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Thread: Income potential of space mining?
I want to be able to sell my goods to my customers at a fair price. So you won't catch me buying space resources at 50cpu. Most I'll bend is to 10cpu when browsing the entire galactic bazar. Other than that, I have a Kimogola equiped with a level 3 mining laser, tactor beam, level 6 gun and a 1550 storage cargo bay. I find i can fill my hold in 10-20 minutes depending on the yeild of chunks
Message Edited by GrimBear on 05-25-2005 11:34 AM
Interesting ideas about the trader stations...I disagree, but interesting all the same. I'd rather see more ways to integrate mining into the player economy than alter the trading stations. Hell, if it turns out they HURT the player economy, in the way the 'chassis guys' at starports do in some ways (instead of selling the items you harvest off ships to a shipwright who can do something with them, you're removing them from use by *anyone*, you may as well be deleting the goods while getting a tiny money amount from it), I'd rather take my brand-new VT (made Ace last night, yay!) with my guildies on ops and guns, travel to every one of those stations, and blow them to pieces. I'd basically like to see more ways for the asteroid minerals to be used--more shipwright schematics, some armor that can use these minerals, I'd proudly carry a sword, powerhammer, or VK that was made with Correllian iron, Kessel diamonds, and Kash whatever-it-is-that's-there. Heck, why stop there? Improved foods and drinks made using Dathomir ice, be the first on your block to wear a miner's jacket made with stuff you mined, enhanced by BE tissues utilizing asteroid organics, carry Instant Stimpack-E, made with minerals mined in Lok space...the possibilities are endless. That, and I'd like to see the amount of cash you get from trading stations lowered, at least right now while the mining economy is still getting started--encourage people to sell to players, not just delete the stuff for a tiny profit. There'll be lazy miners who'd rather slide over to the station for quick cash, but if you get 5 CPU for Kessel diamonds there and a player will pay 30 CPU for the same stuff, I'd think more people would get the idea and sell to other people.
What else...yeah, the Y8 (mine, unpacked just this morning) is destined to be the floating wardrobe, closet, and party boat for me right now. Pity, it's a great looking ship, but it's better as an MP fighter from what I can see than as a mining vessel. If it's even good for that. My Oppressor might just eat its lunch as a mining ship.
Ya, I'd say it's not profitable as is, and I don't think changing the selling prices is the right direction (well, they need to be changed in the sense of better variety, but that's another story). The real issue is how feasable mining large quantities is, or in this case is not. The current ability to mine from standard space craft is fine, but mining in the Y-8 (due to storage limits the only ship able to obtain a decent quantity) is a nightmare. Even if the ship wasn't as buggy as all heck (the tractor beam loaded in the rear turrent was firing from the forward gun at a 90 degree angle from the barrel) the design of that ship makes it near impossible to collect ore at even the same rate as a well armed fighter. Add to that you need 3 people in the Y-8 plus protection and solo mining is infinately better.
I thought I could make it work, but no, I'm pretty sure the Y-8 is useless (though I will say sorta nice on the inside). It's one more example of the devs not actually PLAYING the game they create. They do HAVE quality testers right?
It theoretically could be more profitable if the asteroid resources were made capable of replacing some resources planetside that are required for building ships and thier components with SW. In fact it wouldn't even be too presumptuous to have ALL ship components and chassis require asteroid resources for their creation. Think of the lag it would save on planet, by subtracting the mass quantities of harvesters all around player cities, SW could become professional miners as well, hell you could even create a new profession geared completely around it. The possibilites of this resource potential is endless, but I fear it will never come to light, due to the fact that SOME devs that remain nameless seem to think the players have no clue what is fun in an MMO, and all we do is whine without coming up with any good ideas.
Zeeke Casarian
Imperial Pilot Ace
Master Shipwright
Ahazi
GrimBear wrote:
I want to be able to sell my goods to my customers at a fair price. So you won't catch me buying space resources at 50cpu. Most I'll bend is to 10cpu when browsing the entire galactic bazar. Other than that, I have a Kimogola equiped with a level 3 mining laser, tactor beam, level 6 gun and a 1550 storage cargo bay. I find i can fill my hold in 10-20 minutes depending on the yeild of chunks
The biggest problem with space mining is the space stations that buy the resources don't sell them.
What we need is for these trade stations to have average costs per unit of space resources. When they're stock is low, then their buying and selling price should increase. Whenthey're stock is overly abundant, their prices should drop. The space stations should also have a maximum and optimum storage amounts.
e.g.
Trade Station 1 has a maximum storage value of 100,000 of each resource type with an optimum storage of say 50,000
Diamonds have a base price of 20cpu
Trade Station 1 currently holds 50k of diamonds, it buys them at 15cpu and sells at 25cpu.
A pilot docks with the station and sells off a cargo load of 25k of Diamonds. The station calculates what the post purchase base price will be ... which is 15, the trade station then removes a 25% of that to reach a buying price of 11.75. The trader leaves the station with an empty hold and 281250 credits richer.
Message Edited by GrimBear on 05-25-2005 11:34 AM
Different servers have different base prices, and if harvesting meat sells for 40cpu then space mining has to compete as a form of income or it won't be done for that server, and that hurts shipwrights the most in the end because space mined materials become rare or time consuming for the shipwright to do it themselves. Anyway, I am not supporting nor denouncing the 50cpu, just stating what I hear shipwrights have been offering to players to get the materials they want. At least the space miners could afford the components
The whole idea of introducing buying from tradestations is to make it possible for shipwrights to obtain large quantities of space resources very quickly. To make one set of elite components, you need a lot of space resources, enough where you'd hours and hours mining.
if you are able to buy from the space station, it changes the money flow. right now you can't buy, which means any resources sold there is new money introduced into the economy. make it so you can buy what has been mined and credits are not being introduced but simply being transferred
padren wrote:
How it would work, is you go to a station, and place a fill order for 100k diamonds @ 15cpu, and when a player comes up and selects your fill order from the list, they offload their 20k and get a bank transfer from you for 300k automatically. If you don't have the funds, the transaction is cancelled. The station may invoke a 10% fee or something to facilitate the trade.
Then you can go and pick up the 20k, or wait until someone fills the remaining 80k of your order. This way, everything is demand driven, and savvy miners can scout out for good fill orders, or even get tipped for finding good offers for their guildmates. It would cause some friction too, since more players would compete to fill orders while the getting is good and more organized groups would prosper better.
I really like this idea.
--
On the Y-8, I think it was under-tested, as someone said. I remember from ROTW beta, only a few people had them, and even they said that they probably wouldn't be all that useful without some big changes.
I don't think the devs were all that concerned with the effectiveness of the vehicle. Turns out they weren't that concerned with it even working properly (see the bugged live version of the Y-8).
There is resistance to making a truly capable multiplayer ship, and I don'tknow why thereis. A programming issue? Lag issues? Laziness? Something is out there.
I read hundreds of ideas to make mp ships useful, and no reasons why it can't be done. I beleive that it can be done, and doing so would make space mining more convenient and fun.
GrimBear wrote:
The whole idea of introducing buying from tradestations is to make it possible for shipwrights to obtain large quantities of space resources very quickly. To make one set of elite components, you need a lot of space resources, enough where you'd hours and hours mining.
if you are able to buy from the space station, it changes the money flow. right now you can't buy, which means any resources sold there is new money introduced into the economy. make it so you can buy what has been mined and credits are not being introduced but simply being transferred
QFE
Message Edited by quadpers0n on 05-26-2005 08:27 PM