Smuggling. Just the word evokes images of speedboats pursued by the navy, of backroom deals, the scent of cuban cigars and flourescent lights yellowed by smoke.
Unfortunately, the current experience in Elite is far from this. The experience of smuggling can pretty much be summed up as follows:
1. Find a station where your cargo is illegal.
2. Pop a single heat sink while docking, instantly making yourself invincible to legal consequences.
3. Sell your cargo at the same price as you'd get anywhere else.
This isn't just a sad disappointment; it's a major opportunity for serious gameplay opportunities. Smuggling could be an amazing and fully-developed aspect of the game! So, let's get started.
Perhaps one of the most important parts of smuggling is the distinction between smuggled vs stolen goods. It makes perfect sense that a Fence will take a cut of the profits of moving stolen goods. It even makes sense that your smuggling contact will likewise take a cut for their risk of doing business. What does NOT make sense is that illegal goods pay the same amount where they are highly illegal, compared to where they are freely traded. For a real world comparison, Cocaine can be bought in Panama for around 5 dollars per gram. By contrast, it costs over 220 dollars per gram in Japan, which isn't even the most expensive location in the world!
This is the first step in making Smuggling worthwhile. If you buy Battle Weapons in an Anarchy system and sell them to Rebels in a high-security dictatorship, you should be seeing substantial return on investment.
However, there's a second key factor involved. You can't have massive profit, unless there's something else keeping that profit reasonable when compared with other credit-making options. And that balancing factor is Risk.
Why are illegal goods valuable?
Not just because they're illegal; far more importantly, because BEING illegal means they're difficult to acquire. If a government makes something illegal, and yet makes no effort to stop trade in that product, the supply will be largely unchanged, and the price will remain unchanged. By contrast, if a government goes to great effort to stop any and all trade of that product, then supply will drop to near-zero, and the price will skyrocket.
This is the second key aspect of smuggling; it needs to be difficult. Difficult enough to significantly reduce the chances of success, and the raw amount of goods hauled. If players are able to easily haul in cutter-loads of drugs to a station, the price offered would have to be very low. By contrast, if the most you can achieve is sneaking in a few tons on an Imperial Eagle, then the prices could be sky-high, and yet still be balanced, both in terms of real-life, as well as in terms of gameplay balance.
To achieve this, there are a few necessary changes that need to take place.
Releasing a heat sink in a station's no-fire zone should immediately issue a player with a fine. Not a large fine, mind you; literally anything will be enough. Why? Because after getting that fine, the player will need to pay it off before they can unload any cargo. And in order to pay off that fine, we lead directly into change number 2:
Paying off fines or bounties should require the voluntary scan of a player's ship, even when docked at the station. If they are found to be carrying illicit goods, they will be given a countdown to surrender them. If they do not surrender or undock in that time limit, they will automatically be captured and sent to the nearest prison ship. If they DO undock, they will be pursued by local police forces, though the station itself will not fire on them unless they return fire.
These two changes alone will dramatically increase the difficulty of varying smuggling activities. Without being able to use Heat Sinks to bypass 99% of scans, players will instead need to rely on specially-engineered ships, Silent Running, as well as quick and skillful piloting, to land instead. Another aspect would be Enviromental Conditions. It shouldn't matter that you're low-heat, if you're shining brightly in the light of an O-class star. Players would be encouraged to dock at stations when in the shadow of the planet, when they can't be as easily spotted by the polizia.
Of course, that alone isn't enough. It's well-known that in many occasions, it's more than enough to just line up outside the NFZ, point towards the slot, and boost, and you can get inside without any difficulties. That's all well and good for low-security or even some medium-security systems, but high security? I can't see Zachary Hudson looking out his window and watching some spike-covered Type-7 boost through the slot of his personal station and just accepting it. Hence, higher security systems should have additional safeguards.
Manifest scanners currently are very binary; they immediately scan the entire inventory, and if you're carrying ANYTHING illegal, you're instantly in trouble. This makes smuggling far too binary. Either you get scanned, or you don't. This eliminates concepts of secrecy, and smuggling is very limited.
Instead, Manifest Scanners should scan your inventory one ton at a time, and players should be able to re-organize their inventory to choose where they want their illegal goods to be. In lower-security systems, the police would have low-quality scanners, and would be likely to stop scanning as soon as they see a few tons of Food Canisters or Biowaste, while high-sec systems would have better technology and would be more likely to scan your entire inventory, requiring either specialized cargo bays for smuggling, which conceal some part of your inventory from cursory scans, or a distraction to cut the scan short before it reaches the illegal goods.
Ships shouldn't just be able to line up from 10km away and boost straight through the slot; some stations should erect blast shields in front of the slot, requiring players to slow down to navigate around them. These would automatically be emplaced when the correct conditions for smuggling exist. Some stations, especially in High Security systems, would ALWAYS have them.
Especially on the slot-side of the station. These would happen in a variety of ways.
From time to time, the police will not simply light-scan you, but will require you to slow down and allow yourself to be deep-scanned. Refusal to do so will be a crime, and would result in a fine. Similarly, being interdicted by the police in space would also result in a fine, if you refuse to comply. Escaping the interdiction would also result in a fine. However, if something else distracts them, they'll immediately cancel their scan and leave to focus on the distraction, instead. This could be another player, committing a nearby crime, or it could be a pre-arranged distraction, using new modules designed for smuggling. In addition to this, there would be police bias, depending on what sort of ship you're flying. In Imperial space, you'll be less likely to be scanned when flying an imperial ship, and more likely to be scanned in a Federal ship. However, if you ARE caught smuggling in the ship of a local power, the penalties will be higher, including immediate and significant losses in REP. Pretending to be something you're not is yet another crime atop the smuggling you're already doing.
Once you dock at the station, it shouldn't be as easy as just dumping your goods at the local black market. Sure, you could do that, but it will never result in the best prices for your goods - or even a fair price.
Once docked, you should be able to get out of your ship and, if you have a good enough familiarity with a local faction, locate the local 'boss', and negotiate the sale of your goods. They will be located on a separate level, deep in the bowels of the station, and you will be able to sneak in a weapon. They might be willing to give you a better price if you offer to bring a certain amount more of the same goods over the next time period; alternatively, you might be able to negotiate based on the current economic situation of the station, and the scarcity of your goods. But beware; Bosses are notoriously finnicky! Each Boss will have a different temperament, which you can discover over multiple deals, or from other factions. Offend them, or push too hard, and they're as likely to open fire as agree to your deal. Then you'll need to fight your way out of the level, and even if you do manage to escape, you'll find your opportunity to offload your goods heavily limited! Nobody wants to get on the mafia's bad side.
Of course, if you're allies with the local mob, they might be willing to provide a distraction to allow you to escape without getting caught - for a fee, of course. Alternatively, you might be able to convince an enemy faction to carry out a raid or attack at a specific time, giving you a chance to leave while the cops are distracted!
Smuggling should be a profession that's extremely risky, yet with profits to spare. It should involve gameplay that you don't experience elsewhere in the game. It should be...amazing.
And it can be.
Unfortunately, the current experience in Elite is far from this. The experience of smuggling can pretty much be summed up as follows:
1. Find a station where your cargo is illegal.
2. Pop a single heat sink while docking, instantly making yourself invincible to legal consequences.
3. Sell your cargo at the same price as you'd get anywhere else.
This isn't just a sad disappointment; it's a major opportunity for serious gameplay opportunities. Smuggling could be an amazing and fully-developed aspect of the game! So, let's get started.
1. Illegal vs Stolen.
Perhaps one of the most important parts of smuggling is the distinction between smuggled vs stolen goods. It makes perfect sense that a Fence will take a cut of the profits of moving stolen goods. It even makes sense that your smuggling contact will likewise take a cut for their risk of doing business. What does NOT make sense is that illegal goods pay the same amount where they are highly illegal, compared to where they are freely traded. For a real world comparison, Cocaine can be bought in Panama for around 5 dollars per gram. By contrast, it costs over 220 dollars per gram in Japan, which isn't even the most expensive location in the world!
This is the first step in making Smuggling worthwhile. If you buy Battle Weapons in an Anarchy system and sell them to Rebels in a high-security dictatorship, you should be seeing substantial return on investment.
However, there's a second key factor involved. You can't have massive profit, unless there's something else keeping that profit reasonable when compared with other credit-making options. And that balancing factor is Risk.
2. Risk.
Why are illegal goods valuable?
Not just because they're illegal; far more importantly, because BEING illegal means they're difficult to acquire. If a government makes something illegal, and yet makes no effort to stop trade in that product, the supply will be largely unchanged, and the price will remain unchanged. By contrast, if a government goes to great effort to stop any and all trade of that product, then supply will drop to near-zero, and the price will skyrocket.
This is the second key aspect of smuggling; it needs to be difficult. Difficult enough to significantly reduce the chances of success, and the raw amount of goods hauled. If players are able to easily haul in cutter-loads of drugs to a station, the price offered would have to be very low. By contrast, if the most you can achieve is sneaking in a few tons on an Imperial Eagle, then the prices could be sky-high, and yet still be balanced, both in terms of real-life, as well as in terms of gameplay balance.
To achieve this, there are a few necessary changes that need to take place.
A: Heat Sinks
Releasing a heat sink in a station's no-fire zone should immediately issue a player with a fine. Not a large fine, mind you; literally anything will be enough. Why? Because after getting that fine, the player will need to pay it off before they can unload any cargo. And in order to pay off that fine, we lead directly into change number 2:
B:Internal Scans to pay off Fines
Paying off fines or bounties should require the voluntary scan of a player's ship, even when docked at the station. If they are found to be carrying illicit goods, they will be given a countdown to surrender them. If they do not surrender or undock in that time limit, they will automatically be captured and sent to the nearest prison ship. If they DO undock, they will be pursued by local police forces, though the station itself will not fire on them unless they return fire.
These two changes alone will dramatically increase the difficulty of varying smuggling activities. Without being able to use Heat Sinks to bypass 99% of scans, players will instead need to rely on specially-engineered ships, Silent Running, as well as quick and skillful piloting, to land instead. Another aspect would be Enviromental Conditions. It shouldn't matter that you're low-heat, if you're shining brightly in the light of an O-class star. Players would be encouraged to dock at stations when in the shadow of the planet, when they can't be as easily spotted by the polizia.
Of course, that alone isn't enough. It's well-known that in many occasions, it's more than enough to just line up outside the NFZ, point towards the slot, and boost, and you can get inside without any difficulties. That's all well and good for low-security or even some medium-security systems, but high security? I can't see Zachary Hudson looking out his window and watching some spike-covered Type-7 boost through the slot of his personal station and just accepting it. Hence, higher security systems should have additional safeguards.
C: Rework Manifest Scanners
Manifest scanners currently are very binary; they immediately scan the entire inventory, and if you're carrying ANYTHING illegal, you're instantly in trouble. This makes smuggling far too binary. Either you get scanned, or you don't. This eliminates concepts of secrecy, and smuggling is very limited.
Instead, Manifest Scanners should scan your inventory one ton at a time, and players should be able to re-organize their inventory to choose where they want their illegal goods to be. In lower-security systems, the police would have low-quality scanners, and would be likely to stop scanning as soon as they see a few tons of Food Canisters or Biowaste, while high-sec systems would have better technology and would be more likely to scan your entire inventory, requiring either specialized cargo bays for smuggling, which conceal some part of your inventory from cursory scans, or a distraction to cut the scan short before it reaches the illegal goods.
D: Barricades.
Ships shouldn't just be able to line up from 10km away and boost straight through the slot; some stations should erect blast shields in front of the slot, requiring players to slow down to navigate around them. These would automatically be emplaced when the correct conditions for smuggling exist. Some stations, especially in High Security systems, would ALWAYS have them.
E: Extended No-Fire Zones.
Especially on the slot-side of the station. These would happen in a variety of ways.
- Sentry Beacons: Beacons which automatically scan ships that fly near them. Some stations would have just a few scattered around, that could be navigated around; others would have complete spheres that must be crossed.
- Extended Patrols: Patrols of police ships significantly beyond the standard radius. These would typically be on the slotward side of the station, but could occasionally be on all sides, especialyl in High-Sec conditions. They will approach and scan any spotted approaching ships.
- Capital Ships: Sometimes Capital Ships would park nearby stations, just outside the standard No-Fire Zone. Not only would they expand the no-fire zone, they would automatically scan anything that comes within 5km of them. They MUST be navigated around.
F: Random checks.
From time to time, the police will not simply light-scan you, but will require you to slow down and allow yourself to be deep-scanned. Refusal to do so will be a crime, and would result in a fine. Similarly, being interdicted by the police in space would also result in a fine, if you refuse to comply. Escaping the interdiction would also result in a fine. However, if something else distracts them, they'll immediately cancel their scan and leave to focus on the distraction, instead. This could be another player, committing a nearby crime, or it could be a pre-arranged distraction, using new modules designed for smuggling. In addition to this, there would be police bias, depending on what sort of ship you're flying. In Imperial space, you'll be less likely to be scanned when flying an imperial ship, and more likely to be scanned in a Federal ship. However, if you ARE caught smuggling in the ship of a local power, the penalties will be higher, including immediate and significant losses in REP. Pretending to be something you're not is yet another crime atop the smuggling you're already doing.
G: New Smuggling Modules.
- Shielded Cargo Racks. Basically just normal cargo racks, but with 50% the normal cargo capacity shielded from view. The other half functions as a normal cargo rack. However, if the police see the carried goods as suspicious, they'll conduct a deeper scan, with a high probability of discovering the hidden goods. Suspicion will be largely based on the profitability of the carried goods. If they're not a profitable trade, they'll find this suspicious, and carry out a second scan. This ensures that players need to maintain a veneer of respectability.
- Time Bombs. These allow the player to deploy a large, flashy, and stealthy explosive device. The player can set a countdown for when it will go off, and if it goes off during a security scan, the police will leave the investigate rather than sticking around. However, this will require skill by the player to ensure it goes off at the right time. It will also alert authorities that SOMETHING is happening, even if they don't know exactly what.
- Recon Limpets. These already exist, but their function will be expanded to allow the hacking of the aforementioned Scanning Beacons. At present, they are limited to E-Grade and their range only goes up to 2km; these would be upgraded to go all the way to A-Grade, which would have much longer range. When they hack the beacon, it will briefly short out their scanning capabilities. However, it will also draw the attention of nearby police, who will search the area for the cause. The player would need to wait for patrols to move away, then time to release of the recon limpet to hack the Beacon at the right time, allowing them to pass by the police as they travel to investigate.
H: Selling.
Once you dock at the station, it shouldn't be as easy as just dumping your goods at the local black market. Sure, you could do that, but it will never result in the best prices for your goods - or even a fair price.
Once docked, you should be able to get out of your ship and, if you have a good enough familiarity with a local faction, locate the local 'boss', and negotiate the sale of your goods. They will be located on a separate level, deep in the bowels of the station, and you will be able to sneak in a weapon. They might be willing to give you a better price if you offer to bring a certain amount more of the same goods over the next time period; alternatively, you might be able to negotiate based on the current economic situation of the station, and the scarcity of your goods. But beware; Bosses are notoriously finnicky! Each Boss will have a different temperament, which you can discover over multiple deals, or from other factions. Offend them, or push too hard, and they're as likely to open fire as agree to your deal. Then you'll need to fight your way out of the level, and even if you do manage to escape, you'll find your opportunity to offload your goods heavily limited! Nobody wants to get on the mafia's bad side.
I: Escape.
Once the player completes the trade and offloads their smuggled goods, the challenge wouldn't be over! If they used a recon limpet or time bomb to bypass defenses, the police will know something happened, and will be scanning exiting ships for the related module. When the player undocks, they will then attempt to do a deep scan of the player, and if the appropriate modules are discovered, they'll immediately issue a bounty on the player corresponding to the offense. Players will need to rapidly leave the area!Of course, if you're allies with the local mob, they might be willing to provide a distraction to allow you to escape without getting caught - for a fee, of course. Alternatively, you might be able to convince an enemy faction to carry out a raid or attack at a specific time, giving you a chance to leave while the cops are distracted!
TLDR
Smuggling should be a profession that's extremely risky, yet with profits to spare. It should involve gameplay that you don't experience elsewhere in the game. It should be...amazing.
And it can be.
