These ideas were triggered by forum member NeilF’s ideas around changes he’d like to see for the Black Market. It got me thinking about the upcoming crime and punishment changes in Beyond, and how that might give people more of a reason to be in Anarchy systems. I think the following 3 things would work really well together:
These 3 things would then combine to have some interesting consequences:
Overall, this feels like a relatively simple change that could actually have a lot of positive outcomes, especially in the context of the upcoming C&P changes…
- Assume that the C&P changes do indeed make Anarchies appealing to pirates and murderers (both player and NPC).
- Remove Black Markets completely from Anarchy systems. Allow stolen goods to be sold freely on the commodities market in Anarchy systems.
- Apply a significant blanket reduction (say 10–20%) to the price of all everyday goods on the commodities market in Anarchy systems (but still allow for supply/demand fluctuations on top of that).
These 3 things would then combine to have some interesting consequences:
- It would feel more realistic from a lore perspective. You wouldn’t expect a boutique store in a classy area to sell goods at the same prices as some backstreet flea market in the rough part of town.
- Pirates could freely sell any stolen goods at near-market prices without any risk of being scanned and fined, as long as their base of operations is an Anarchy system (which further cements Anarchy systems as the right place for criminal enterprise).
- Anarchy systems would suddenly become appealing for traders too, if they’re willing to take the risk. They’d not be a great place for selling imported goods (which again feels kinda realistic), but they’d be the perfect place to grab some export bargains. Those systems don’t have high tax overheads to worry about after all!
- Grabbing these bargains would mean getting to the system without being taken down by murderous criminals though. Is your ship rebuy worth the risk? And is it now worth sacrificing some cargo space for a shield generator? Trading becomes a bit more varied for ship loadout.
- Getting out of the system (loaded with all that tasty cargo) wouldn’t be that risky, sure. Unless you get followed by some NPC/player villain with a wake scanner, of course…
- Pirates have a slightly higher risk to take when flying to these new easy-access markets — They’ll need to do a full supercruise through the Anarchy system with a their hold full of stolen cargo, without getting preyed on by pirate-pirates. Again, this feels kinda realistic though. Criminal activity *should* be more risky than even high-risk legal trade.
- If enough high-risk trade occurs, some of those commodities might even start to approach normal (i.e.: non-Anarchy) market prices. Which makes them even more valuable for pirates. And of course, the traders leaving this Anarchy station have, by definition, been particularly keen on filling their holds with this particular commodity. What a great target to follow and interdict! But scare them off too much and they’ll stop trading here, and that commodity will drop back down in price again. Emergent gameplay maybe?
Overall, this feels like a relatively simple change that could actually have a lot of positive outcomes, especially in the context of the upcoming C&P changes…