Trading income

[Bobson]

I thought I posted this before, but I can't find it now, so here it is:

My Traveller group started off rather poor, but was quickly (in about 20 game-weeks) banking upwards of 2MCr profit per jump, and usually much more. Our trader was rolling 3d6+6 (minimum 9, average 16.5) on his trading rolls, which meant we could never pay more than 105% of what a cargo was worth, and never sell for less than 95%. On average, we were making a profit of 75% of our cargo's base value on everything we transported. Admittedly, 75% of a hold full of Pharmaceuticals or Radioactives pays much more than 75% of a hold full of basic ore, but we were still making a huge profit.

Has anyone else run into this? How have you dealt with it? Or is my perception of what's a reasonable amount to be making off?

 

[Lord High Munchkin]

Remember taxes!

A lot of that profit could disappear on government taxes, permits and charges at both ends of a run.

 

[CosmicGamer]

Yes, there are numerous issues with trade. Yes, there are numerous ways of compensating. Things like taxes, insurance, loading costs and so on.

You also could rewrite the tables, or the rules.

I just use an additional positive or negative DM to make the purchases and sales fall into a range that I feel they should be. Adding a DM is right in the rules (any Dice Modifiers from the supplier). This works equally well for situations where the cargo rates are expected to be high or low.

Justification: Suppliers are not all idiots. They know what their product typically is worth and if it can be sold at a nearby system for big profits, they would increase their price. Perhaps think of this as an opposing DM for the NPC seller/buyer. Determine their DM using Broker and Intelligence or Social Standing.

 

[Duroon]

It wasn't until quite a way into our first campaign that my group and I discovered something we had been forgetting about trade.

All of those rolls are supposed to be opposed by the broker you are doing business with.

That one little tid bit of information changes a lot. There is nothing in the book that says the referee's NPC broker doesn't have just as high, or higher, broker skill than the character.

 

[Marchand]

I've previously posted with exactly this issue on another Traveller forum. Some suggested capping Broker skill. Some Folks came up with a number of suggestions about taxes, bribe requests, starport charges of various kinds etc.

However, I don't think a system that depends on continual arbitrary GM intervention is very satisfactory. Also, the massive profits routinely generated by the system don't seem plausible in their own terms. If there was so much money to be made, more people would enter the freight business, and bid the profits down.

Assigning mods to the buy / sell value rolls seems a better way of doing it. I would weight the mod based on the size of the economies of the two worlds (derived from population and TL). Bigger economies = more traders active = tighter margins on trade = bigger negative mods. You could say a Pop 7 world at TL9 (early stellar) is "baseline". Summing these gives 16 as a simplistic "economy rating". Two such worlds would have summed "economy ratings" of 32. So when rolling on the table, there is a mod of (32)-(sum of worlds' Populations and TLs), less than or equal to 0.

This has what I consider a good side-effect of encouraging PC traders towards the backwaters, where interesting things can happen to them.

I did not come up with this myself - it very loosely follows the approach taken in GURPS Traveller Far Trader, which is a book I highly recommend.

 

[dreamingbadger]

There are also the direct cost of running a ship...

and the in-direct costs... profitable lightly armed ships could come to the attention of less than scrupulous individuals ... pirates for example or hijackers ... either way their will be battle damage or delays or cargo damage...

alternatively the players could be framed, for smuggling either by business rivials, or officals on the turn, or just used to smuggle goods without their knowledge...

 

[BP]

Making a lot of money trading is ok - but the real question is -
What else are they doing?

Some people enjoy trading style games - i.e. to make lots and lots of money so their characters can be rich and have big floaty islands of their own for a while.

If this is the case - come up with some challenges to make it interesting - i.e they get scammed (fake product) or blamed (defective product - especially pharmas) or inadvertantly start a religious cult and then run afoul of it (ala Han Solo's Revenge) or sold hot goods and run afoul of the law. And this isn't neccessarily all bad - the players should have a chance to work it out to their benefit. If roleplay was just about die roles, then there would be no reason for a referee...

No need to resort to using taxes and other artificial means of reducing their income (besides, if they are good they will get around or avoid the taxes, etc with bribes, etc.). Let them make all they can - it's not all that hard to come up with senarios they can get themselves into where they will need every centi-credit...

A new starship is expensive for example :wink: - and surely there must be something they just can't Travell without...

 

[Gee4orce]

You mean your Referee hasn't mentioned the annual Imperial Commerce Tax yet ? What about your monthly contributions to the Merchant Marine Benevolent Fund ?

And remember, jump drives don't last forever - you've been servicing it regularly right ?

"Replacement J drives are pricey around these parts - >sucks teeth<. You just can't get the parts. And then there's the labor - and the drydock charges, purchase taxes, taxes on the labour, taxes on the taxes…."

 

[FreeTrav]

You mean your Referee hasn't mentioned the annual Imperial Commerce Tax yet ? What about your monthly contributions to the Merchant Marine Benevolent Fund ?

And remember, jump drives don't last forever - you've been servicing it regularly right ?

"Replacement J drives are pricey around these parts - >sucks teeth<. You just can't get the parts. And then there's the labor - and the drydock charges, purchase taxes, taxes on the labour, taxes on the taxes…."

You don't even have to resort to this; just make sure that they're keeping PROPER ships' books - including paying off the mortgage, allocations for and scheduling of routine and annual maintenance, routine reprovisioning of the ship, PERSONAL maintenance (can't have them looking disreputable when they come ashore to do business), and so on. You will be surprised how much it costs to run a ship.

If you really feel that you need to fiat their money away, there's also currency exchange issues, guild memberships, ...

 

[atpollard]

While any of the punitive ‘fixes’ would reduce profits, frankly, they suck.

Why doesn’t the Free Trader just trying to make ends meet get crushed and driven into bankruptcy by Imperial taxes? Why don’t all those NPC Uber-Brokers guarantee that a humble Broker-1 PC pays no less than 110% and sells for no more than 90% - loosing on every transaction?

If you don’t want players to make a profit at Speculative Trading, then you owe it to them, as a courtesy, to tell them up front. Then they will not waste time on characters with Trading skills that you are determined to negate with punitive modifiers. After all, are you prepared to tell the character with Rifle-6 that the sun only glares in his scope, the wind only blows dust in his eyes and the leaves only block his view, on every shot, limiting his roll to Rifle-2?

IMHO, a better solution is to recognize that the rolls represent a game reality. Go with it and use the rolls to drive role-playing. If you are buying goods at 50% of the base price on a world in which an average broker would pay 80% of base price, then there is a reason for that…

… Perhaps the ownership of the goods is in question and you need to untangle a paperwork mess to actually be allowed to load them on your ship.

… Perhaps the source of the goods is black market and delivery involves a clandestine meeting in an empty warehouse district at 3 AM. You need to bring cash and a truck (weapons are optional, but recommended).

… Perhaps the factory workers are on strike and you need to cross the Teamsters picket line to take possession (and cross it again to leave with the goods). Do you want to negotiate with the head of the Union to reach an arrangement ahead of time? Do you want to just crash thru the line?

… This deal is for a limited time only. You have 1 hour to get the money, in cash, and a truck to move the goods. Have you fallen on a sweet deal? [The seller owes money to a bookmaker and needs CASH IMMEDIATELY.]

At the other end, Selling high priced goods at high prices could involve a quest to actually get to see the potential buyer. Your Broker has discovered that your cargo hold is full of something that Donald Trump desperately needs and will pay top dollar for. The Donald will be at a White Tie affair being hosted by the Kennedys at the finest hotel in town. The right SOC will allow a character (perhaps not the Broker) to make a few calls and secure an invite to the 500 credit per plate charity event. All you need to decide is how many are going, can you get past security, can you avoid creating a scene (and being thrown out), and can you create an opportunity to speak with Mr. Trump?

Each roll represents the seed of an adventure or patron or encounter. Use them and Live them. Or be honest with the players and tell them that you don’t want that type of campaign.

Ultimately, it is unfair and not much fun to be punished because your character has a few high skills rather than many low skills.

 

[CosmicGamer]

If you don’t want players to make a profit at Speculative Trading, then you owe it to them, as a courtesy, to tell them up front...

IMHO, a better solution is to recognize that the rolls represent a game reality. Go with it and use the rolls to drive role-playing. If you are buying goods at 50% of the base price on a world in which an average broker would pay 80% of base price, then there is a reason for that…

… Perhaps the ownership of the goods is in question and you need to untangle a paperwork mess to actually be allowed to load them on your ship.

… Perhaps the source of the goods is black market and delivery involves a clandestine meeting in an empty warehouse district at 3 AM. You need to bring cash and a truck (weapons are optional, but recommended).

… Perhaps the factory workers are on strike and you need to cross the Teamsters picket line to take possession (and cross it again to leave with the goods). Do you want to negotiate with the head of the Union to reach an arrangement ahead of time? Do you want to just crash thru the line?

… This deal is for a limited time only. You have 1 hour to get the money, in cash, and a truck to move the goods. Have you fallen on a sweet deal? [The seller owes money to a bookmaker and needs CASH IMMEDIATELY.]

At the other end, Selling high priced goods at high prices could involve a quest to actually get to see the potential buyer. Your Broker has discovered that your cargo hold is full of something that Donald Trump desperately needs and will pay top dollar for. The Donald will be at a White Tie affair being hosted by the Kennedys at the finest hotel in town. The right SOC will allow a character (perhaps not the Broker) to make a few calls and secure an invite to the 500 credit per plate charity event. All you need to decide is how many are going, can you get past security, can you avoid creating a scene (and being thrown out), and can you create an opportunity to speak with Mr. Trump?

Ultimately, it is unfair and not much fun to be punished because your character has a few high skills rather than many low skills.

To me, it appears that you are still treating the higher level broker differently (unfairly?) by creating 'hoops' they have to 'jump through'. IMO, there is a difference between creating a situation because of a high die roll and creating a situation because of an average roll but high DMs.

 

[Golan2072]

Remember that the majority of trade is probably conducted by the megacorporations, who typically either own both the factory on one world and the retail outlet on another, or else arrange large-scale deals with both sides of the trade deal. Small-ship, PC-level trade represents an exception to the rule, not the normal situation itself. They buy and sell the left-overs of the corporate-dominated interstellar economy, probably either dealing with very small buyers and sellers who prefer for whatever reason not to do business with the corporations, trade with backwater worlds not profitable enough for the corporate mega-freighters, or go into the grey area of shady business.

Goods retrieved or sold in, say, a 90%-110% of the usual market price are probably fully legit and involve perfectly normal business deals. But buying something at a much lower price than the local market price or selling it for a far higher price probably involves something more... complex. The trade roll in this case probably means looking for a particular buyer or a seller offering non-standard prices; a high Broker skill allows you to hunt down the best trade partners.

Put yourself in the buyer's (or seller's) shoes. Why are they selling the product at a price far below the market price (or buying far above the normal retail price)? Are they trying to get rid of something? Selling stolen or low-quality goods? Wanting very badly to buy something? Not wanting a record for that transaction?

Think about this: why would someone be willing to pay 150% the market price for a few ATVs? Why couldn't he or she simply go to a normal ATV lot and buy them for 50% less?

The main exception are low-pop backwater colonies with such a low trade turnouts that it doesn't make corp mega-freighters profitable on the route to them. If a world only produces 100 tons of exportable grain surplus per season, the megacorp won't be sending its smallest ship (with a 1,000 ton hold for the very least) to buy it.

 

[atpollard]

To me, it appears that you are still treating the higher level broker differently (unfairly?) by creating 'hoops' they have to 'jump through'. IMO, there is a difference between creating a situation because of a high die roll and creating a situation because of an average roll but high DMs.

Actually, all that I am advocating is for the Ref to use the rolls as a guideline for setting up an encounter scenario. If Trade is being reduced to a few dice rolls and nothing more, then just move it to the background noise (like cleaning the air scrubber and changing the bed linens).

As Golan suggested, a mediocre result probably indicates a fairly normal transaction. An extreme result suggests a more unique scenario is required. My examples were designed to explain deals that were typically at the far extremes of the economic spectrum, since that is what the opening post was asking about.

Selling goods at 400% of their “fair market value” suggests that SOMETHING is going on, whether you just lucked into the deal (good rolls) or found the deal through skill (high die modifiers).

If the broker wants to avoid “jumping through hoops”, then he should use his high skill to offset the penalty for reducing the time and aim for deals that earn a little profit. Then the high skilled broker can land on a strange world, sell goods for 110%-120% and fill the hold with goods at 80%-90% base value faster than the starport can refuel the ship.

 

[towerwarlock]

If your players are making this kind of profit. . . . LEAVE THEM ALONE. Every time I hear how players need to lose some of their hard earned money, it sounds like jealousy to me. It brings the mind the lame ways of releaving players of their hard earned loot from D&D.

If players have the skills on their characters to make a decent living, all you are doing is punishing them for having those skills, and punishing them for making good rolls. I have been a GM and a player for many years. It always seemed lame that say after we slayed the dragon terrorizing the kingdom that the king's tax collectors would show up and demand we hand over 75%+ of the dragon's hoard as taxes. Of course once we got high enough level, we decided that we would kill the tax collectors and their guards. Finally we were summoned to the king to explain why we refused to pay his "generous" taxes. We all explained that being punished for killing the monsters he was too lazy or just unable to kind of made us mad.

In traveller, taxing us heavily is rediculous, just for making a decent profit, boils down the same way. I know that if after paying the crew off, if I had a ship's mortgage to pay, I usually paid towards getting that paid off. That is assuming that I had not done well in character generation and paid it off in the beginning. Remember, if the GM starts doing things like this, he can expect the next time he is a player for his character to be short lived. The last time my GM tried something like this on me, when someone else was GMing, my character kindly turned on his character and killed him, and made sure that no medical help would be used in time. So keep it in mind, that if you do not want to be punished the next time you are a player, do not punish players for doing well. :evil: :evil: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

 

[Golan2072]

If your players are making this kind of profit. . . . LEAVE THEM ALONE. Every time I hear how players need to lose some of their hard earned money, it sounds like jealousy to me. It brings the mind the lame ways of releaving players of their hard earned loot from D&D.

IMHO, the reason for adding complication to ultra-high-profit trade rolls is not taking away their hard earned money, but making them to work hard (and enjoy their time adventuring rather than just rolling and book-keeping) to earn it in the first place instead of just getting it easily by rolling a high number on a table.

In D&D terms, it's just making them have to slay the dragon in the first place instead of just skipping to its horde with no battle.

 

[towerwarlock]

Making them slay the dragon to get the hoard I have no problem with. Telling them afterwards they have to surrender 75% or more to rid them of their wealth is what I have problems with. Merchants do not become merchants to have adventure and excitement, they become merchants to make money. If they wanted adventure, they should become marines, scouts or join the navy.

 

[BP]

Merchants also become merchants for the challenge of making money.

On that note - penalizing success is poor referee-ing. Adding additional challenges with aquisitions should be par for the course - just taxing is lame - encouraging creative avoidance of taxation (introducing NPCs when needed) is right up a merchant's alley.

Theft, cons and fancy toys - these are decent ways to relieve characters of coin - as long as they are balanced (catch the theif and get rewarded - perhaps by authorities, other victims and credits 'nobody will miss').

As a ref - I've never considered myself 'against' the players. That's just a recipe for no fun - IMHO. A good ref lays out challenges and opportunities and helps guide players in acting out their characters. A good ref is a fan of players' success - with the need, sometimes, to layout bad senarios to allow for that success to have meaning. And be enjoyed.

 

[GamerDude]

Here's the thing...

What happens as the players make all this money? What happens to them? What do they do with it?

Even on the way up they are making enemies out of their competitors... big corporations hate "honest" competition just as much as the other guy barely squeaking out a living.

As they make money and gain success, they begin to add to their enemies... the jealous, the competitor, maybe even the thief.

Once they become relatively/very successful they are the target for scam artists, thieves, hijackers... takeover moves by bigger companies.

Then there is their new lifestyle... how many people can resist living it up according to their new wealth level? Will they spend it all sinking back to their original condition or will they actually manage to build on their successes?

These are questions "just a few die rolls" aren't going to answer

 

[JohnWFox]

Hello Everyone:
As a player I understand that the tables are a little scewed. What I would like is if the GM will explain "AT THE BEGINING" tht I have to keep all the paperwork for the merchant. Then I know up front it has to be done. either that on the the first couple trading sessions I will learn (or face a few fines for not having the paperwork in order) what to do.
Suppose I get going and start making some decent money. There are the normal fees, the normal maint (monthly and annual) that have to be paided. Also there are quirks that older ships have and repairs that need to be made. Things break down. This will come out of the profits (or may be get paid because we saved someone's butt and got a good deal, say 30% off at the shipyard). In addition, the crew will want better stuff and high TL stuff cost money. They will want the ship upgraded, weapons are expensive. Yes we may run into some pirates and suffer some damage. That is part of the game.
The characters also may get some bad cargo, have some enemies, run up against a broker, have to grease some palms, etc. Do not make it vindictive. Also, have some legitimate goal they are looking to obtain. This may require trips where the profit is not that much. Maybe the rumor of a starship crash is just that, a rumor. It might be an old ship not a starship. That takes time and money away from the crew because they are investigating something. Maybe they did something stupid (like get into a brawl with the local police) and have to be bailed out of jail (with appropriate fines) and be told to leave in 24 hours. Less time to get a good deal on what they want to purchase.
Maybe they make some enemies. The other trader wanted that shipment and is willing to get a little revenge or spread a bad rumor about the ship. Maybe they have to do some work to get the ship running properly and build their reputation from scratch. That takes time and money.
The main thing is work it into the story. Make them role play it and make it interesting. If it is just a bunch of rolls, it is boring. If it is interesting they will talk about it for weeks, months or years to come.

A few thoughts from a player.
John W. Fox

 

[Golan2072]

Making them slay the dragon to get the hoard I have no problem with. Telling them afterwards they have to surrender 75% or more to rid them of their wealth is what I have problems with. Merchants do not become merchants to have adventure and excitement, they become merchants to make money. If they wanted adventure, they should become marines, scouts or join the navy.

That is true, at least for regular merchants. That is why they stick to the local commodities exchange at the starport (or to reputable local brokers), do mostly legit business and avoid shady back-room deals with 400% sell prices (for example) like the plague.

However, the typical Traveller PC 'free trader' is more of an opportunistic smuggler or black-marketeer willing to take risks that an ordinary merchant won't dare to take in order to make profits the ordinary merchant can't even dream about.

And besides, in a game, taking these risks is usually far more fun (to most players) than just being a regular trader and focusing on accounting.