traveller rpg economy

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Sector Data (economic)

• Thread starter TamsinP
• Start date Dec 21, 2023
• Dec 21, 2023

I recently got pointed to the Sector Trade Maps on the Wiki ( https://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Category:Trade_maps ) and found through that the Sector Data pages (eg. https://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Daibei_Sector/data ). Looking at some of the latter, it seems that there are a couple of issues with the column headers: 1) The headers for RU (and GWP are the wrong way round (or the data in the columns is the wrong way round) - the RU column has the GWP data and the GWP column has the RU data. 2) The header for the Trade column has an error - it should be MCr not BCr.  

Just for clarity - it is the pages TUVWXYZ_Sector/data that have this issue; TUVWXYZ_Sector/economic pages are correct.  

• Dec 22, 2023

I'm pretty sure the data pages are wildly out of date. The last time the data pages were updated was in 2015, and the economic pages were updated in 2019. The plan was to delete the outdated pages, but that has not been completed.  

tjoneslo said: I'm pretty sure the data pages are wildly out of date. The last time the data pages were updated was in 2015, and the economic pages were updated in 2019. The plan was to delete the outdated pages, but that has not been completed. Click to expand...

• Dec 23, 2023

TamsinP said: If an update is done, it would be useful if they calculated the BTNs down further, even if the routes aren't shown - as far as I can tell, the Trade Value has only been calculated for systems that are on routes leaving a large number of systems with no value shown in that column even though there would be trade. Click to expand...

That's useful information - thanks! Looking at my own calculations for the Akerut routes* in Aramis subsector from The Traveller Adventure (also going slightly beyond into Pretoria and Rhylanor subsectors), there are a number of routes of BTN 7.5 or more which seem to be missing (eg Rhylanor to Aramanx and Junidy) which suggests there may be some other factors involved. I think I'll probably sit down over the holidays and look into it a bit deeper. I wish you a wonderful Christmas. * I was trying to work out how Akerut's fleet of about fifty 5000 ton J1 Hercules transports was viable - it looks like they might be if they only operate in the Towers Cluster.  

• Spinward Flow

tjoneslo said: the system has a cutoff of 200 parsecs. Click to expand...

Part of the issue was simply that the model as presented in Far Trader allowed systems from VERY far away to impact the trade numbers. I was curious how these maps were generated since there's, what, 20,000+ systems? Just made the relationships when "every system impacts every system" just explode. Does the trade volume of Regina really affect Core in any tangible way?  

whartung said: was curious how these maps were generated since there's, what, 20,000+ systems Click to expand...

Kakistocrat

Spinward Flow said: 200 parsecs at a 2 weeks per jump cadence commercial operations tempo amounts to ≈2 Years @ J4 … which seems rather … excessive. Click to expand...

Those maps are a boon to one of my side projects, Subsidized Merchants. The sets of systems on the subsidy really start to pop out.  

Kakistocrat said: I’d imagine that few (if any) merchants would travel so long a route themselves. Like the overland Silk Road routes, they’d probably travel a fraction of that distance to trade with other traders who are based closer to the ultimate destination, and ultimately depend upon successive “trader-to-trader” trading to get the in-demand products to their intended far-flung destinations. I’d guess that this model would be viable mainly for trading high-value, low-bulk items, although your proposed bulk arbitrage strategy for megacorporations might already be in place for supplying the far-to-coreward Zhodani worlds. Click to expand...

• Dec 24, 2023

A few thoughts. A lot of this is rehash of individual points I’ve made before, but kind of mashed together for this Uber thread on the topic. A major factor is the value of the cargo vs the margins of source cost vs destination. So CT IND products usually have a 30% at source price (which isn’t itself product cost, already profit baked in). Assuming we bake in an additional 10% profit/margin of costs of accident/error, the product travels 20% of source cost per Cr1000 per parsec-ton. So Cr10000 per ton IND products have a travel distance of 2 parsecs, Cr100000 per ton travels 20 parsecs, MCr1 per ton travels 200 parsecs. Then add the target world modifiers for potentiallly further distances. One can see why A starports can have all the letter drive/computer starship parts for repair and assembly. And why Ag planets are very tied to close and/or needy customer planets. Plug in your version of per ton costs and parsec rates, you need some sort of speculative margin on trade codes like the CT/MgT tables. Rate calculation matters. If using the CT rate of per jump instead of parsec, the range products travel may double or triple, depending on average. Thats simplistic calculation for a sense of scale and issues. Megacorps and Megaliners are playing on a different level. One variable is financed ships. If a ship starts out paid off no debt, there is a lot more profit built in. If a megacorps owns its own supply chain ships, it ships at operating costs not standard rates, and so product travel distances can increase more. This is where the per jump rate could be collusion with fees built to favor rich self financed shippers to increase market range. There can be another form of subsidized merchant, where a megacorps acts as financier, a megaline operates the ship paying crew and costs, and both megacorps and megaline share in both main products’ profits and opportunistic speculation. These stick to the main trade routes and can be bigger high jump ships given no debt advantage, built bigger on large guaranteed hauling contracts above variable lots, and unparalleled reach. Speaking of range, the ships only have to be maintained at some base along the way, the crews can operate on a two jump out and back per month basis/two weeks off basis. Or one jump out and back per month, only owner/operators have to ride the same hull the whole way. So we get a picture of subsector, sector and multisector products with lines and corps servicing those customers based on value. They are likely to stack the deck to preserve their investments in century long business models. The per jump rate and financing advantages keep marginal lines from upsetting long range arrangements, but the same joined at the hip transport system can also be used to target potential local producers threatening to expand and damage near guaranteed profits. An uppity air/raft maker may find their local subsector swamped by General Products diverting normal flows to sell below rate and embargoed by the megaline GP is partnering with, and drive them out of business. Conversely, a megacorps that has driven out local production may decide to reduce supply locally to drive prices up, then trickle in limited shipments to maximize profit. So a picture emerges of vast distant megacorps/lines keeping their markets under control and stamping out competition. This explains government subsidized merchants not only contracting for rural route delivery, but also providing a service to get products locally produced shipped reliably and lessen the death grip of the distant overlords. And so, a LOT of stories to be told. There is potentially more to get into, but this should be enough to chew on for awhile.  

Remember, worlds have interests in getting products out, but megacorps will be on all IND worlds, they would seek to ‘win’ everywhere and coordinate operations.  

Spinward Flow said: The one point that I would dispute is the assumption of 200 parsec market range for Industrial world products ... not because the math is wrong (because it's not) but because the result gets overridden by context most of the time (specifically, map details). Click to expand...

tjoneslo said: If I understand what is being argued here is given two worlds N parsecs apart, in the ideal world their trade would be Y (based purely on the existing formula). Click to expand...

• Efate/Regina
• Lunion/Lunion
• At J1 only, Efate is 26J1 distant from Lunion along the Spinward Main.
• If the Spinward Main between Efate and Lunion is divided into 13+13 parsec sections, Pirema/Lanth is 13J1 distant from Efate ... and Pirema/Lanth is 13J1 distant from Lunion.
• 8J2 from Efate will reach as far down as Frenzie/Vilis.
• 8J2 from Lunion will reach as far up as Frenzie/Vilis.

• Ruie (7B at TL7 and outside the Imperium)
• Enope (6B at TL7)
• Roupe (3B at TL7)
• Rethe (30B at TL8 and a class E port)
• Vilis (8B at TL10, and not reachable via J2 except going through Lunion)
• Porozlo (30B at TL11, and probably a continual fight between Efate and Lunion),
• Rhylanor (8B at TL15, like Porozlo, but also 40% Dandy).
• Lunion (8B at TL13)

tjoneslo said: What is the trade between Efate and Lunion? Click to expand...

tjoneslo said: From Efate's market viewpoint, all of the worlds in the sphere of influence it generates (6J2 if I follow your logic) does not match the power Lunion, that is number of people with money to spend. Click to expand...

tjoneslo said: The lower TLs mean's there simply isn't the kind of money in the economy that makes trade profitable at scale. The population of the remaining worlds is too small to matter in the scope of the market analysis. Click to expand...

tjoneslo said: By your metrics, Rhylanor would prefer to buy from Lunion because it's cheaper due to lower travel costs. But the merchants and manufacturers on Efate aren't simply going to give up on a potentially profitable market like that one. And the same is true of Lunion itself. Yes, there is a large markup on goods because they are traveling a long way, but it is possible to make that profitable. Click to expand...

The other issue with the 200 parsec limit is simply the base shipping cost to move anything over that distance. At the most base level, it's 100K Cr just in "shipping" (at 1000Cr per ton/Jump 2 trip). So, the farther you get away, the more valuable the base items must be just to justify moving to from A to B. Then, on top of that, the farther away it gets, the more the middle man stack on to the base price. So, the value to the original world may actually be quite cheap, but by the time it gets to its destination, it can be quite high, but all of that value is lost and scattered in transit.  

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Is there a way to make this economically viable in Traveller?

Started by Dumarest, September 17, 2017, 06:01:04 PM

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Willie the Duck

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Quote from: AsenRG;994798 Well, technically, there is a way to make up for this, depending on setting's technology  and for a limited time. If the jump or jumps would be faster than going to the belt and mining asteroids or comets, and the Belt is far enough, it might be economically viable just this once.

• Bloody Weselian Hippy

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Quote from: Willie the Duck;994832 Well certainly. If were making a space station instead of an on-planet mine, we wouldn't bat an eye at them shipping in the water any more than we would the atmosphere or bulkheads that made up the station. I think the overall argument is that hydrogen is abundant in all star systems. Oxygen is abundant in all star systems with the potential for mining. The idea of shipping in the bulk elements from however many jumps away (where you have to burn 10% of total mass of ship in hydrogen per parsec moved) just doesn't seem like it would make sense for any length of time. Obviously we can all dream up counter-narratives (after all, we have oil-producing countries in our world today who import gasoline). It all depends on whether the technological hurdles (and investments, in time and money) required in extracting H and O from the system vs. the investment of transit. And shipping stuff around in the Traveller-verse is actually relatively costly.

• high-minded hack

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Quote from: Schwartzwald;994430 Not to bust on your post but in all fairness traveller tech may have developed to a point water wasn't needed for mining.  

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Shawn Driscoll

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Quote from: Dumarest;995023 You guys have given me some good ideas, thanks! That was really just a thought off the top of my head after thinking about some sci fi tropes of desert planets like Dune and Tatooine and then thinking about the Ice Pirates movie. I was thinking about some interesting worlds for a Traveller game. Another I want to rip off nearly wholesale is Scar, from The Jester at Scar. Harvesting dangerous fungus to scrape by...

Quote from: GameDaddy;995293 Ok, using the Classic Traveller trading rules and selling the colonists Evian we get this business model; ESS Sun Bride - Traveller Water Hauler, 200 Ton Type A Free Trader Ebay currently has Evian going for $4 a liter. So if we go dollars to credits, we get;   985 Metric Liters equals 1 Metric Ton. So 1 Metric ton of Evian goes for 3,940 Cr So you average Far Trader with a cargo space of 82 tons can make 25 2j shipments a year providing a desert planet with 2,050 Metric Tons of Water. This will support approximately 4,000 colonists providing a water ration of 1L a day (With considerable high-efficiency recycling as well as moisture conservation, of course, this can turn entire swaths of a desert planet green). So, this water transport will earn $8,077,000 Credits just hauling water. On the return trip from the desert planet to the water planet, good cargoes would be Petrochemicals 10,000 Cr/ton Radioactives 1,000,000 Cr per ton, Crystals 20,000 Cr per ton, and Pharmaceuticals 100,000 cr per ton so... My average purchase Dms ensure I can buy the cargos at 50% of the listed values so... a typpical haul would be Start on the Water planet Buy 82 tons of water at $1,970 Cr per ton   $161,540 Cr Fly 2 Jumps to the Desert Planet, this takes a day to travel out, two weeks for two jumps, another day of travel to dock One day to trade cargoes. Sell the water for 3,940 Cr per ton and earn 323,080 Cr Buy cargo at the desert Planet for the water planet. 2 Tons of Radioactives, 1,000,000 Cr 6 Tons of Pharmaceuticals 300,000 Cr 3 Tons of Crystals 30,000 Cr. 71 Tons of Petrochemicals @ 5,000 Cr per ton 355,000 Cr Total Price  1,685,000 Cr Then 1 day to travel, Two weeks for the two Jumps, and a day of travel to dock yet again. Sell the cargo at 100% of price on water planet. 2 Tons of Radioactives 2,000,000 Cr 6 Tons of of Pharmaceuticals 600,000, cr 3 Tons of Crystals 60,000 Cr 71 tons of Petrochemicals 710,000 Cr Gross Earnings   3,370,000 Cr + 323,080 for a grand total of 3,693,080 Cr in four weeks and four days. Ten trips a year like this are possible, so; Gross Annual Income for the Sun Bride is 36,930,800 Cr. Now our expenses. Cargo costs per trip 1,685,000 Cr + 161,540 Cr = 18,465,400 Cr per year. Net Profit: 18,465,400 Cr per year Now let's take a look at Sun Bride's Annual Operating Expenses Annual Jump Drive Fuel Costs 30 tons per jump @ 4 jumps = 120*10 trips = 1200 tons Annual Maneuver Drive Fuel Costs (see above) 600,000 Cr. Annually Staterooms (Life support, etc.) 400,000 Cr Annually 10 staterooms * 4,000 Cr per round trip Ship's Maintenance 37,080 Cr annually Crew Payments Captain 1,475,454 Cr (10% of the Net Profits) Pilot 72,000 Cr Annually (+2.5% of net profits as bonus) Engineer 48,000 Cr Annually (+2.5% of net profits as bonus) Medic 24,000 Cr Annually (+2.5% of net profits as bonus) Steward 36,000 Cr Annually (+2.5% of net profits as bonus) Crew Total: 180,000 Cr per year (not counting the Captain and bonuses) Standard 30 year Mortgage payment on the Sun Bride 37,080,000 Cr Purchase price. 29,664,000 Cr @ 30 years 7.5% Mortgage (this is the financed amount -20% down payment). 207,415 cr per month or 2,488,980 Cr annually Standard Berthing Costs 400 Cr per month 4,800 Credits Annually Total Annual Expenses 5,186,314 Captains Annual Salary 1,475,454 Cr Net Annual Profits (after profit sharing with the entire crew) 11,803,632 Cr Sun Bride can also sell and transport an additional 60 High or Mid passenger Tickets and 400 Low passage tickets for Interstellar Travellers to earn up to an addition 600,000 Cr (high passage) or 480,000 Cr (Mid passage) and possibly an additional 400,000 Cr for low passage passengers, between the two worlds. So possibly an additional 1,480,000 cr may be earned annually. Little known facts Total cost of this thirty year Starship Mortgage (premium + interest); 74,669,397 Cr A far Trader being a Jump 1 ship, requires a fast refueling station that needs to be established 1J out where the starship can be refueled as the second jump is plotted, all this need to happen in about twelve hours or so, in between jumps twenty times a year. Each crew member on the water hauler will receive an annual profit sharing bonus whose average value will be 368,863 Cr

Quote from: Dumarest;995333 Game Daddy, thanks for crunching those numbers! I never expected this thread would get so many interesting responses and ideas. Good job, everyone! I'll have to bounce more ideas off this wall...

Quote from: Shawn Driscoll;995391 Traveller is not a simulator.

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Classic Traveller: Freetrader Economics

One of my players, playing a merchant, did roll a ship! The Chen’s Chance , a freetrader with the home port of Ladfaus: 82 tons cargo; 6 available staterooms and 20 low berths. The player rolled the freetrader twice on the mustering out tables so the ship starts with only a twenty year mortgage rather than a thirty year mortgage. And Captain Chen has gone in partners with another NPC merchant who rolled a ship, Poul der Löwe, which makes it a ten year mortgage. Only 120 payments go. But, what payments they are: 154,500 credits per month required rain or shine, solar flare or meteor shower. How will he pull that off? Let’s take look at the economics of a freetrader.

The basic costs of running a freetrader include: fuel, if refined 15,000 per jump; crew salaries, assuming all positions paid, 15,000 per month; life support for staterooms of 20,000 per jump; and life support for low passage of 100 per passenger; plus those jump cassettes of 10,000 per. Possible revenues are: 10,000 per high passage; 8,000 per middle passage; and 1,000 per low passage; and 1,000 per ton cargo haul. There is also the possibility of speculative trading that may more may not earn revenue. The lucrative mail contracts are not generally available to freetraders. Jumps take one week to complete so assuming hauls a load per week and full passengers (two high passengers per stateroom and all low berths full) and full cargo it looks like a freetrader can pull in a profit of 530,500 credits per month. Not bad. Those merchants are sitting pretty. Or are they?

Lasfaus is is a two jumps from everywhere so can a freetrader even trade out of Ladfaus? I ruled they could assuming they carry an extra 30 tons of fuel in collapsible tanks (1 ton) in the hold. The first jump is into deep space, then transfer fuel and jump again. It’s two weeks of jump time into Mazar.  But, still, the planets available from Mazar are 1 jump away so  Finn’s Chance can get two more jumps in before a payment is due. Even with reduced cargo (52 tons available space) on the first jump that clears 324,500 a month, right?

Well, no, that’s not right. Those assume no time to deliver, find and load cargo. A more realistic assumption is a week to arrive in system find and load cargo and then a week of jump time which results in at most two deliveries a month. If a freetrader can do two full loads of cargo and passengers per month, they can clear 180,500. Still, more than a payments-worth of profit. Not bad. But, out of Ladfaus how does this work? One week to deliver, find and load cargo, two weeks jump time, then another week to find and load cargo.  Finn’s Chance will only get one delivery the first month. Not good. It puts the ship 72,500 in the red after the first month’s operation. Delivering goods back to Ladfaus is a money losing proposition for a freetrader. Looks like it’s best to focus on the rest of the Empire who are 1 jump systems.

The above calculations assume optimal cargo as well. What did  Finn’s Chance achieve for its first cargo? Rolling randomly for cargos there was a 50 ton cargo bound for Mazar available, 2 high, 5 middle, and 17 low passengers. Plus, there were polymers available for speculation are a price of 3,500 per ton. Our Captain, Finn Chen, elected not to speculate and went with the 50 ton cargo, and all the passengers. The previous assumption of full cargo and doubled up high passengers did not play out. Where does that put him? Chen is piloting himself, and the steward is an NPC merchant, Poul der Löwe, quarter owner who doesn’t get paid so that saves a bit on crew costs.

Holy Moley! Captain Finn Chen’s career is starting out massively in the red. That’s an inauspicious start. Captain Chen is in something of a pickle. Assuming the crew can wait for pay, there is nonetheless a lot of incentive to start cutting corners and taking risks. And, taking risks is what RPGs should all be about.

You have just summed up why I almost never played TRAVELLER in my youth. If I wanted a desperate, starving, hand-to-mouth existence with creditors hounding me from world to world, all I had to do was switch to a liberal arts degree. 🙂 Why would I fantasize about it?

D&D was about the combat equivalent of crazed prospectors looking for gold in the desert. TRAVELLER was the equivalent of bankruptcy proceedings with guns.

Every campaign I even vaguely enjoyed started with characters who’d rolled well enough to at least be breaking even. There’s a big difference between adventuring because you could be doing better, and adventuring because it was that or LOSE EVERYTHING. And I never got any kick out of the former, whatsoever.

This is, of course, a YMMV thing. It sounds like it suits your bunch to a tee. Just thought I’d*mention thisn for the next “Why wasn’t TRAVELLER more popular?” Thread.

Oops. I meant “the latter,” of course.

I’ve always tended to agree; the primary premise of Traveller is less intriguing than much of the rest of the game. There tends to be a patina of interstellar law and order too; although it SAYS it’s about frontier regions, it rarely ever FEELS like it. If it was, who are these creditors chasing the ship’s captain out in the middle of nowhere?

I think this could be easily salvageable for the more adventurous tastes like yours. I’d shake it up just a bit; make New Assam an angry colony of refugees who fled Calapia following the “finlandization” by the Empire of Reason rather than simply a colony of political neutrals. The PCs could travel with a letter of marque issued by Assamite authorities to prey on Reasonite ships.

You can still have that same vibe of living hand to mouth, one-step ahead of scuzzy creditors, but rather than taking on cargo and passengers for peanuts, engage in outright piracy and chasing after wild rumors of exotic treasures across the subsector.

Traveller as written somehow managed to take a setting of what should be exotic space-faring adventure, and turn it into space-faring bean counters all too often. But the adventure is still right there. All that it really takes is making it a cold war between rival powers, or a true frontier region; get rid of some of the settled feeling of powerful space empires which tend to suppress most of the possibilities for adventure.

Excellent ideas. And, going rogue is definitely hinted at in the rules. I think a lot of the economics is to pressure players into desperate decisions which then lead to adventures. With the definition of adventure as “The bad things that happen to other people, far away.” They really need to look for opportunities ti strike paydirt to escape the grind.

Yeah. TRAVELLER always felt to me like ENTERPRISE:

“Well, here we are–another place where no man has gone before. Check the Vulcan database for atmosphere, gravity, and four-star restaurants…”

I guess a difference between D&D and Traveller is that D&D has a built in mechanism to make players take risks as money grubbing psychos. Traveller, which generally has little character advancement doesn’t have this mechansim. But, the costs of doing business can create a similar effect. Plus, SF had a general trope of the money issues of tramp freighters (e.g. Han Solo and Jabba) but, also really the trope of poor travellers is straight from the novels of E.C. Tubb. So, different genre expectations. But, I’d agree it does feel different grubbing money to get ahead versus grubbing money to not fall behind.

Problem is, they didn’t get Tubb right, either.

For example, Low Passage was star travel for the desperate, yes. But it wasn’t an *automatic* dice roll. There were things *you* could do to help your odds, and Dumarest routinely did them. Things like never taking a passage before recovering from the last one. Paying close attention to diet, etc. And so on. It changed the flavor noticeably.

And even then, the series had a strong streak of hopelessness to it that only the main character’s sheer grit made tolerable. Role-play it? Not me.

And a merchant with an inadequate ship and a forty-year mortgage was little better. Why the living H*** would a fifty-year-old man live one step ahead of Guido, barely making payments on a ship whose mortgage will outlive him–and probably the ship?

Again, your mileage may vary–and obviously does. But the missing element in vanilla TRAVELLER that made it usually unplayable fo me was not momey-grubbing psychosis. It was hope.

And then they came up with the Imperium. And things got worse.

True, no Imperium in my setting.

Well, I wouldn’t say it’s hopeless. One payday loan and a few good trades and they should be caught up. And, this turns out to be a particularly unfortunate setup in that the first jump is a two parsec jump. The hope in Traveller was to one-day acquire that plasma rifle.

Though, it does seem like a successful newly “retired” merchant could just sell his newly rolled Freetrader and retire in luxury. Jon Mollison’s Sudden Rescue addresses this with the protagonist’s desire to retire always being interrupted by wanderlust.

And, I suspect, an economy that allows for viable business modelsm 🙂

Your case is a *bit* extreme (though I gather Earth is at least as bad), but it’s actually fairly typical of-the game as a whole, as I recall. A ship that can barely get from port to port, with steadily deteriorating safety margins (your estimate didn’t include saving up for the next overhaul, and I saw how much refined fuel there was on that map), the above mentioned mortgage that will outlive both you and the ship–the whole TRAVELLER setting was gray goo.

Again, don’t get me wrong–it sounds like you guys are up for it. I’m just covering my own problems. As often as not, when someone started a TRAVELLER campaign, I’d roll up a character, look at the prospects after everyone else had done the same, and say “I think I’m gonna put my mustering- out into a nice comfortable retirement.”

After all, I’d already done one of the most fun parts of the game–rolling up the character. That’s a campaign all by itself. Only thing that would beat it was if somebody wanted to design a starship. And who could afford that? 🙂

Well, there is a lot of expectation for the Referee to come up with profitable opportunities. The classic JTAS scenario Annic Nova drops an alien ship worth millions into the players laps.

Yep. Always wanted to play that one.

As I said, my problem was with the milieu, not what *could* be done. There’s just a different *feel* to a game where you’re adventuring out of hope for something better, rather than out of crawling fear of homeless poverty.

The pioneers who “went west, young man” were, by and large, looking for opportunity, not fleeing doom. And most of the space opera I read had the same air. TRAVELLER deliberately eschews that. You’re not the crew of the *Solar Queen,* much less the *Muddlin’ Through.* At best, you’re Northwest Smith. At worst you’re Earl Dumarest of Terra, and you’ll have to be as good as Kimball Kinnison just to live another day.

I will confess. Most of the games I saw or played in, they skipped the merchant thing and came up with an excuse for the players to go looking for trouble. Mercenaries. Scouts. Or just somebody with an ungodly Admin score so they could consistently make good money. Once they were more or less on their feet, they would look around and say “Anything interesting? That’s what we came out here for…”

Whups, to be clear the D&D mechanism is gold for XP.

Actually, I thought that

“mechanism to make players take risks as money grubbing psychos.”

was quite clear. And accurate.

Interesting analysis of the prospects for a Free Trader. It has been a long time, and I can’t remember if this played a part in our campaign’s “Guns for Hire” theme, or whether it was just luck of the roll during character generation.

Thanks for posting!

Staterooms :cost 20,000 to run, can accomodate 2 passengers, each passenger pays 10,000.

So a full stateroom provides exactly 0 credits of profit.

Did you mess up the numbers in your post?

That’s 20,000 total for all 10 staterooms. It’s 2,000 per room for life support. So, a full ship with four crew and 12 high passengers pays 20,000 for life support but, earns 120,000 from the high passengers. So, 100,000 profit. But, it’s unlikely to get 12 high passengers. Even a population A world will have a maximum of 18 people looking for high passage. And, most worlds will provide significantly less. But, it is clear that high passages are the gravy that can make or break a ship.

I believe that means that ALL of the staterooms on the ship cost a combined 20,000 per run, so two high-end passengers = breakeven, more brings in revenue.

If one tires of economics there’s always the flip side of the classic game: Playing the scuzzy creditors trying to repo a starship. Typically you work for a bank or corporation and roll up a group of veterans with sweet gear. A scout class ship can be the chase vessel in a pinch.

Yep. There are lots of options. I think that was often the sticking point in Traveller. What to do? D&D Dungeon Crawls are pretty straight forward and well defined. Same with Call of Cthulhu’s investigate the weird event of the week. Or, Shadowrun’s, well, Shadowruns.

Traveller was a sandbox with no easily defined goals.

The downside of staterooms is that you pay the life support whether or not you find passengers to fill them. I can see players modding their ship to just keep empty staterooms in vacuum and unheated to try to save money. Could be handy if you get an unruly passenger too. “Steward please dump stateroom 6 to vacuum, it appears we’ve acquired another chestburster. What a nuisance.”

There are few ways to believably modify that so it’s not quite so dire. I think a Free Trader is equipped with fuel scoops, which allow them to refuel off any convenient gas giant…if it doesn’t have fuel scoops, then there’s your first upgrade.

Second, it doesn’t seem reasonable that unused staterooms must be kept open regardless of occupancy. Our modern vessels are compartmentalized, why wouldn’t this be standard on any starship?

Likewise, it seems like the game assumes you buy everything new each time you go to port, which forgets the advantages of having your own mobile fusion reactor. Air recycling, atmosphere compression in port, water, all of those ought to be almost incidental cost, leaving food and other potables as the primary expense.

The ships are equipped with scoops, yes. But most character groups start (if they have a ship) with a Free Trader. The equivalent of a tramp coasting steamer from the 1930’s.

Which means civilian engines. Which deteriorate rapidly when you don’t feed them *refined* fuel. The cost for which our host notes above.

Not only does your reactor have problems wit it. So does your jump drive. Every time you jump on the cheap stuff, your chances of disappearing forever goes up.

Basically, you’re trying to run a trucking company in the desert–with a used truck made to be driven inside Las Vegas city limits. A high compression motor with no fuel filters–which you’re feeding alcohol or cheap kerosene, with sand in the bottom of the tank.

A truck made for rough country? Sorry. Those are military-grade–and they cost the earth.

The rest of your suggestions have similar answers. As our host has suggested, TRAVELLER’s economic system seems designed to make players poor and desperate, so they can be more easily railroaded into the GM’s adventure for this session. It’s an aspect of the game I’ve hated since the beginning–as discussed above.

Which is annoying, because I’ve always had a liking for it otherwise.

This is an example of the modern equivalent of a Freetrader.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Arn%C3%B8ytrans.jpg

One thing I didn’t mention in the article is the scenario of a freetrader getting its two jumps per month. Assuming a full hold and full load of high passengers a ship can earn profit of 180,500/month. So, that’s not a horrible scenario. Now, most of the profit comes from high passengers. You need at least 6 high passengers per month to break even. Plus, add in speculative cargo shrewdly bought and sold a ship can be nicely profitable without cutting corners. But, that jump 2 from Ladfaus is quite a hit.

Your Captain Chin managed on the passengers this time (2*high + 5*mid = 6*high). Congratulations. Now how often is he likely to repeat that? (I’m really curious–it’s been thirty years since I’ve seen a rulebook.) Especially away from Class A ports?

It’s true the odds of finding lots of high passengers lowers quite a bit at the smaller population planets. The average population planet in the Empire is 4 (in the tens of thousands) so, these places are small. A population 4 world will have 3D-3D high passengers, 3D-3D middle passengers, and 4D-1D low passengers (this is the 1977 table, the later tables are a bit different). So average is something like zero high and middle passengers and eleven low. Something like that. But, the swings could be huge 0-15 high, 0-15 middle and 0 to 23 low. Though high and middle will tend toward zero as negative rolls become zeros. Though your point is well taken that there is no guarantee of high paying passengers. And, the above assumes travelling to a similar planet. Traveling to a low population world will be additional minuses to the roll.

Thought it would be like that. Captain Chen or his steward better have a good Admin rating. Speculation is pretty much their only hope, sounds like.

Or traps with exceeding expensive bait, laid out by an evil GM… 🙂

Welcome to the Proto Traveller movement (as it should be rather than another definition of Proto Traveller which includes Supplement 3, The Spinward Marches).

One little nit, the Free Trader mustering out benefit gives a brand new ship with a 40 year mortgage, so your PC with 2 rolls should still have a 30 year mortgage, with the NPC’s roll, that’s still a 20 year mortgage.

As to the hardscrabble nature of running a Free Trader, I think it’s great to push the characters into seeking fortune in other ways. I see that as a feature rather than a bug. If the economic system gave an easy profit we might as well be playing Papers and Paychecks…

Nice article touching on a fine point of fuel costs versus skimming fuel.

http://twilightgm.blogspot.com/2017/06/just-pay-fee.html

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[Traveller] Starship economics

• Thread starter Random Goblin
• Start date Jul 5, 2008
• Tags traveller

Random Goblin

Active member.

• Jul 5, 2008

So pretty much my only beef with Traveller is the 2000cr/week cost for "life support." I mean, I understand the rule's function in the game: it's an abstracted additional cost to keep the ship running, and it provides a minimum expense for high passage. But what is actually being bought with this money? And from whom is it being purchased? "Life support" means the basics for survival: food, air, water, heat, gravity, and light. Anything else is either built into the ship (bunks, wall lockers), or can be brought by the passengers/crew on their own (towels, toiletries, clothes). Honestly there's not much else you would need. Heat and light are no-brainers; they're electric and are run off the ship's drive. They should tax the ship in terms of fuel, but not in terms of weird abstracted extra expenses. I assume the same for gravity; however gravity happens in Traveller ships, I think it's safe to assume it's connected to the ship's power somehow, and not the result of some consumer good that you buy at a starport. Gravity seems like a luxury on a starship anyway. Food and water can't possibly cost that much, and it should be possible to forage them on most inhabitable worlds. Maybe the water needs to be purified and the food needs to be stored and/or prepared, but again, this shouldn't cost 2000cr/week (and should theoretically be do-able with ship's power and manpower, which cost salaries and fuel, not extra magic credits). If nothing else, the fixed cost here is annoying. The cost of food should vary widely based on where you buy it and what kind of food you buy. What you need for paying passengers is different from what you need for crew rations in lean times. I'm not sure how air works, but I can't imagine it takes anything more than the ship's power to scrub and recycle the air, and a periodic airing-out. So what is the 2000cr actually being spent on, and who is it being spent to? In an average merchant campaign, this would probably never be noticed anyway. It's just a miscellaneous expense that has to be met to keep the ship running. It came up with us, however, when we started an exploration campaign. The players got pretty bent out of shape about the cost. The money clearly doesn't go into a slot in the hull. What is being bought and form whom? Ditto for the low passage berths. They should run on ship's power, so what's the 100cr being spent on?  

RobertEdwards

Replacement filters, lubricants, seals. light bulbs, pesticides, Radiation meters, miscellaneous repairs and small parts and cleaning supplies. I figure the 100 CR for the Low passage includes some medication to keep the freezees's cell walls from collapsing, and possibly to kick start their heart.  

Part Time Dilettante

Wear and tear on the life support systems.  

Technical Shaman

Have you ever looked at the costs to keep your car running, over a long period of time. Not just the gasoline, but the oil changes, brakes, filters, etc. And if you blow a chip in the computerized fuel-injection system, may the gods help you. Not to mention if one element in your dash-board panel goes out, the whole thing has to be pulled, sent off, and repaired, and then reinstalled. Maintainance of any vehicle, over the long run, is expensive, and something as complex as a space-vehicle is even moreso. So you ameliorate it over an extended period of time, rather then paying a little bit, every week, and then a whomping $50gig bill when the framastat converter goes blooey.  

• Jul 6, 2008

Traveller ships don't seem to have a complex waste recycling system that turns solid waste into soil or algae feed fluid. They're probably too large and heavy to provide practical returns. So what you're paying for isn't just what you're taking aboard it's what you're dumping. And yes, I believe dumping that in orbit is probably punishable by death.  

Validated User

Scurrilous said: Traveller ships don't seem to have a complex waste recycling system that turns solid waste into soil or algae feed fluid. They're probably too large and heavy to provide practical returns. So what you're paying for isn't just what you're taking aboard it's what you're dumping. And yes, I believe dumping that in orbit is probably punishable by death. Click to expand...

Mad Scientist

Or dump on a crash orbit (either solar or planetary) when no one's watching? Or just leave your litter in the local gas giant?  

A Most Sincere Poseur

A lot of minor kinds of upkeep are probably subsumed into the general life-support costs. Basic medical supplies, Library updates, insurance fees, mandatory inspections of all life-support systems each landing as per Imperial regulations, radiation shielding... Remember, this is an interstellar spaceship that's expected to carry its occupants through a deadly environment (space) then an incredibly deadly environment (hyperspace) over a course of several weeks. The demands for precision and reliability are high and therefore not cheap.  

Cartoon Poet

Random Goblin said: So what is the 2000cr actually being spent on, and who is it being spent to? Click to expand...

Don't you dare forget Solomani Gold Mustard, by the caseload. Its the only thing that makes those protein-enhanced algae chips tolerable.  

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