Trade network: Show how much credits shop has & make gui better

Thanks for your post man. Because of it I tried to trade network for the first time. I didn't even know it was a thing until now lol. I really like getting stuff delivered to me for a small fee.

I also think some easy "5 minute to code" improvements for the trade network would be pretty cool

The trade network is a great part of the game that really improves convenience while playing. It could use some UI improvements in the searching offers department, as mentioned.

I still would also like to see an option for adding ships for sale to the trade network when docked to a networked station. It would be the easiest way to permit formal ship trade. Probably add a ships page, and when you want to sell a ship (or turret) you click a button that lets you browse a tree of docked entities (like browsing a file tree in your OS); click your selection, set a price, done. Searching ships for sale should reveal total mass and other vital info to help prevent scam artists from selling dummy ships under fake names over the network. Once you find a ship for sale that you want, you buy it with a click, funds (or materials) are auto-transferred, and the system just changes ownership of the ship to you so you can fly out to pick it up.

MacThule said:

I still would also like to see an option for adding ships for sale to the trade network when docked to a networked station.

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It doesn't even need the whole ship. There could be an extra page where shop owners could type into 5 slots for 5 ships what they currently offer.

One ship-offer-slot should at least contain the following information:
Name, Price, Reactor-Level, Mass, Dimensions, Description, Stock, Purpose (Scout, Mining, Stealth, aso.).

I agree that the trade option is a great tool especally in a server that uses credits to spawn ships.

I also agree that it needs to show how much credits are in a trade node

For the npc factions they need to have a credit respawn rate to keep the ecconomy going for the players this would make the credit servers more of a viable thing. (Trust me nothing is more infurriating then when you burn through all the credits in the server when the admins dont restock any of their credits on the shops)

Showing a trade node's available credits would be great. It would save tons of time. It would also be nice if credit storage on shops were more complex, and shops could have multiple "accounts" or credit funds; one for buying product, one for reserve that the shop cannot access but provides safe storage for the shop owner, and best would be the ability to simply create infinite new, named accounts and set their ownership as private to a character, faction shared (or shared by certain faction ranks), shared with allies, etc. Shops could very easily be expanded to serve as banks.

I am very curious about how they are going to handle credit generation when they remove the stick shops. It's a complex problem. Honestly the best bet might be to simply replace credits as default with an actual resource or refined version, like Fertikeen Capsules or Fertikeen Ingots. It wouldn't reflect our familiar central bank run fiat currency system, but it would be a strong basis for a stable, understandable market economy without requiring a complex system to balance credit injections to maintain market liquidity. Wherever credits are being injected players will be forced to go there to maximize profit, and any finite source of currency that can be controlled will always offer the potential for a form of hydraulic despotism.

Or it could be set up very much like our current system (IRL), in terms of currency generation, but without the central bank feeding on all the surplus value created by growth (since it's only a simulation): Allow players to create accounts at shops. Every time a player deposits credits in a shop account that is theirs, that shop cannot use those credits (unless that is part of the permissions set for that account), but it receives a number of credits equal to 20% of every deposit in an account that can only be used for trade network purchases. The 20% is created on top of the existing funds, so every time players deposit money they are creating liquidity (credits) in the economy, but the new liquidity cannot simply be withdrawn and deposited again for more credits. It must be spent somehow, and that drives industry. That could be exploited, of course, and people exploit the fractional reserve system of money generation IRL as well, but even if you ran a loop to create trillions of new credits out of thin air you'd be injecting fees into the trade guild for delivery and the time spent shuffling resources would amount to work done performing the service of adding credits to the server and distributing goods from areas of concentration to areas in need. More credits in circulation would raise prices (inflation), and - if correctly implemented and balanced - it would not amount to OP value creation (since credits are worthless themselves unless spent to acquire goods & services).

aceface said:

Giving a credit reward after killing an npc pirate would be a very simple solution. Works good in eve online.

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True. That would work to an extent. I hate to think of being forced to grind AI mobs to keep the system wet though; assuming they will eventually balance out players' ability to just park a huge shield beast near a pirate station with heat-swarmers on autocycle, that could grow dull.

You make a vert good point though; the credit creation through banking would disproportionately benefit shop owners.

Probably best to credit credits through pirate bounties, through exploration pay/rewards, and through shop banking. Maybe other means too. Then in an SP or private server game, players aren't boxed into one particular activity.

Interesting, having played long ago, to note that insurance is a substantial source!

So I was wondering about using the NPC market - it seemed an obvious choice for industrial route of credit creation and could even allow miners to act as 'faucets' - but I wasn't sure how 'acceptable' it would be. Looks like there's at least one good precedent.

Good info!

I love seeing my corp on that list u posted

aceface said:

Giving a credit reward after killing an npc pirate would be a very simple solution. Works good in eve online.

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The problem with this is the same as Stick Shops. Pirates don't spawn until you harm a pirate base... and most warships worth while one-shot them; so, this would lead to massive pirate attrition. While I think they should have a payout, there needs to be a more sustainable source of credits than stick shops or NPC grinding.

My vote has always been using planetary ownership as a source of cash via taxes. This would also give the PvP crowd more to do as people would jostle over the relatively limited number of worlds, especially in the "inner sphere" regions of the galaxy where player density tends to be high.

Nosajimiki said:

My vote has always been using planetary ownership as a source of cash via taxes. This would also give the PvP crowd more to do as people would jostle over the relatively limited number of worlds, especially in the "inner sphere" regions of the galaxy where player density tends to be high.

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Definitely a good idea. If there were to be a choke point on credit creation, planets would be the place to do it. Theoretically. Currently not so much, since they are still a no-fly zone, but assuming that this changes somewhat after Galaxy reboot I'd be inclined to agree with planets as a major or possibly even primary source of credit creation (but some diversity would still be best).

Nosajimiki said:

The problem with this is the same as Stick Shops. Pirates don't spawn until you harm a pirate base... and most warships worth while one-shot them; so, this would lead to massive pirate attrition. While I think they should have a payout, there needs to be a more sustainable source of credits than stick shops or NPC grinding.

My vote has always been using planetary ownership as a source of cash via taxes. This would also give the PvP crowd more to do as people would jostle over the relatively limited number of worlds, especially in the "inner sphere" regions of the galaxy where player density tends to be high.

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One problem is that would make it possible to generate an infinite amount of credits without any effort if you're in a peaceful part of the galaxy or just really far away from other players. I'd like to instead see an option to sell excess items to the trading guild over the trade network. The trade guild could act like the branch of government that coins money. If their reserves get too low, they make more credits. This would still make it possible to get an infinite amount of credits, but it would require some kind of action on the player's part. (i.e. mining, refining/manufacturing, stealing/war, etc.)

Micro753 said:

One problem is that would make it possible to generate an infinite amount of credits without any effort if you're in a peaceful part of the galaxy or just really far away from other players.

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If I know there will be players building up planets in far-flung reaches of the galaxy and stockpiling credits on them, I now have motivation to fund exploration missions to find these planets so I can plunder their bounty (because you know a lot of them will be abandoned after being set up, and many others will be insufficiently defended off the bat). Just saying. If you can protect all that tax from me just by locating far away, more power to you. Probably you'll want to put a couple of defense stations and a fleet in orbit though. Maybe make some allies as well. Just in case.

So even if someone started setting out huge credit farms (colonies) on the galactic rim, it'd only be a matter of time before their farm became the subject of a major war. Which is fun. The only "peaceful" part of the galaxy would be an unprofitable part. On the other hand, if you could find a quite corner and farm credits unnoticed for a long period, it could offset some other factors like early start and pre-teaming.

Just my initial thoughts, anyway. So long as credit generation per planet weren't too high, I don't think it would be out of control. Like if each planet maxed at like $1M or so per day with full development, and if that currency could be player-looted somehow from planets left neglected, it wouldn't be crazy and would keep the server full of liquidity.

MacThule said:

Definitely a good idea. If there were to be a choke point on credit creation, planets would be the place to do it. Theoretically. Currently not so much, since they are still a no-fly zone, but assuming that this changes somewhat after Galaxy reboot I'd be inclined to agree with planets as a major or possibly even primary source of credit creation (but some diversity would still be best).

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Planets are way more friendly than they used to be, as long as you don't try landing a battle cruiser on one, or hitting it with 1000+ mining beams at once, I have not seem major issues with them for at least a year. That said, if their value was in ownership, I'd kind of prefer to make them some non-voxel spherical objects where you just drop a starbase in orbit to "claim" it; so, they aren't putting heavy lag on what would likely become 90% of future battlefields.

I would also make bombarding planets no longer about blowing them up, but as destroying their industry/environment/population/whatever to devalue them or as part of the process for ousting another player's ownership, but make it something they can recover from over time.

Micro753 said:

One problem is that would make it possible to generate an infinite amount of credits without any effort if you're in a peaceful part of the galaxy or just really far away from other players. I'd like to instead see an option to sell excess items to the trading guild over the trade network. The trade guild could act like the branch of government that coins money. If their reserves get too low, they make more credits. This would still make it possible to get an infinite amount of credits, but it would require some kind of action on the player's part. (i.e. mining, refining/manufacturing, stealing/war, etc.)

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Right now there is a big problem, especially on mature servers, where the amount of money going into the trade network is not nearly sufficient to sustain it. The AI factions are constantly trading with each other which makes massive amounts of money disappear into freighter fees, but they produce way more resources than players can buy. If stick shops were removed, then there would only be money disappearing and none being added to the game. If players could generate a decent passive income, then AI factions wouldn't be constantly sitting on huge hoards of resources with no money left to do anything and player factions would be more inclined to buy which also gives players more opportunity to sell. Putting money in player hands is especially critical for the planed galaxy update, since you will have to buy a certain amount of your stuff.

All that said, some ideas that could address your concern:

1. Make AI factions bleed money. Since AI factions can generate massive amounts of resources, they tend to be the ones doing most of the buying and selling. If too much money starts to accumulate in them, then they can just start converting it into resources at a rate that accelerates with volume. This way there is always something to buy, and never too much money in circulation.
2. Make planet claims cost faction points. If you need to spend faction points to claim and or maintain planets, then your available territory will be dependant on your faction's activeness.
3. Make planet claims slow to gain value. If planets take days or even weeks to become fully colonized, or if you have to invest a lot of wealth or materials into making them productive, then they become a difficult resource to spam, and they must be carefully protected.
4. You can not effectively hide planets. Either you have to claim a sector to claim the planets in it, or all your planets show up in your faction description just like your home base. This way, war time would make maintaining your planet claims more difficult.
5. Diplomatic maintenance. Make planets something you need to occasionally visit to maintain loyalty. Basically, if they don't feel like you are a good governor, they will rebel and you lose them.

I don't think these are all necessary, but pick any 2-3 of them and you'd have a pretty balanced system.

MacThule said:

If I know there will be players building up planets in far-flung reaches of the galaxy and stockpiling credits on them, I now have motivation to fund exploration missions to find these planets so I can plunder their bounty ...

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I actually didn't think of that. That would only be incentive if the credits are stored on the planets instead of being directly deposited into a player's account. Hmm, now I'm torn on the idea.