Brewer Corporation requires illegal cargo... and punishes me for it.

[SkadiTango]

So I'm building a space bar. Brewer corporation requires, among other things, some tons of liquor and beer.
After purchasing them, I proceed to the construction site. Upon arriving, Brewer Corporation quickly scans my ship, then proceeds with issuing me a fine for finding "illegal cargo" and confiscate it nonetheless.
They also lower my status to 'unfriendly'. After building dozens of facilities, one fine lowers me to 'unfriendly'.. for acquiring the material that they need and requested.
Is this working as intended?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

It's not called the "Crime and Players Having a Good Time" system, so yes, punishing players is fully intended.

More seriously:
- all of the individual components of this event are intended and normal: factions are allowed to outlaw specific cargo types, smuggling is an offence which generates a fine and rep loss, some of the cargo types used in colonisation are illegal in some (but not all) jurisdictions presumably to make obtaining them a more interesting challenge
- it's more severe consequences than normal in this case because you don't have an easy way (unlike most factions) to repair reputation with Brewer Corp
- the overall consequence probably wasn't intentional, but within the current rules the obvious fix is to make Brewer Corporation an Anarchy faction instead (so it stops outlawing goods and issuing fines), which would have its own potentially unwanted consequences elsewhere
- the "Crime and Punishment" system isn't at all well designed so all sorts of unintended consequences like this crop up all over the place (it's been working very badly with Odyssey on-foot content for the last four years)

 

[Astrofizzix]

I’m of the opinion that the system architect should be exempt from hauling illegal building supplies when in a system they manage.

The other thing that needs addressed are the building sites that move too fast to get to.

 

[SkadiTango]

It's not called the "Crime and Players Having a Good Time" system, so yes, punishing players is fully intended.

More seriously:
- all of the individual components of this event are intended and normal: factions are allowed to outlaw specific cargo types, smuggling is an offence which generates a fine and rep loss, some of the cargo types used in colonisation are illegal in some (but not all) jurisdictions presumably to make obtaining them a more interesting challenge
- it's more severe consequences than normal in this case because you don't have an easy way (unlike most factions) to repair reputation with Brewer Corp
- the overall consequence probably wasn't intentional, but within the current rules the obvious fix is to make Brewer Corporation an Anarchy faction instead (so it stops outlawing goods and issuing fines), which would have its own potentially unwanted consequences elsewhere
- the "Crime and Punishment" system isn't at all well designed so all sorts of unintended consequences like this crop up all over the place (it's been working very badly with Odyssey on-foot content for the last four years)

Sure, I'm aware of the crime and punishment system, it just doesn't look like it makes too much sense for a corporation to require some materials and then go "hey! those are illegals, bad guy, we friend no more and here, have a fine" xD

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Sure, I'm aware of the crime and punishment system, it just doesn't look like it makes too much sense for a corporation to require some materials and then go "hey! those are illegals, bad guy, we friend no more and here, have a fine" xD

Absolutely, but it's standard practice because the C&P system is completely broken in terms of how it connects things together.

It's exactly the same thing where you can quite easily be sent by faction A to do a mission which will get you a bounty with faction A if you try to complete it. Or get sent by faction A to do a mission which gets you notoriety, which faction A will also apply to you regardless of why you got it.

Or on the other side, if you shoot down faction A's ship in faction A's jurisdiction, they'll get annoyed with you - bounty, reputation loss, notoriety, etc. If you shoot down the exact same ship two minutes later in a nearby Anarchy jurisdiction, they don't care at all.

The whole cause-and-effect of "why do we have laws and why does the authority dislike people breaking them?" is so incoherent in Elite Dangerous that it would require a complete rewrite to start getting sensible answers out. This is one of the many many silly ones.

 

[Feuerklaue]

On the plus side, if you want to avoid getting penalized; silent running and/or heat sinks will make carrying illegal goods easier.
I just wouldn't rely on auto-docking as it'll take its sweet time for them to try and scan you.

The ships at construction sites seem to be alot more scan happy than most places and stations.
But it is a problem you can't improve Brewer rep and it would make construction impossible if you do end up getting to hostile status.

 

[CMDR GFJake]

On the plus side, if you want to avoid getting penalized; silent running and/or heat sinks will make carrying illegal goods easier.
I just wouldn't rely on auto-docking as it'll take its sweet time for them to try and scan you.

The ships at construction sites seem to be alot more scan happy than most places and stations.
But it is a problem you can't improve Brewer rep and it would make construction impossible if you do end up getting to hostile status.

this doesn't work, brewer security scans you anyway and you get fined very quickly, they do not care for stealth, they literally do see all unlike some pirates.


on another note, Brewer Corp (not Brewer Logistics) are what controls the orbital, planetary construction sites and colonization ships.

once you lose enough rep and become hostile all of them will open fire on you... the worst part is, you can't do anything to get that rep back, you can't get it back from trailblazer Minerva as that's controlled by brewer logistics and delivering cargo also does not increase rep.

so, I sent in a support ticket and reported it to them, they replied that it's a design oversight and it's probably going to be fixed soon.

It's not called the "Crime and Players Having a Good Time" system, so yes, punishing players is fully intended.

More seriously:
- all of the individual components of this event are intended and normal: factions are allowed to outlaw specific cargo types, smuggling is an offence which generates a fine and rep loss, some of the cargo types used in colonisation are illegal in some (but not all) jurisdictions presumably to make obtaining them a more interesting challenge
- it's more severe consequences than normal in this case because you don't have an easy way (unlike most factions) to repair reputation with Brewer Corp
- the overall consequence probably wasn't intentional, but within the current rules the obvious fix is to make Brewer Corporation an Anarchy faction instead (so it stops outlawing goods and issuing fines), which would have its own potentially unwanted consequences elsewhere
- the "Crime and Punishment" system isn't at all well designed so all sorts of unintended consequences like this crop up all over the place (it's been working very badly with Odyssey on-foot content for the last four years)

Also, corporations typically don't forbid combat stabilizers and battle weapons (the only forbidden cargo any colonization stuff needs) but for some reason, brewer Corp that's a corporation does forbid it.

currently there is no way at all to regen brewer rep, once your hostile, that's it, colonization is done and dusted for good for you as from personal experience hostile rep only regens half-way through the hostile section of the reputation bar (I have a months' worth of experience with another faction where it stopped there)

 

[Kalizandra]

On the plus side, if you want to avoid getting penalized; silent running and/or heat sinks will make carrying illegal goods easier.
I just wouldn't rely on auto-docking as it'll take its sweet time for them to try and scan you.

The ships at construction sites seem to be alot more scan happy than most places and stations.
But it is a problem you can't improve Brewer rep and it would make construction impossible if you do end up getting to hostile status.

My head canon for this is: construction sites are probably full of itinerant workers who want to get a little 'spicy' on their off hours. There used to be same issues in Aberdeen in Scotland iirc. The oil workers would come off the rigs after a long stint and drop thousands of pounds on drink, sex and substances of questionable legality.

A little off topic but one of my favourite things to do in Elite is to smuggle narcotics and battle weapons into a station. If the system has a relatively small population you can really tank the INF/BGS for the controlling faction. It just makes me giggle to think the entire station crew is off their gourds on drugs...with access to military weapons
As soon as the Panther Mk2 comes out I'm hoping to smuggle thousands of tons of 'questionable cargo'...

x

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Also, corporations typically don't forbid combat stabilizers and battle weapons (the only forbidden cargo any colonization stuff needs) but for some reason, brewer Corp that's a corporation does forbid it.

Are you sure? Those two are normally on the forbidden list for independent corporations at least (and almost everyone bans combat stabilizers, especially)

currently there is no way at all to regen brewer rep, once your hostile, that's it, colonization is done and dusted for good for you as from personal experience hostile rep only regens half-way through the hostile section of the reputation bar (I have a months' worth of experience with another faction where it stopped there)

Bounty hunting should work - it's just a bit fiddly to get enemies with bounties in the right jurisdiction.
- stack a bunch of cargo missions which get pirate enemies
- drop out of supercruise about 100km from an orbital construction site
- kill the mission enemies
- return to supercruise and orbit at minimum speed until some more appear
- drop close to but not at the construction site again, wait for them
- repeat until out of enemies
- hand in the bounties somewhere else

 

[Ned Flandalorian]

Bounty hunting should work - it's just a bit fiddly to get enemies with bounties in the right jurisdiction.
- stack a bunch of cargo missions which get pirate enemies
- drop out of supercruise about 100km from an orbital construction site
- kill the mission enemies
- return to supercruise and orbit at minimum speed until some more appear
- drop close to but not at the construction site again, wait for them
- repeat until out of enemies
- hand in the bounties somewhere else

I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't work. Before they were put in charge of all constructions you would get rep by delivering the construction materials, but you get no rep increase with Brewer when delivering them.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Before they were put in charge of all constructions you would get rep by delivering the construction materials, but you get no rep increase with Brewer when delivering them.

Interestingly, I found something slightly different: I got rep pre-U3 for deliveries to the colonisation ships, but not to the secondary sites.

I can believe the first was an error, certainly.

 

[CMDR GFJake]

Are you sure? Those two are normally on the forbidden list for independent corporations at least (and almost everyone bans combat stabilizers, especially)


Bounty hunting should work - it's just a bit fiddly to get enemies with bounties in the right jurisdiction.
- stack a bunch of cargo missions which get pirate enemies
- drop out of supercruise about 100km from an orbital construction site
- kill the mission enemies
- return to supercruise and orbit at minimum speed until some more appear
- drop close to but not at the construction site again, wait for them
- repeat until out of enemies
- hand in the bounties somewhere else

this won't work as they are removed from the game as a normal "faction", those that are allied to them can't pledge to them if they make a squadron either.

but the support team did outright state that this is developmental oversight and has been reported to the devs

 

[Shurimal]

currently there is no way at all to regen brewer rep, once your hostile, that's it, colonization is done and dusted for good for you

Hostile rep should decay back into Unfriendly after a few days, no? And you're not KOS at Unfriendly. At least this has been my experience with tanking reputation with a minor faction.

 

[Kira Goto]

Interestingly, I found something slightly different: I got rep pre-U3 for deliveries to the colonisation ships, but not to the secondary sites.

I can believe the first was an error, certainly.

I got reputation for a non-Brewer minor faction (Memento Mori) supporting a colonization's primary port near Titan Hadad for my squad, so I'm not sure that it was removed. If it was a mistake to begin with...

... I managed to slip into a construction site of a security station to deliver the illegal items 'unseen' (security didn't start scanning process while I was docking), what I did was just come in with a T8 dropping heatsinks as soon as I dropped in and began boosting toward the construction site, so it is possible. Manual flying, no autodock, and it certainly wouldn't be a great idea to bring these in with a big brick hauler. Although you might manage it with a T9, it's not something I'd recommend.

Is it a particularly intended way of doing things? Probably not, no. But it does add a little spice to the otherwise relatively boring hauling loop, on occasion (sometimes it's welcome that it can be a relatively hands-off experience, don't get me wrong, but most of the time it's relatively uninteresting).

Hostile rep should decay back into Unfriendly after a few days, no?

It does. I never did any Azimuth rep work after going hostile with them (pins badge of honor) but it slowly got back up into Unfriendly anyway. Though it's not by much so getting a fine for illegal goods can slip it back into hostile.

 

[CMDR GFJake]

Hostile rep should decay back into Unfriendly after a few days, no? And you're not KOS at Unfriendly. At least this has been my experience with tanking reputation with a minor faction.

i had a zeroed-out rep gauge with a certain faction, after a few days it had regen half way through the hostile segment, but for the next 3 weeks it didn't move anymore and i stayed permanently hostile with them, im still hostile to them to this day.

 

[darkflemish]

i had a zeroed-out rep gauge with a certain faction, after a few days it had regen half way through the hostile segment, but for the next 3 weeks it didn't move anymore and i stayed permanently hostile with them, im still hostile to them to this day.

Did you gave them cookies? ;-)