TL;DR: Trading is pretty boring, and not challenging. It needs more stuff to make it less boring and more challenging.
Introduction; the percieved problem
Trading has always been a cornerstone of elite. It's often described as a space trading sim, even.
In Elite : Dangerous, trading has, just like in the earlier iterations, a very central role. I don't think anyone can doubt that it currently is the main income source in the game. At the same time, however, there's problems. Many people view trading as a ''grind'' that you have to do in order to achieve enough capital for a ''fun'' career doing something else.
High end trading often consists of travelling on the same back-and-forth route until you feel like doing something else. Rare trading spans over long distances, but in the end, it is even more static: To maximize profits, you have to go from a rare selling system to another, at the optimal distance where time/Cr is maximum.
There's little use in going on long trade runs with anything else than rares, and when you are trading rares, it is simply about distance, nothing else.
There's practically no reason to not simply trade in the really valuable goods, like Superconductors, Tobacco, Progenitor cells and Palladium. Occasionally, in very Cmdr-dense places, some goods like Tantalum can actually yield more profit, but there's pretty much no reason to ever trade in things like Grain, Aluminium, Polymers... unless you are just starting out and do not have enough capital to buy anything else than ''noob-goods''.
Trading doesn't really seem to affect the background simulation. More trading means more wealth in the system, but AFAIK, that's everything that happens. We are going to get famines, but it seems like they are going to be injected events.
There's pretty much no reason to smuggle illegal goods. In some rare circumstances (like the Eranin Liquor smuggling), you could get a small increase in profits, but since most outlawed goods are the cheaper ones (like narcotics), you're better off just trading high value goods.
The only real threat is player pirates. The NPC pirates are remarkably incompetent.
There currently seems to be serious problems with the trading system in itself. The Crazy times of mines that bought gold are over, but there's a lot of reports of a current bug where two players get different prices simultaneously at the same market.
This obviously needs to be fixed.
All right, that's the introduction. Here follows: my suggestions. They can be treated as one large suggestion, or they can be treated individually. Some of the things here have been suggested before.
Suggestion 1
The niche/mixed economies need to return
Back in the early Beta, with the planet Chango in I Bootis we got to see how a niche economy could work.
The planet and its space station was a Marine Agriculture/Industrial station.
The original plan for niche economies went something like this: Large core worlds would not specialize, they would just be ''Industrial'' or ''Agricultural'' like now. Small frontier worlds might not be capable of specializing either, it's hard to sustain yourself on the frontier just by producing Tea and Coffee. Medium sized worlds, however, would often have specialized economies or mixed economies, like Chango. So, what's the good thing with this?
Having niche economies and mixed economies quickly makes things a lot more complex. There might be agricultural worlds that hapily buy your Coffee or Animal meat. If it's a marine agriculture, they might not pay well for Crop harvesters, but a lot more for marine equipment. Or maybe the world is a mixed (Mar)Agriculture/(Mech)Industrial? And so on.
Another great side effect: This, in a way, helps the world get more varied. Chango was a vast water world, with floating cities. It was all pretty interesting. Now it's a dull Agri-world like any other. The old flavor text is still there, in some kind of taunt, but the planet actually has more land than water. This brings us to my second suggestion:
Suggestion 2
How planets, events and states should affect the trading game
Firstly, for an agricultural economy, the type of niche economy would greatly depend on the actual environment of the planet. If it's a large temperate world, it's more likely to be a general Agriculture world, even more so if it has a very high population (the larger the population, the less likelyhood of a specialized economy). Tundral worlds would be more likely to have a Staple-based Agricultural economy, producing things like Grain. These worlds might be more likely to have a mixed economy, also producing something else. Tropical worlds like Azeban would be more likely to be devoted to various forms of Cash Crops, growin Tea, Coffee, Cotton (Natural fabrics) and so on. Worlds with a lot of water life (either local or introduced) would be more likely to have a marine economy.
Here's an important thing: Mineral oil, being a by-product of crude oil processing, which comes from fossilized organic material, should only be exported from worlds that have had life for more than a few hundred years. Basically, only planets that are naturally life bearing should produce oil. The economy of that planet shouldn't matter for oil production as long as it is settled, and because of the many uses mineral oil has in things ranging from machinery to biomedicine, it should be a highly valued good in some parts of the galaxy.
An undersupply of critical goods (for any population: Food and basic medicine, but for space stations also water purifiers) can lead to a crisis. This should, in my opinion, be something the game does on its own. I know that the devs will be able to ''moderate'' all events that happen, but I hope that, unless they interfere directly, things like this will happen on their own. Before entering a ''crisis state'', there should be a phase where the ruling faction actively tries to prevent the crisis, by raising the prices of the goods they need, but also by offering missions not only on their own but also on nearby system's bulletin boards. Here's what I think a crisis could do:
Famine: Critical undersupply of foodstuffs
Prior to outbreak:
- Inflated food prices
- Ruling faction offers missions at their stations to fetch food
- Local news give information about the situation
The undersupply is still there, and the system enters a state of famine:
- Significant price increase for foods
- Missions to deal with the crisis (some pay, some are charity)
- Drop in system population because of emigration
If the crisis continues:
- Drop in system population because of deaths
- Civil unrest
If the crisis is not solved, it finally enters a ''catastrophe'' stage:
- Mass death to starvation
- Order collapses; system falls into state of anarchy or civil war.
Suggestion 3
Information: It needs to be presented clearly and in an informative manner
''I tried following the exports/imports but nothing made sense and I didn't profit''
We really, really need a solid, good trading interface, that actually tells us what the Tharg is going on in a system. I'm not for displaying prices once you enter the system - for that kind of thing you should have to access the market, but you should be able to get a general overview of the situation in the system, including roughly what kinds of goods are being moved around. The current ''Three goods that are being imported/exported'' really doesn't help very much. FE2/FFE had pretty good information on the system map, but I think we need more. I've made my own little mockup of how I would imagine the system information screen:
Yes, that is quite a lot of stuff. Here's an explanation:
Major Exports: Goods that are produced here, but generally only exported to other systems. The list is ordered by how much goods in Credits are being exported, and the tonnage is also given.
Minor Exports: This list is also only for exports out of the system, but these goods are actually demanded in-system too. This can be important, because these goods will probably have prices closer to the galactic average. This is because the AI traders will favor interplanetary trade, due to the lowered fuel costs. Coffee, for example, is produced at the AGR(CASH) world and in small amounts at the standard AGR world. The other stations demands it. We also know that 566 t is being exported to other systems.
Major Imports: goods that come from out-of-system and sold at atleast one of the starports. All of the stations consume Consumer tech, for example.
Minor Imports: Crop harvesters are being imported from out-of-system and sold at the AGR worlds, but some of the Industrial stations also produce Crop Harvesters, making it a minor import.
Interplanetary Trade: Every canister moved from one station to another station in the system is recorded here.
There's also some local news bulletins. A criminal has been spotted nearby not long ago. Are they still there, did they maybe move here? A period of relative prosperity means that settlements are being expanded, and prices for autofabricators are surging. This kind of event should not require dev intervention to fire, and should happen all the time across the galaxy. Finally, Liaedin is nearing a crisis because of a lack of water purifiers. These are needed to sustain life on the starports, and now the local faction there is offering additional rewards to anyone selling water purifiers there. Hmm, there's probably a station here in 31 Aquilae that produces those...
Suggestion 4
On the profitability of piracy and spacecows filled with Gold
This is a simple suggestion. The problem: Piracy kind of sucks.
unless something is done to change a certain thing, piracy will always be a poor way of making money.
Pirating things is dangerous. Let's assume, however, that we just did the perfect deed of piracy. We convinced the spacecow to drop all its gold. Didn't even get a bounty. So now, we scoop up all the gold we can get, head off to our nice pirate cove to sell our treasures... selling price halved for stolen goods... so, around 4500 Cr per canister for gold.
A trader can make more than a thousand Credits per canister on legal trade. A large-scale trader can carry hundreds of canisters. Pirates have to worry about a lot of things, heck, even the scooping is a time sink compared to trading! Then there's the law, bounties, trouble with people simply running away...
I propose a change, and this might sound as a ''nerf'' to traders, but trust me, I'm a trader myself, and I think the game needs this.
The price of all goods should be scaled upwards, while the Cr/ton profit should stay about the same. (possibly increased somewhat for high value goods)
Let things like Algae and Biowaste be the same price, double the price of grain, triple the price of fish, quadruple the price of Titanium, quintuple the price of Tantalum... you see where I'm going. Increase the price of things like gold 10-fold. Yes, that means around 95 000 Cr/canister, and no, I'm not mad. I promise! Yes, that does mean that a Lakon 9 Basically can carry 50 million Cr in cargo... if they dare, if they dare! Do you?
Suggestion 5
Non-bulk goods
This suggestion comes from the original Elite: Not all goods should go in canisters. Some goods are instead transported in open compartments, and sold by the kilogramme.
So, what goods are non-bulk?
- Rare metals, such as Platinum and Palladium
- Rare mineral resources, such as diamonds and gems
- Complex medicines and substances, such as Progenitor cells or narcotics.
- Packets and information storage devices that you have been tasked to deliver
- Some rare goods
An important thing: You generally don't want to get detected carrying these goods, because you can't jettison them. This can mean trouble...
These goods can be stored, in up to medium amounts, in the ''packet rack'' that comes with your cockpit. However, here, they are not safe from cargo scans...
Since the goods are not packed in canisters, it is possible to conceal them, but for this you need... not a special internal module (that would be blindingly obvious... hmm, odd, this trader has a large empty room that our scanner picks up as a ''TOTALLY NOT HIDDEN CARGO HOLD''), but rather as an upgrade to the bulkheads! In some... backwatery places, it will be possible to fit shielded cargo compartments between the bulkheads of your ship. Goods stored here will never be detected through remote scan.
For these goods, you are mostly limited to your capital, not cargo space. There's room for a lot of narcotics, especially with the special upgrades. The deciding factor will probably if you think it's a good idea to pass the security control of Gorbachev station while carrying eight hundred kilogrammes of narcotics under the bulkheads...
The profit is generally not high for these goods. You just get a lot of space, so you can spend a considerable capital on trading even in small ships, and in small ships, the profit might be comparable to canister trading. In spacecows, doing non-bulk hauling would probably yield very little compared to the canister trade, but it can always be used to supplement that trade, if you want to bind up more capital in trade goods.
Suggestion 6
The rares...
A simple suggestion: Typically being very expensive and luxurious goods, and often very nonessential, the price that stations pay for rares should be siginificantly affected by the prosperity of the system...
It's pretty silly that a backwater mining station might pay crazy amounts of money for 50 tonnes of ''Turrumak Alien Rabbits'' or whatever rare good.
Suggestion 7
The traders that go solo to avoid player pirates
No, don't worry, I'm not going to suggest a 10% penalty on income in solo play, or anything like that. Not at all.
A lot of traders go into solo, not because they want to avoid players, but simply because they feel like it is too much of a risk. They value their ship and cargo over human contact. How do we fix this? We don't penalize them for it, that's for sure!
I suggest this a lot, but NPC's need to be universally harder. I think that there forever is going to be a serious imbalance in this game if NPC's remain the braindead vegetables they currently are. If they can't be made intelligent, at least, make them numerous and strong. Especially in anarchies. Anarchies should be hell for traders, well, hell until they reach the stations, where serious profit should be made!
If the anarchies are as hellish as in previous Elites, I imagine two ways for traders to survive to the station (well, then there's also luck and crazy Han Solo skills):
- They could get a good armored transport like a Cargo fitted Cobra, a Clipper or a Python and just try to barge through
- They could get friends
So... assume that you have a Cobra... if you still have any desire to play in open, would you not play there instead? Cobras are survivors!
And, for your friends, you could play in private group... but why not open? You've taken a step away from solo already. You have friends. Will you force them to just fight NPC's too?
Any further suggestions or comments on my suggestions are welcome.
Introduction; the percieved problem
Trading has always been a cornerstone of elite. It's often described as a space trading sim, even.
In Elite : Dangerous, trading has, just like in the earlier iterations, a very central role. I don't think anyone can doubt that it currently is the main income source in the game. At the same time, however, there's problems. Many people view trading as a ''grind'' that you have to do in order to achieve enough capital for a ''fun'' career doing something else.
High end trading often consists of travelling on the same back-and-forth route until you feel like doing something else. Rare trading spans over long distances, but in the end, it is even more static: To maximize profits, you have to go from a rare selling system to another, at the optimal distance where time/Cr is maximum.
There's little use in going on long trade runs with anything else than rares, and when you are trading rares, it is simply about distance, nothing else.
There's practically no reason to not simply trade in the really valuable goods, like Superconductors, Tobacco, Progenitor cells and Palladium. Occasionally, in very Cmdr-dense places, some goods like Tantalum can actually yield more profit, but there's pretty much no reason to ever trade in things like Grain, Aluminium, Polymers... unless you are just starting out and do not have enough capital to buy anything else than ''noob-goods''.
Trading doesn't really seem to affect the background simulation. More trading means more wealth in the system, but AFAIK, that's everything that happens. We are going to get famines, but it seems like they are going to be injected events.
There's pretty much no reason to smuggle illegal goods. In some rare circumstances (like the Eranin Liquor smuggling), you could get a small increase in profits, but since most outlawed goods are the cheaper ones (like narcotics), you're better off just trading high value goods.
The only real threat is player pirates. The NPC pirates are remarkably incompetent.
There currently seems to be serious problems with the trading system in itself. The Crazy times of mines that bought gold are over, but there's a lot of reports of a current bug where two players get different prices simultaneously at the same market.
This obviously needs to be fixed.
All right, that's the introduction. Here follows: my suggestions. They can be treated as one large suggestion, or they can be treated individually. Some of the things here have been suggested before.
Suggestion 1
The niche/mixed economies need to return
Back in the early Beta, with the planet Chango in I Bootis we got to see how a niche economy could work.
The planet and its space station was a Marine Agriculture/Industrial station.
The original plan for niche economies went something like this: Large core worlds would not specialize, they would just be ''Industrial'' or ''Agricultural'' like now. Small frontier worlds might not be capable of specializing either, it's hard to sustain yourself on the frontier just by producing Tea and Coffee. Medium sized worlds, however, would often have specialized economies or mixed economies, like Chango. So, what's the good thing with this?
Having niche economies and mixed economies quickly makes things a lot more complex. There might be agricultural worlds that hapily buy your Coffee or Animal meat. If it's a marine agriculture, they might not pay well for Crop harvesters, but a lot more for marine equipment. Or maybe the world is a mixed (Mar)Agriculture/(Mech)Industrial? And so on.
Another great side effect: This, in a way, helps the world get more varied. Chango was a vast water world, with floating cities. It was all pretty interesting. Now it's a dull Agri-world like any other. The old flavor text is still there, in some kind of taunt, but the planet actually has more land than water. This brings us to my second suggestion:
Suggestion 2
How planets, events and states should affect the trading game
Firstly, for an agricultural economy, the type of niche economy would greatly depend on the actual environment of the planet. If it's a large temperate world, it's more likely to be a general Agriculture world, even more so if it has a very high population (the larger the population, the less likelyhood of a specialized economy). Tundral worlds would be more likely to have a Staple-based Agricultural economy, producing things like Grain. These worlds might be more likely to have a mixed economy, also producing something else. Tropical worlds like Azeban would be more likely to be devoted to various forms of Cash Crops, growin Tea, Coffee, Cotton (Natural fabrics) and so on. Worlds with a lot of water life (either local or introduced) would be more likely to have a marine economy.
Here's an important thing: Mineral oil, being a by-product of crude oil processing, which comes from fossilized organic material, should only be exported from worlds that have had life for more than a few hundred years. Basically, only planets that are naturally life bearing should produce oil. The economy of that planet shouldn't matter for oil production as long as it is settled, and because of the many uses mineral oil has in things ranging from machinery to biomedicine, it should be a highly valued good in some parts of the galaxy.
An undersupply of critical goods (for any population: Food and basic medicine, but for space stations also water purifiers) can lead to a crisis. This should, in my opinion, be something the game does on its own. I know that the devs will be able to ''moderate'' all events that happen, but I hope that, unless they interfere directly, things like this will happen on their own. Before entering a ''crisis state'', there should be a phase where the ruling faction actively tries to prevent the crisis, by raising the prices of the goods they need, but also by offering missions not only on their own but also on nearby system's bulletin boards. Here's what I think a crisis could do:
Famine: Critical undersupply of foodstuffs
Prior to outbreak:
- Inflated food prices
- Ruling faction offers missions at their stations to fetch food
- Local news give information about the situation
The undersupply is still there, and the system enters a state of famine:
- Significant price increase for foods
- Missions to deal with the crisis (some pay, some are charity)
- Drop in system population because of emigration
If the crisis continues:
- Drop in system population because of deaths
- Civil unrest
If the crisis is not solved, it finally enters a ''catastrophe'' stage:
- Mass death to starvation
- Order collapses; system falls into state of anarchy or civil war.
Suggestion 3
Information: It needs to be presented clearly and in an informative manner
''I tried following the exports/imports but nothing made sense and I didn't profit''
We really, really need a solid, good trading interface, that actually tells us what the Tharg is going on in a system. I'm not for displaying prices once you enter the system - for that kind of thing you should have to access the market, but you should be able to get a general overview of the situation in the system, including roughly what kinds of goods are being moved around. The current ''Three goods that are being imported/exported'' really doesn't help very much. FE2/FFE had pretty good information on the system map, but I think we need more. I've made my own little mockup of how I would imagine the system information screen:
Yes, that is quite a lot of stuff. Here's an explanation:
Major Exports: Goods that are produced here, but generally only exported to other systems. The list is ordered by how much goods in Credits are being exported, and the tonnage is also given.
Minor Exports: This list is also only for exports out of the system, but these goods are actually demanded in-system too. This can be important, because these goods will probably have prices closer to the galactic average. This is because the AI traders will favor interplanetary trade, due to the lowered fuel costs. Coffee, for example, is produced at the AGR(CASH) world and in small amounts at the standard AGR world. The other stations demands it. We also know that 566 t is being exported to other systems.
Major Imports: goods that come from out-of-system and sold at atleast one of the starports. All of the stations consume Consumer tech, for example.
Minor Imports: Crop harvesters are being imported from out-of-system and sold at the AGR worlds, but some of the Industrial stations also produce Crop Harvesters, making it a minor import.
Interplanetary Trade: Every canister moved from one station to another station in the system is recorded here.
There's also some local news bulletins. A criminal has been spotted nearby not long ago. Are they still there, did they maybe move here? A period of relative prosperity means that settlements are being expanded, and prices for autofabricators are surging. This kind of event should not require dev intervention to fire, and should happen all the time across the galaxy. Finally, Liaedin is nearing a crisis because of a lack of water purifiers. These are needed to sustain life on the starports, and now the local faction there is offering additional rewards to anyone selling water purifiers there. Hmm, there's probably a station here in 31 Aquilae that produces those...
Suggestion 4
On the profitability of piracy and spacecows filled with Gold
This is a simple suggestion. The problem: Piracy kind of sucks.
unless something is done to change a certain thing, piracy will always be a poor way of making money.
Pirating things is dangerous. Let's assume, however, that we just did the perfect deed of piracy. We convinced the spacecow to drop all its gold. Didn't even get a bounty. So now, we scoop up all the gold we can get, head off to our nice pirate cove to sell our treasures... selling price halved for stolen goods... so, around 4500 Cr per canister for gold.
A trader can make more than a thousand Credits per canister on legal trade. A large-scale trader can carry hundreds of canisters. Pirates have to worry about a lot of things, heck, even the scooping is a time sink compared to trading! Then there's the law, bounties, trouble with people simply running away...
I propose a change, and this might sound as a ''nerf'' to traders, but trust me, I'm a trader myself, and I think the game needs this.
The price of all goods should be scaled upwards, while the Cr/ton profit should stay about the same. (possibly increased somewhat for high value goods)
Let things like Algae and Biowaste be the same price, double the price of grain, triple the price of fish, quadruple the price of Titanium, quintuple the price of Tantalum... you see where I'm going. Increase the price of things like gold 10-fold. Yes, that means around 95 000 Cr/canister, and no, I'm not mad. I promise! Yes, that does mean that a Lakon 9 Basically can carry 50 million Cr in cargo... if they dare, if they dare! Do you?
Suggestion 5
Non-bulk goods
This suggestion comes from the original Elite: Not all goods should go in canisters. Some goods are instead transported in open compartments, and sold by the kilogramme.
So, what goods are non-bulk?
- Rare metals, such as Platinum and Palladium
- Rare mineral resources, such as diamonds and gems
- Complex medicines and substances, such as Progenitor cells or narcotics.
- Packets and information storage devices that you have been tasked to deliver
- Some rare goods
An important thing: You generally don't want to get detected carrying these goods, because you can't jettison them. This can mean trouble...
These goods can be stored, in up to medium amounts, in the ''packet rack'' that comes with your cockpit. However, here, they are not safe from cargo scans...
Since the goods are not packed in canisters, it is possible to conceal them, but for this you need... not a special internal module (that would be blindingly obvious... hmm, odd, this trader has a large empty room that our scanner picks up as a ''TOTALLY NOT HIDDEN CARGO HOLD''), but rather as an upgrade to the bulkheads! In some... backwatery places, it will be possible to fit shielded cargo compartments between the bulkheads of your ship. Goods stored here will never be detected through remote scan.
For these goods, you are mostly limited to your capital, not cargo space. There's room for a lot of narcotics, especially with the special upgrades. The deciding factor will probably if you think it's a good idea to pass the security control of Gorbachev station while carrying eight hundred kilogrammes of narcotics under the bulkheads...
The profit is generally not high for these goods. You just get a lot of space, so you can spend a considerable capital on trading even in small ships, and in small ships, the profit might be comparable to canister trading. In spacecows, doing non-bulk hauling would probably yield very little compared to the canister trade, but it can always be used to supplement that trade, if you want to bind up more capital in trade goods.
Suggestion 6
The rares...
A simple suggestion: Typically being very expensive and luxurious goods, and often very nonessential, the price that stations pay for rares should be siginificantly affected by the prosperity of the system...
It's pretty silly that a backwater mining station might pay crazy amounts of money for 50 tonnes of ''Turrumak Alien Rabbits'' or whatever rare good.
Suggestion 7
The traders that go solo to avoid player pirates
No, don't worry, I'm not going to suggest a 10% penalty on income in solo play, or anything like that. Not at all.
A lot of traders go into solo, not because they want to avoid players, but simply because they feel like it is too much of a risk. They value their ship and cargo over human contact. How do we fix this? We don't penalize them for it, that's for sure!
I suggest this a lot, but NPC's need to be universally harder. I think that there forever is going to be a serious imbalance in this game if NPC's remain the braindead vegetables they currently are. If they can't be made intelligent, at least, make them numerous and strong. Especially in anarchies. Anarchies should be hell for traders, well, hell until they reach the stations, where serious profit should be made!
If the anarchies are as hellish as in previous Elites, I imagine two ways for traders to survive to the station (well, then there's also luck and crazy Han Solo skills):
- They could get a good armored transport like a Cargo fitted Cobra, a Clipper or a Python and just try to barge through
- They could get friends
So... assume that you have a Cobra... if you still have any desire to play in open, would you not play there instead? Cobras are survivors!
And, for your friends, you could play in private group... but why not open? You've taken a step away from solo already. You have friends. Will you force them to just fight NPC's too?
Any further suggestions or comments on my suggestions are welcome.
