things. The job of adding hundreds of commodities to the game is just waiting for a willing OXP developer to come on board and make it happen.

That's starting to sound more like a RTS game! Mine resources here, take to base, convert into stuff. It could be a very compelling experience. Go for it!

phkb wrote:

That's starting to sound more like a RTS game! Mine resources here, take to base, convert into stuff. It could be a very compelling experience. Go for it!

I wish I could code it. But I can provide the screens, one by one, for each step of the Industry-Complex.

Actually, what makes this game even more fun would be that the "political career" section. It would not blow the entire game up beyond good regarding code or graphic wise: "Die Fugger" - one 1998 game from Germany, was purely based on this "production x political career x production privilege" concept with merely more than relatively simple screens as graphics yet the bribing, the money spending to get into certain political positions to finally being able to mine gold, was so much fun that even now, after 20 years, we have the 4th version of exactly that game coming out. http://www.theguild3.info/ And as well as Patrizier this is pretty close to Elite: trading goods in different markets, carts instead of spaceships, Pirates and fights. Plus - also here: one very complex production chain setting depending on the experience one has. Plus the Political career in 3 dimensions.
Converting Oolite a bit into Gilde would be just perfect.

I could think about an F3 menu where you can buy 3 types of "orbiting factories" - just the naked rooms in space so to say. First you need the privilege to do so. Anyway: you buy one of these factories then you have to equip them with assembly line robot-sections. You could buy them at Menu F3, too. Bigger factory, more assembly lines who are faster, too.
Now you are ready to produce! You need certain raw products in sufficient numbers and after a certain time you get your product. You can dock to that factory and put the product into your cargospace. Done. This must not be complicated on graphically detailed.

Dear Norby, thank your for your OMGlaser.

This is into the right direction yet, I am honest, not exactly what I mean.
The stream of plasma, light or whatever the weapon produces should be something to behold!
And the sound of the stream itself, too.
Also, I might add with great respect, the blackout for 10 seconds after the shooting, is pretty annoying.
Still the power drainage is exactly what I meant. Maybe we can even nullify the shields - or lower them by 80%?

In short words: the laser itself should be something to behold!

PS: The kills by the OMG are not counted as trophies!

Norby wrote:

Welcome DrunkenPalpatine!

Thanks for all of your reports and ideas. I suggest to continue the OXP related ones in the topics of OXPs, for example Andromeda related ones. Imho there is a room to get more shields and energy banks for high additional cost into this ship, just ask and there is a chance to be implemented once.

You can check a stronger baseship in HardBase OXP.

Weapons can be destroyed when your ship's service level hit the minimum (75%) and [wiki]ShipVersion[/wiki] OXP is installed. You should buy either full "Maintenance Overhaul" or at least some "Small Fix on Service Level" far before your hull become useless for weapons.

You can power up your aim by [wiki]SniperLock[/wiki], combined with Base weapos I think you can beat your enemies very fast.

[wiki]I Missile[/wiki] is something like you mentioned.

The best weapon for you probably an [wiki]OMGLaser[/wiki] which fit into ships with at least 500t cargo capacity and do exactly what you want: a big kaboom in exchange of almost all of your energy, including your cockpit's power! If you seen the Star Wreck movie and remember to the main gun of enemy flagship then you can imagine the effect.

There is one thing I would like to add:

Do not underestimate the importance of Elite being designed as a trading and money-making game!

- Not only for me but for many other people the trading aspects and being able to buy bigger ships to trade even more goods was the key aspect, for me even the only aspect, to buy the game and love it. I always hated the dogfights. Believe it or not. I even had a fried that always had to take over the game once I was in a fight. Elite is NOT a dogfight/space simulation with some more or less fun aspects regarding flew-market minor trading - it IS in many eyes a trading game in space with some annoying fighting aspects.
This balance of being able to set your own priorities for the game aka "Elite is what you want it to be" made it great.

For now Oolite has ignored the aspect that trading, big trading, complex trading, was one major aspect of the elite success. We have to get back to this! It is important that the player is able to make 200.000 or even 1 million credits with one deal.
If you take the risk to load, lets say, 100000 units of drugs from a brutal anarchy system, you store it into your "smuggles cloaked deck oxp" (which has to be developed yet), you fly to a level 14 system and find a black market (oxp yet to be developed) request on the "real bulletin board" (oxp has to be developed) for 3000% of the original price it is one MAJOR fun aspect of the game.

"YES, I made it there and back again with my Andromeda full of narcotics (not 850 tons or units, but 850.000 units which is far better and realistic) without being spotted"

We of course have to adjust the prices for ships and weapons accordingly. THIS is one major thing we really have to fix: Ship prices must be fixed. If your cobra is 600.000 the Boa must be at least 50.000.000 $ so you need to take trading risks in illegal goods or be lucky with some Sheik requesting luxury goods on the "real bulletin board" within 3 days you have to organize in time to make a 10.000% profit.

---> We need the original bulletin Board back. Pioneer has it. I want to sell my computers for triple the price at one remote anti-technology monk planet. Or buy luxury goods for almost nothing at the hedonistic system and sell it on the bulletin board to one spice-Sheik for 5x the normal price. You remember the bulletin board? I know, we have it at f4 in some way, but we need to work on that. In addition illegal goods must not be detected ALL THE TIME in your cargo. There must be a good chance that they never detect that you have narcotics on board.

Where is the "smugglers secret cargoroom" oxp? With a tiny "camouflage" generator included you can even upgrade?

Now it is time for me to finally open up the trading thread. Lets get this rolling!

DrunkenPalpatine wrote:

Do not underestimate the importance of Elite being designed as a trading and money-making game! - Not only for me but for many other people the trading aspects and being able to buy bigger ships to trade even more goods was the key aspect

You talking about Frontier rather than Elite?

Hi DrunkenPalpatine – some existing OXPs which you might find interesting:

 Risk-based economy
 New Cargoes
 Smugglers

Cody wrote:

DrunkenPalpatine wrote:

Do not underestimate the importance of Elite being designed as a trading and money-making game! - Not only for me but for many other people the trading aspects and being able to buy bigger ships to trade even more goods was the key aspect

You talking about Frontier rather than Elite?

Yes. Be sure these are all just suggestions. My fighting friend later switched to T-Fighter and loved it while I moved on to the settlers and patrizier.

Anyway I think the space stations need a bigger number or regularly trading goods on the main f8 screen. And bigger numbers than 127 tons to hold them. No more tons but kilos. The problem is of course that we have to adjust the prices of all equipment stuff. It must be accordingly to the money you can make. We also need to adjust the break down possibility of equipment. Losing my 200.000$ Base cannon at every system just because 90% of all pirates ram me or even my escorts do it is no fun and not realistic. If the risk of losing your weapon system is SO BIG nobody with a clear mind would ever buy such unreliable thing. "Weapon Stasis Field Generator.oxp" for the rescue. Or weapon repair Robots/nanobots.