The current economy system is...well, 'Jury-Rigged' would be putting it kindly.
Price is set seemingly arbitrarily, and gets modified invisibly by a host of different factors. But then Demand - which 99% of the time is completely independent of Price - comes in that last 1% of the time and breaks everything, because if the demand hits zero, every other aspect instantly becomes irrelevant. It's convoluted, and doesn't make very much sense. It resembles a brokerage system in some ways, a supply-demand system in others, and is counter-intuitive in just about every way.
You can have a system with 1,000,000 demand, but rock-bottom prices. The next system over, you can have a system with 100 demand, but the best prices in the galaxy. A system can have 'high demand, suggesting a good price', and yet pay terribly, or have 'low demand, suggesting a bad price', and yet pay extremely well, but only if sold in small lots.
I'd like to propose it be changed to a system purely based around demand.
tldr: Demand increases every day. The higher the demand, the higher the price. This means unvisited stations will naturally get high prices as time passes, while more often visited stations will instead trigger BGS states that cause their demand, and therefore their prices, to increase more rapidly.
A brief note before I start: This suggestion is NOT about creating a working economy. That requires commodities to have actual demand, not pseudo-demand generated by code at fixed intervals, and is way too complicated to do in a game like this(in my opinion). The purpose of this suggestion is purely about making the trade system more integrated and understandable, with side benefits of creating fun new possibilities for trading across the galaxy.
Cool? Cool.
Fundamentals
Firstly, all commodities would have two default statistics; A galactic average PRICE, and a galactic average DEMAND.
The AVERAGE PRICE would be the price you would see at zero demand EVERYWHERE, no matter the economy. (Functionally identical to the current galactic average) You can sell at this minimum price anywhere you go.
Average DEMAND, by contrast, would set how that price would then be modified. For every increment of this number, the price of the commodity would increase by 10%.
Take Osmium, for example. The galactic average price might be set at 50k, and the galactic average demand set at 1000. This means that for every 1000 demand the station has, the price of Osmium would increase by 10%. At 1000 Demand, the price would be 55000. At 10000 demand, the price would be 100,000. At 100,000 demand, the price would be 1 million. Obviously, you wouldn't see 1 million demand very often; we'll get to that in a moment.
Now take Clothing as a contrasting example. The galactic average price might be set at 800, and the galactic average demand set at 25000. This means that for every 25000 demand, the price increases by 10%, or 80 credits. 25000 demand = 880. 250000 demand = 8000. 2.5 million demand =80,000.
Now, a real-life example.
Osmium at an untouched station with default demand(1000), the price would be 10% higher than the default price(50k), or 55k. If a player were to sell 1000 Osmium to this station, they would know that they would get halfway between the price for the current demand and the minimum demand. IE, they would get 55k for their first sold Osmium, and 50k for their last sold Osmium, and an average of 52.5k each for every Osmium sold. Ideally, this would update as the player selects more to be sold, showing them the average price being paid for each individual commodity.
Straightforward so far.
Now, what would control the demand, and therefore price?
The Daily Tick
Every station in the galaxy adds demand every day. Demand for commodities they DON'T want stays at zero, obviously, but for every commodity they DO want, it increments every 24 hours. Further, every station would have a multiplier for the default demand, controlling how MUCH demand is added each day. Refinery stations, for example, might add the full galactic demand every day, or even more than that, to all MINERALS. However, their demand for other goods would be relatively smaller; they might only increase in demand for clothing by half the default demand every day, assuming they want it at all.
This means that every day this demand isn't met, the price increases. In some cases this increase would be small; clothing might go up 80 credits per day, maybe as much as 160 or 240 in a Colony economy. That would be represented by wanting 25-50k clothing per day.
In other cases, the price increase would be large but the demand numbers smaller. Demand for Alexandrite, for example, might only go up by 500 per day, but because of the large base price, the absolute increase to price would be relatively larger, increasing by 25-50k/day.
This increase in demand is persistant, so the next day, it increases yet again, and the price goes even higher.
BGS States
Moving on to BGS states; BGS states would simply multiply the daily demand gain of a station. For example, Boom might multiply the demand INCREASE of a station by 2.5x, and Public Holiday might further multiply the demand increase by 5x. So rather than gaining 1k per day, a system at zero demand in Boom and Public Holiday would now increase by 12.5k per day, and at the same time increase in price by the same amount. So the new price after the first day(from zero demand) would be 12.5x higher than the standard.
Lastly, this whole equation would need to be limited to prevent a station being forgotten for years and suddenly paying 10m/each for Biowaste. So we modify the equation. Rather than Y=1000X(for osmium in the above example), you make it Y=1000000x/(x+1000), which causes the price to asymptote at 1000000 demand.
Now, let's take an example. A ground station hasn't had a player trading at it for 100 days. It's a Colony economy, so it gains 25% the Osmium demand every day, and 150% the Clothing demand every day.
27500 Osmium Demand, after 100 days, or an Osmium price of 113,750. A decent price, but nothing gamebreaking.
3,412,500 Clothing Demand, after 100 days, or a Clothing price of 109,200! This is a FANTASTIC price for Clothing, BUT it assumes that no player has traded here in over 100 days.
On the flip side, BGS states like Bust or Famine will instead reduce these numbers, often dramatically, perhaps resetting them to zero over their duration, while dramatically boosting the demand for food and basic supplies. The odds of Bust happening randomly increases as demand itself increases.
Here's an image of how the demand would increase as days pass. In economics, I believe this is known as a Utility Function.
Source: https://i.imgur.com/tcm5eb4.png
What does it all mean?
This might all sound a bit confusing, but it boils down to something very simple; the higher the demand, the higher the price. The longer a market has gone without a player selling to it, the higher the demand, and therefore price, will grow. This means that any commodity can become worth trading, given enough time without players having traded there. This means that distant stations would often be the best trade routes, as the further away they are, the less players will trade there, and the more valuable all commodities will be to trade there.
For example, a commodity like Clothing currently is rarely if ever worth trading, since its average price is just 808. BUT, with this new system, the demand for Clothing would grow steadily across the galaxy, until eventually, it would reach a point of being worth trading.
Take lesser-traded goods, like Methanol Monohydrate Crystals. They might have a very small relative demand(like 10), but given enough time, they could increase in demand until the price becomes quite good. However, the total demand would still be quite low(around 900 after 100 days), so a single cutter load would quickly drop the price down to more reasonable levels.
And wait too long, and a Bust may come and knock all prices back to their starting levels.
Price is set seemingly arbitrarily, and gets modified invisibly by a host of different factors. But then Demand - which 99% of the time is completely independent of Price - comes in that last 1% of the time and breaks everything, because if the demand hits zero, every other aspect instantly becomes irrelevant. It's convoluted, and doesn't make very much sense. It resembles a brokerage system in some ways, a supply-demand system in others, and is counter-intuitive in just about every way.
You can have a system with 1,000,000 demand, but rock-bottom prices. The next system over, you can have a system with 100 demand, but the best prices in the galaxy. A system can have 'high demand, suggesting a good price', and yet pay terribly, or have 'low demand, suggesting a bad price', and yet pay extremely well, but only if sold in small lots.
I'd like to propose it be changed to a system purely based around demand.
tldr: Demand increases every day. The higher the demand, the higher the price. This means unvisited stations will naturally get high prices as time passes, while more often visited stations will instead trigger BGS states that cause their demand, and therefore their prices, to increase more rapidly.
A brief note before I start: This suggestion is NOT about creating a working economy. That requires commodities to have actual demand, not pseudo-demand generated by code at fixed intervals, and is way too complicated to do in a game like this(in my opinion). The purpose of this suggestion is purely about making the trade system more integrated and understandable, with side benefits of creating fun new possibilities for trading across the galaxy.
Cool? Cool.
Fundamentals
Firstly, all commodities would have two default statistics; A galactic average PRICE, and a galactic average DEMAND.
The AVERAGE PRICE would be the price you would see at zero demand EVERYWHERE, no matter the economy. (Functionally identical to the current galactic average) You can sell at this minimum price anywhere you go.
Average DEMAND, by contrast, would set how that price would then be modified. For every increment of this number, the price of the commodity would increase by 10%.
Take Osmium, for example. The galactic average price might be set at 50k, and the galactic average demand set at 1000. This means that for every 1000 demand the station has, the price of Osmium would increase by 10%. At 1000 Demand, the price would be 55000. At 10000 demand, the price would be 100,000. At 100,000 demand, the price would be 1 million. Obviously, you wouldn't see 1 million demand very often; we'll get to that in a moment.
Now take Clothing as a contrasting example. The galactic average price might be set at 800, and the galactic average demand set at 25000. This means that for every 25000 demand, the price increases by 10%, or 80 credits. 25000 demand = 880. 250000 demand = 8000. 2.5 million demand =80,000.
Now, a real-life example.
Osmium at an untouched station with default demand(1000), the price would be 10% higher than the default price(50k), or 55k. If a player were to sell 1000 Osmium to this station, they would know that they would get halfway between the price for the current demand and the minimum demand. IE, they would get 55k for their first sold Osmium, and 50k for their last sold Osmium, and an average of 52.5k each for every Osmium sold. Ideally, this would update as the player selects more to be sold, showing them the average price being paid for each individual commodity.
Straightforward so far.
Now, what would control the demand, and therefore price?
The Daily Tick
Every station in the galaxy adds demand every day. Demand for commodities they DON'T want stays at zero, obviously, but for every commodity they DO want, it increments every 24 hours. Further, every station would have a multiplier for the default demand, controlling how MUCH demand is added each day. Refinery stations, for example, might add the full galactic demand every day, or even more than that, to all MINERALS. However, their demand for other goods would be relatively smaller; they might only increase in demand for clothing by half the default demand every day, assuming they want it at all.
This means that every day this demand isn't met, the price increases. In some cases this increase would be small; clothing might go up 80 credits per day, maybe as much as 160 or 240 in a Colony economy. That would be represented by wanting 25-50k clothing per day.
In other cases, the price increase would be large but the demand numbers smaller. Demand for Alexandrite, for example, might only go up by 500 per day, but because of the large base price, the absolute increase to price would be relatively larger, increasing by 25-50k/day.
This increase in demand is persistant, so the next day, it increases yet again, and the price goes even higher.
BGS States
Moving on to BGS states; BGS states would simply multiply the daily demand gain of a station. For example, Boom might multiply the demand INCREASE of a station by 2.5x, and Public Holiday might further multiply the demand increase by 5x. So rather than gaining 1k per day, a system at zero demand in Boom and Public Holiday would now increase by 12.5k per day, and at the same time increase in price by the same amount. So the new price after the first day(from zero demand) would be 12.5x higher than the standard.
Lastly, this whole equation would need to be limited to prevent a station being forgotten for years and suddenly paying 10m/each for Biowaste. So we modify the equation. Rather than Y=1000X(for osmium in the above example), you make it Y=1000000x/(x+1000), which causes the price to asymptote at 1000000 demand.
Now, let's take an example. A ground station hasn't had a player trading at it for 100 days. It's a Colony economy, so it gains 25% the Osmium demand every day, and 150% the Clothing demand every day.
27500 Osmium Demand, after 100 days, or an Osmium price of 113,750. A decent price, but nothing gamebreaking.
3,412,500 Clothing Demand, after 100 days, or a Clothing price of 109,200! This is a FANTASTIC price for Clothing, BUT it assumes that no player has traded here in over 100 days.
On the flip side, BGS states like Bust or Famine will instead reduce these numbers, often dramatically, perhaps resetting them to zero over their duration, while dramatically boosting the demand for food and basic supplies. The odds of Bust happening randomly increases as demand itself increases.
Here's an image of how the demand would increase as days pass. In economics, I believe this is known as a Utility Function.
Source: https://i.imgur.com/tcm5eb4.png
What does it all mean?
This might all sound a bit confusing, but it boils down to something very simple; the higher the demand, the higher the price. The longer a market has gone without a player selling to it, the higher the demand, and therefore price, will grow. This means that any commodity can become worth trading, given enough time without players having traded there. This means that distant stations would often be the best trade routes, as the further away they are, the less players will trade there, and the more valuable all commodities will be to trade there.
For example, a commodity like Clothing currently is rarely if ever worth trading, since its average price is just 808. BUT, with this new system, the demand for Clothing would grow steadily across the galaxy, until eventually, it would reach a point of being worth trading.
Take lesser-traded goods, like Methanol Monohydrate Crystals. They might have a very small relative demand(like 10), but given enough time, they could increase in demand until the price becomes quite good. However, the total demand would still be quite low(around 900 after 100 days), so a single cutter load would quickly drop the price down to more reasonable levels.
And wait too long, and a Bust may come and knock all prices back to their starting levels.
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