Quick question about the speculative trading rules: According to the rules, the purchase price is determined by 3D + the PC Broker skill - the NPC Broker skill + the various planetary buy and sell bonuses. I'm assuming that the Broker skill values are just the base Broker skill for the two characters with no attribute DM applied, correct?
The reason I ask is that this Traveller trading utility page (travellertools.azurewebsites.net) has you enter "Broker Skill (Int)" which seems to imply that you should add the INT/EDU/SOC/CHA/etc attribute bonus from both traders as well. Is this website just wrong about this or am I reading the trade rules incorrectly?
I'd like to get some feedback on this. On one hand, it could be argued that it's fair to add attribute bonuses since you're adding the attribute DM bonus to both sides of the trading equation. On the other hand, that does have the potential of having a larger delta between the two traders if the PC and/or NPC Broker has a particularly high or low applicable attribute bonus) Presumably most NPC Brokers will have Broker 2 and a +1 relevant attribute bonus for a total bonus of +3 - anyone that's better than that is going to be working at a megacorp or running their own trading company, not doing brokerage at some crappy, little downport somewhere. A PC is likely going to have Broker 1-3 and +1 or +2 in a relevant skill, so could have a total trading bonus of +2 to +5. I'm guessing that you probably don't want to let that happen since a high PC total Broker score really starts to mess up game balance.
I ran several simulated trading runs with a PC crew doing mostly J-2 hops in a scout ship and 50K of starting cash from Flammarion over by the Sword Worlds to near the Islands sector Great Rift crossing with different Broker bonus values to get a feel for how their finances would fare. (Combat repairs from pirates attacks, etc, weren't factored in but these were mostly well travelled trade routes, so pirate attacks should be minimal) I assumed a consistent average NPC broker bonus of +3, I got the following results: With a PC bonus of +3, the PCs were constantly on the edge of financial ruin with fuel, maintenence, docking fees, etc. It was nearly impossible for them to get ahead without double-bunking and taking on the occasional passenger or two or taking on the occasional hair-brained sidequest I dangle in front of them. I feel that this is how Traveller is designed to operate to encourage PCs to, you know, adventure. If the PC Broker had a +4 total Broker bonus, they were able to steadly make a modest cash flow and after 6 months, I think they had close to a million credits which could easily be eaten up by ship upgrades, repairs or other costs so it wasn't too overpowered IMO. When the PC Trader had a toal Broker bonus of +5 (so an INT of 12 and Broker 3, for example), they made more money than god. Two separate 6 month runs each had them with tens of millions of credits and they would have been able to outright buy a Free Trader by the end of the year at the rate they were getting money.
By that argument, I think that my initial reading that it's just the Broker score with no attribute bonuses is probably correct but wanted to get opinions from other folks.
The reason I ask is that this Traveller trading utility page (travellertools.azurewebsites.net) has you enter "Broker Skill (Int)" which seems to imply that you should add the INT/EDU/SOC/CHA/etc attribute bonus from both traders as well. Is this website just wrong about this or am I reading the trade rules incorrectly?
I'd like to get some feedback on this. On one hand, it could be argued that it's fair to add attribute bonuses since you're adding the attribute DM bonus to both sides of the trading equation. On the other hand, that does have the potential of having a larger delta between the two traders if the PC and/or NPC Broker has a particularly high or low applicable attribute bonus) Presumably most NPC Brokers will have Broker 2 and a +1 relevant attribute bonus for a total bonus of +3 - anyone that's better than that is going to be working at a megacorp or running their own trading company, not doing brokerage at some crappy, little downport somewhere. A PC is likely going to have Broker 1-3 and +1 or +2 in a relevant skill, so could have a total trading bonus of +2 to +5. I'm guessing that you probably don't want to let that happen since a high PC total Broker score really starts to mess up game balance.
I ran several simulated trading runs with a PC crew doing mostly J-2 hops in a scout ship and 50K of starting cash from Flammarion over by the Sword Worlds to near the Islands sector Great Rift crossing with different Broker bonus values to get a feel for how their finances would fare. (Combat repairs from pirates attacks, etc, weren't factored in but these were mostly well travelled trade routes, so pirate attacks should be minimal) I assumed a consistent average NPC broker bonus of +3, I got the following results: With a PC bonus of +3, the PCs were constantly on the edge of financial ruin with fuel, maintenence, docking fees, etc. It was nearly impossible for them to get ahead without double-bunking and taking on the occasional passenger or two or taking on the occasional hair-brained sidequest I dangle in front of them. I feel that this is how Traveller is designed to operate to encourage PCs to, you know, adventure. If the PC Broker had a +4 total Broker bonus, they were able to steadly make a modest cash flow and after 6 months, I think they had close to a million credits which could easily be eaten up by ship upgrades, repairs or other costs so it wasn't too overpowered IMO. When the PC Trader had a toal Broker bonus of +5 (so an INT of 12 and Broker 3, for example), they made more money than god. Two separate 6 month runs each had them with tens of millions of credits and they would have been able to outright buy a Free Trader by the end of the year at the rate they were getting money.
By that argument, I think that my initial reading that it's just the Broker score with no attribute bonuses is probably correct but wanted to get opinions from other folks.