Commodities and Bases

Try this link for info on commodities

http://the-starport.net/freelancer/forum/viewtopic.php?topic_id=5214&forum=7&post_id=55173#forumpost55173

Check out the attachment for a commodity creation tutorial

If you mean the difference in pricing, to make the trading work, then yes it is quite complex.

It’s been done quite well in the original game, so that you need to travel a long distance to make more profit, with small price changes in nearby systems to the one where you purchased that commodity. But still there were loopholes and when you found them you could make a big profit in a short time.

When there were no tools it was frustratingly long to discover the routes, now there are tools such as FL Companion which display prices for commodities at all bases, with profits and distance and time needed to make the journey, and using this type of tool you can easily work out cyclic routes so that you make a profit in each “leg” of the route.

Now to redistribute prices? Much harder. I have no idea if anyone has written a tool to help with this?

The principle is the same, starting price from one system incrementing with distance from that system to bases in other systems. But there will always be loopholes when there are multiple producing bases in different systems through the galaxy.

One way to lay it out might be to define different commodities in different systems, with limited supplying bases, and only bought at good prices by certain bases in other distant systems, with other bases offering a much lower price or 0.

On the other thread, it seems that a multiplier of 0 prevents the commodity from showing at a base and in your cargo hold when you land at that base? So if this is the case, that would be a way to prevent the player from selling a particular commodity at particular bases. As long as the commodity re-appears in the cargo hold when the player lands at a base which does accept that commodity.

Note that there are also other ways to limit trading of commodities: the player’s Rank, and the player’s Reputation with that base. So players can be limited to trading a particular commodity only at certain factions’ bases with whom they are neutral or friendly (the scale is -1 for totally hostile through 0 for neutral and to +1 for madly in love), and if they are at more than a certain Rank.

Hope this helps, if I got it wrong and you need different info please ask again and anyone will help more.

And if anyone knows a redistribution tool for commodities and prices (not the tool to just amend or scramble all commodity prices) please tell & link.

If you keep the basic commodity price low and use the multiplier to get the sell price then there is no profit in selling apart from the bases you have added it to. If no entry the sell price is the default.

For example base price = 50 and lowest buy price = 50, then no profit unless at the base where you have a multiplier (covered in the tutorial above).

I am using an excel sheet for the balancing - one table is holding the commodities and a territory wide base multplier - for every system within the territory - taking in account where it is connected to vanilla. other connected sheets are grabbing the general infos while adding a basetype specific multiplier to it.
This way i am able to simply copy and paste the allready balanced values into the market_commodities.ini and i just have to calculate it once per new territory.

Probably it may help as an idea.

sure, but it’s not only the marketfile, it is currently also creating the mbase.ini with containing names, rumors, and several other settings, universe.ini and additional the list for infocards, names and rumors for adoxas frc. Not yet, but soon, the <system>.ini informations of the bases and solars. From my knowledge you will need a german excel version because the functions are german too. Also, all settings are on the base of 88Flak from fox and all the other parttaking wizards.

ofc. it is still wip

If you can use it, just pm me your eMail adress and i will attach it. Having it in an open download would spoil our Mod.</system>