Fleet carriers buying up steel from trailblazer carriers & selling with a huge markup

I would have thought steel would be the worst way to get into scalping. There are stations out there with supplies in the millions.
The easiest way to avoid the 'profiteering' or 'supply and demand' parasites (read plain greed) is to use the commodity search on inara and in the additional options setting fleet carriers and stronghold carriers to 'no' removes them completely from the search results and leaves npc results that use galactic average .
I have never even considered the fleet carriers and would rather not construct at all than submit to that type of greed when, as shown, perfectly reasonable alternatives are available if you are prepared to look.
 
I did a time and motion study to see how long it takes to fly to the nearest trailblazer ship (1 jump there, 2 jumps back) versus various other options (nearest settlement: 1 jump there, 1 jump back -- and orbital: 2 jumps there, 2 jumps back). I found that there is very little difference between flying to a Brewer ship versus planet-based supplier. Sometimes, the planet-based one is faster by about a minute. Of course, this does not account for various piloting errors, interdictions, etc.

My data (roundtrips):
Brewer pickup, 1jump/2jump: 10-12 min
Planet-based, 1jump/1jump: 9-11 min
Orbital, 2jump/2jump: 11-13 min

Trailblazer Dream is still in lockdown which means LOTS of interdictions. I'm getting them about 45% of the time visiting the system.

Happy Hunting.
 
It would seem that there are a percentage of players that are just immature and don't care about anything but their own desires, and they don't even care about rules either and will go to great lengths to avoid or outright break rules. And if you confront them, they get all bent and proclaim "...it's just a game, get over it...".

Why in the world would a player want to attack other players for no apparent reason other than to kill them and take their stuff? That's basic thuggery, and it's a disgrace to humanity. We don't need those types of players around.

And no, it is not "capitalism" to take advantage of a market and inflate prices for personal gain. In the real world, it's "price gouging" and in some places, it's illegal.

But hey, it's just a game, right?

Some people are just pathetic miserable souls that don't care about anything but themselves. They don't want to earn anything, they just want to take it from others.

Contrary to some beliefs, piracy is NOT cool. That is why it's illegal in the real world, and in the open ocean it can get those clowns unalived. Just ask those Somali "pirates" trying to attack ships off the coast of Africa!

If you think being a "pirate" is cool, you need to rethink your principles!

I'm rather disappointed that ED seems to promote piracy as a play method without giving players a legitimate means to deal with such thugs. "Notoriety"? Yeah, whatever, that brings virtually no repercussions and is definitely not a deterrent.

/end_rant
 
It would seem that there are a percentage of players that are just immature and don't care about anything but their own desires, and they don't even care about rules either and will go to great lengths to avoid or outright break rules.
What rules are being broken?
Why in the world would a player want to attack other players for no apparent reason other than to kill them and take their stuff?
Because it's an option in the game? If it wasn't...
That's basic thuggery, and it's a disgrace to humanity. We don't need those types of players around.
... then FD wouldn't put it in. As it stands, solo exists, don't have to worry about other players there.
And no, it is not "capitalism" to take advantage of a market and inflate prices for personal gain. In the real world, it's "price gouging" and in some places, it's illegal.

But hey, it's just a game, right?
Yes, it's just a game, so no big deal.
Some people are just pathetic miserable souls that don't care about anything but themselves. They don't want to earn anything, they just want to take it from others.

Contrary to some beliefs, piracy is NOT cool. That is why it's illegal in the real world, and in the open ocean it can get those clowns unalived. Just ask those Somali "pirates" trying to attack ships off the coast of Africa!
If you think being a "pirate" is cool, you need to rethink your principles!
Ah... this is another one of those toxic "how you play a game reflects your real world attitudes" posts.

Sorry mate, these sorts of posts are the real harassment... taking personal exception to someone's life conduct simply based on how they play a game, and broadcasting it around the internet. Pretty juvenile.

I did a fanatic purifier run in Stellaris once. Clearly the Hague is the only place i belong
I'm rather disappointed that ED seems to promote piracy as a play method without giving players a legitimate means to deal with such thugs. "Notoriety"? Yeah, whatever, that brings virtually no repercussions and is definitely not a deterrent.

/end_rant
That's because ED want piracy and PvP to be part of the game.... if they didn't, they'd remove it from the game.

Tbh, there's some robust discussions to be had in that field, but it's generally impossible to even start these discussions in a meaningful way when this flavour of vindictive and spiteful posting colours that discussion from the get-go, of course nothing meaningful happens.

A solution to this "problem" starts with acknowledging players can and should be able to attack other players in Open. If you start from there, a much more productive discussion can be had, as you quickly discover this part of the game is the most bolt-on, underbaked and unrewarding aspect of the game.
 
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What rules are being broken?

Because it's an option in the game? If it wasn't...

... then FD wouldn't put it in. As it stands, solo exists, don't have to worry about other players there.

Yes, it's just a game, so no big deal.


Ah... this is another one of those toxic "how you play a game reflects your real world attitudes" posts.

Sorry mate, these sorts of posts are the real harassment... taking personal exception to someone's life conduct simply based on how they play a game, and broadcasting it around the internet. Pretty juvenile.

I did a fanatic purifier run in Stellaris once. Clearly the Hague is the only place i belong

That's because ED want piracy and PvP to be part of the game.... if they didn't, they'd remove it from the game.

Tbh, there's some robust discussions to be had in that field, but it's generally impossible to even start these discussions in a meaningful way... but when this flavour of vindictive and spiteful posting colours that discussion from the get-go, of course nothing meaningful happens.

A solution to this "problem" starts with acknowledging players can and should be able to attack other players in Open. If you start from there, a much more productive discussion can be had, as you quickly discover this part of the game is the most bolt-on, underbaked and unrewarding aspect of the game.

- Rules in games in general. I thought the context of the post made that rather clear.

- You can jump off a cliff because it's there, but that doesn't mean you should! Seriously, that is the very "get over it" logic I'm talking about.

- Yes, it is a big deal to some. But I guess since you think it isn't, everybody should think like you? And if they don't, you resort to claims of "toxic", "real harassment", "pretty juvenile", "flavour of vindictive and spiteful posting". WOW.

- "...broadcasting it around the internet..."? Exaggerate much?

- I'm willing to bet there are one or more things that ED has in the game that you don't like. But when others comment they don't like something you have no problem with, they are somehow wrong. Got it.

- "A solution to this "problem"..."? We already know it can, and is done in ED, we are past that point of the conversation. Things can change, and be improved upon. ED could make it so that being a pirate has zero merit, and comes with severe consequences that discourages such activity.

I don't like piracy. I'm also just one opinion.

And for the record, I never play in Open because I have zero interest in being around such players.
 
And no, it is not "capitalism" to take advantage of a market and inflate prices for personal gain. In the real world, it's "price gouging" and in some places, it's illegal.

But hey, it's just a game, right?
....
Contrary to some beliefs, piracy is NOT cool. That is why it's illegal in the real world, and in the open ocean it can get those clowns unalived. Just ask those Somali "pirates" trying to attack ships off the coast of Africa!

Elite, even in 1984, was the kind of game where pirates, hostile mercenaries and out and out bad guys abounded. It was never Disneyland 🐭

Yes, I avoid Open because I can't the malice of people who are just out to ruin your day. But if open mode was full of players who truly roleplay instead of using it to excuse bad behavior then I'd be in Open 3 or 4 days a week.

And to those who insist such bad behaviour doesn't exist or is rare, you're not fooling anyone. People do know the difference.
 
- Rules in games in general. I thought the context of the post made that rather clear.
So... no rules have been broken then. Unless you can point me to something in the EULA that was broken.
- You can jump off a cliff because it's there, but that doesn't mean you should! Seriously, that is the very "get over it" logic I'm talking about.
No, you wouldn't, because that's got severe consequence.
I multi-account some games. If there was a rule against multi-accounting, I wouldn't do it, even if I could.

- Yes, it is a big deal to some. But I guess since you think it isn't, everybody should think like you? And if they don't, you resort to claims of "toxic", "real harassment", "pretty juvenile", "flavour of vindictive and spiteful posting". WOW.
You yourself said:

"Why in the world would a player want to attack other players for no apparent reason other than to kill them and take their stuff? That's basic thuggery, and it's a disgrace to humanity."

So, someone coming on, to play the game within the rules the game sets out, is a "disgrace to humanity".

Sounds pretty toxic to me.
- "...broadcasting it around the internet..."? Exaggerate much?
This is the internet, and your post is viewable publicly. Sounds like broadcasting on the internet to me.
- I'm willing to bet there are one or more things that ED has in the game that you don't like. But when others comment they don't like something you have no problem with, they are somehow wrong. Got it.
There's plenty in ED I don't like. I don't call people doing those things a "disgrace to humanity"... I call out ED's game design instead. Like I said, plenty to be talked about with regards to things in this space

People talk about the lack of consequence for crime in the game. That's because there's a lack of reward in the first place. This is hardly the thread for discussing that though... to reign it back in, for reasons I don't really need to understand, people can't look beyond a single location for sourcing materials.... but I guess people will pay for convenience.

Honestly, if people are stockpiling/reselling steel... they're pretty amateur... there's other things they could be targeting with much better effect. I personally welcome that Colonisation has finally brought some player-driven demand to the game, and it's a real shame that CMMs and Insulating Membranes got their resupply rates buffed, because there was no issue sourcing them if you looked outside one station. Why shouldn't people be able to markup when enabling logistics for others?

Of course that can lead to price gouging, but bluntly, these are incredibly amateur and ineffective actions at this point.
- "A solution to this "problem"..."? We already know it can, and is done in ED, we are past that point of the conversation. Things can change, and be improved upon. ED could make it so that being a pirate has zero merit, and comes with severe consequences that discourages such activity.
Except once again, FD has clearly designed a game such that being a pirate should be merited. The fact it isn't done properly is exactly what leads to people ganking at a CG out of boredom...

If FD didn't want players to attack other players, we'd all clip through each other, weapons would just pass through each other... there would be zero interactions between players. Putting in things that are non-options like overwhelming punishments for actions with no actual reward is trash-bin game design. Want high consequences? There should also be high reward. In that way, you can apply a strata approach to crime; by applying heavy penalties to particular crimes which force criminals to assess "Is it worth it, given the consequence". That's impossible in the current game design, because there is no reward for PvP, and therefore it's impossible to apply measured consequences.

Conversely, if there's meant to be demand for goods, then players should be able to charge a premium for their provision as a substitution for the time to source them themselves. There can't be player-driven markets without player-driven demand, whether that's caused by hording, gold rushes or even just locking down supply ports.

Criminal gameplay has always been best designed when there's big incentives to do it, but bigger punishment if/when you get caught, whether it's that day or 5 years down the track.

That all rests in ED's game design. Again. To attack players doing things in the game, without exploits, that the game is designed to allow is the only "disgraceful conduct" here. As crude as the saying is, "Don't hate the player, hate the game". I think there's much more that can be done in this space, but that conversation can only happen when people talk about the problems in the game design, and not perceived problems of other people.

EDIT: To circle it back to this topic... the "hording/reselling" we see is an artefact of the market tools in-game not being particularly effective. There's no shortage of these things by any measure... it's just the barrier to entry to using ingame tools is high, so most people generally don't know how to find goods.

The fix to that is FD needs to fix their in-game market tools to be more intuitive and useful... indeed for all people rave about it, even using Inara effectively seems a strech for quite a few on the forums.
 
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And to those who insist such bad behaviour doesn't exist or is rare, you're not fooling anyone. People do know the difference.
Yup, though I'd draw a distinction between behaviours (which also underpin player intent) and actions within the game. A player killing another player can't be presumed a griefer... unless the attacker then ducked off to reddit with something like "Lol ganked this nub T9 with no shields... QQ get rekt" which, yes, is a common behaviour.
 
And no, it is not "capitalism" to take advantage of a market and inflate prices for personal gain. In the real world, it's "price gouging" and in some places, it's illegal.
For it to be "price gouging" it actually has to be successful, though.

If I offer a packet of crisps on Ebay for £1,000,000 that's an incredibly inflated price for crisps, and I'm highly unlikely to get any buyers, but it's not price-gouging in any form because I don't control a sufficient proportion of the crisps supply. There are no laws against me doing that. It's not going to get any but the worst journalists reporting "major inflation as price of crisps rises to £1,000,000 per packet".

Similarly anyone with Steel on their carrier market at significantly more than the NPC market price is either:
- obviously not going to make a sale, precisely because there are millions of tonnes on the NPC markets, so why does it matter in the slightest?
- intending to jump out to the end of one of the 500+LY colony chains next where the markup is a hauling fee for not having to go back to the bubble yourself [1]

[1] For 500 LY it's probably a little on the high side. But on the other hand if someone has tens of billions of spare credits from Spire parties or similar, the marginal utility of those credits is extremely low and the difference between charging 30k/t and 300k/t is essentially zero to them anyway.

This isn't that one social media site which censors half the dictionary, you're fine to write "killed" here.

That's because ED want piracy and PvP to be part of the game.... if they didn't, they'd remove it from the game.
And similarly, the original price bands for cargo sales on carriers were 0.1-10x galactic average price.

Frontier increased that to allow up to 100x galactic average price when it was pointed out that
- 10x means you can't even charge the range that certain NPC markets do
- the value of a commodity where the NPC markets aren't plentiful is in the collection and hauling time, which you can't really compensate for most goods at 10x (and some of the cheap ones are doubtful even at 100x)

Frontier wouldn't have put it up to 100x if they hadn't wanted people to have the option to charge that much.
 
Yes it's happening! As the post title suggests, some cmdrs are profiteering off the trailblazer carriers stock, steel for example being sold for 300k per ton! Lol.
Is this legitimate?
As intended?
Gotta love em though hehehe.
Well, these commanders will only profit from it if someone is silly enough to pay the high price. If someone is silly enough to do that then they should learn a thing or two about how to trade and make money (ie. buy low, sell high).
 
Well, these commanders will only profit from it if someone is silly enough to pay the high price. If someone is silly enough to do that then they should learn a thing or two about how to trade and make money (ie. buy low, sell high).
And not only that.. if someone does pay that price, it must be worth it to them.

For me, when finding other sources is, well, trivial... there's no value in those prices... but value is subjective... I'm sure it's worth it when you have hundreds of billions of credits 🤷‍♀️
 
And not only that.. if someone does pay that price, it must be worth it to them.

For me, when finding other sources is, well, trivial... there's no value in those prices... but value is subjective... I'm sure it's worth it when you have hundreds of billions of credits 🤷‍♀️

I do love how people make a moral judgement about people who are happy spending their fake-space-money on things, especially when the fake-space-money is not only worthless in real life but is also pretty worthless in the game to anyone who’s been playing a while or took part in the Thargoid War.

All while living in a world where some people spend more on a watch than even the well paid earn on a year… 🤔
 
There's no steel shortage, and fleet carrier resellers don't disrupt the market at all. I get what I need from a nearby surface port—my 730-ton Cutter is literally unable to run it dry, the production speed is fast enough to keep up with my 10...12 minute round trip. The Trailblazer megaships are purely for the convenience of getting all the small amount items at the same time and same place. I only pick up some of the bulk material from them if I have empty cargo space left.
 
Hi All :)

There's an easy solution to all this. It could be termed 'Emergent Gameplay'. :devilish:

Fill a disposable ship, A Hauler for example with remotely detonated mines. Land on / in the other players carrier's shipyard. Hail your getaway ship, get aboard, exit the carrier and retire to a safe distance.
Contact the player and politely ask 'If you don't lower your prices significantly I will detonate my 'fire ship' at your shipyard'
If the player refuses your generous offer, detonate the mines. The players Carrier's shipyard would then be out of action (complete with colourful graphic explosion effects) for a set period of time, and all cargo therein would be lost. Obviously you (the terrorist) would then be a wanted Cmdr. but well, that's the price of emergent gameplay :cool:

Though of course, there'd be enough 'salt' flying about to fill a T9's cargo bay! :ROFLMAO:

Jack :)
 
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So... no rules have been broken then. Unless you can point me to something in the EULA that was broken.

No, you wouldn't, because that's got severe consequence.
I multi-account some games. If there was a rule against multi-accounting, I wouldn't do it, even if I could.


You yourself said:

"Why in the world would a player want to attack other players for no apparent reason other than to kill them and take their stuff? That's basic thuggery, and it's a disgrace to humanity."

So, someone coming on, to play the game within the rules the game sets out, is a "disgrace to humanity".

Sounds pretty toxic to me.

This is the internet, and your post is viewable publicly. Sounds like broadcasting on the internet to me.

There's plenty in ED I don't like. I don't call people doing those things a "disgrace to humanity"... I call out ED's game design instead. Like I said, plenty to be talked about with regards to things in this space

People talk about the lack of consequence for crime in the game. That's because there's a lack of reward in the first place. This is hardly the thread for discussing that though... to reign it back in, for reasons I don't really need to understand, people can't look beyond a single location for sourcing materials.... but I guess people will pay for convenience.

Honestly, if people are stockpiling/reselling steel... they're pretty amateur... there's other things they could be targeting with much better effect. I personally welcome that Colonisation has finally brought some player-driven demand to the game, and it's a real shame that CMMs and Insulating Membranes got their resupply rates buffed, because there was no issue sourcing them if you looked outside one station. Why shouldn't people be able to markup when enabling logistics for others?

Of course that can lead to price gouging, but bluntly, these are incredibly amateur and ineffective actions at this point.

Except once again, FD has clearly designed a game such that being a pirate should be merited. The fact it isn't done properly is exactly what leads to people ganking at a CG out of boredom...

If FD didn't want players to attack other players, we'd all clip through each other, weapons would just pass through each other... there would be zero interactions between players. Putting in things that are non-options like overwhelming punishments for actions with no actual reward is trash-bin game design. Want high consequences? There should also be high reward. In that way, you can apply a strata approach to crime; by applying heavy penalties to particular crimes which force criminals to assess "Is it worth it, given the consequence". That's impossible in the current game design, because there is no reward for PvP, and therefore it's impossible to apply measured consequences.

Conversely, if there's meant to be demand for goods, then players should be able to charge a premium for their provision as a substitution for the time to source them themselves. There can't be player-driven markets without player-driven demand, whether that's caused by hording, gold rushes or even just locking down supply ports.

Criminal gameplay has always been best designed when there's big incentives to do it, but bigger punishment if/when you get caught, whether it's that day or 5 years down the track.

That all rests in ED's game design. Again. To attack players doing things in the game, without exploits, that the game is designed to allow is the only "disgraceful conduct" here. As crude as the saying is, "Don't hate the player, hate the game". I think there's much more that can be done in this space, but that conversation can only happen when people talk about the problems in the game design, and not perceived problems of other people.

EDIT: To circle it back to this topic... the "hording/reselling" we see is an artefact of the market tools in-game not being particularly effective. There's no shortage of these things by any measure... it's just the barrier to entry to using ingame tools is high, so most people generally don't know how to find goods.

The fix to that is FD needs to fix their in-game market tools to be more intuitive and useful... indeed for all people rave about it, even using Inara effectively seems a strech for quite a few on the forums.

Selling steel at "a premium" is the topic, not piracy. I apologize for introducing an off-topic side conversation. I only meant to make a point about player mentality.

I'm going to side with civility and leave it at that. Both of us have shared our thoughts on some off-topic matters which is sufficient to serve as food for thought. I was talking about the mentality of some video game players, not whether or not they violated the terms of service of this game. I never accused anyone of violating the TOS here in ED.

I will say this...

...selling steel for an astronomical price markup is the player's choice, the market will handle it accordingly.

Is it legal within the rules of ED? Seems to be. But is it really "capitalism"? Not directly, but is a result of having an open market and the reality that some humans are greedy. I support "free enterprise", and I encourage fair trade. I do not support the mentality of trying to gouge others. It may be legal in ED, but I don't have to support such practices and will exercise my right to not buy their products.

For the record, I'm former US Navy. We tend to not like certain activities on the high seas! But that has nothing to do with the price of steel in Colonia in a video game!
 
For the record, I'm former US Navy. We tend to not like certain activities on the high seas!
Internet_dog.jpg
 
Hi All :)

There's an easy solution to all this. It could be be termed 'Emergent Gameplay'. :devilish:

Fill a disposable ship, A Hauler for example with remotely detonated mines. Land on / in the other players carrier's shipyard. Hail your getaway ship, get aboard, exit the carrier and retire to a safe distance.
Contact the player and politely ask 'If you don't lower your prices significantly I will detonate my 'fire ship' at your shipyard'
If the player refuses your generous offer, detonate the mines. The players Carrier's shipyard would then be out of action (complete with colourful graphic explosion effects) for a set period of time, and all cargo therein would be lost. Obviously you (the terrorist) would then be a wanted Cmdr. but well, that's the price of emergent gameplay :cool:

Though of course, there'd be enough 'salt' flying about to fill a T9's cargo bay! :ROFLMAO:

Jack :)

I like the idea behind it though! It gives players a way to deal with situations.

That is in line with there being consequences to actions. Some actions in ED don't have enough consequences. Players need a way to counter-act other player's actions.

A consequence of highly inflated steel prices? Buy elsewhere.

It's a pain to some extent, but in time I think such practices will fade away in time when players realize they can't really get sales with such inflated prices. They will be stuck with a garage full of products they can't sell, just like in the real world! :sneaky:
 
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