Talk:Second Sphere Trade

Trade Index

Trade index has some exciting effects!

• Low trade index makes you harder to infiltrate with agents.

Treasure Ships

Cargo

Treasure ships can carry the following:

• Bulk goods, made with PIP. Their value is weakly dependent on your civilian tech index.
• Complex goods, made with CIP. Their value is strongly dependent on your civilian tech index.
• Exotic goods, based on xeno or theo. Maybe.

Peel 03:11, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

How about a +1 to the value of trade goods for every ten points in the civilian tech index. Lokar

Hosting

A nation that recieves a treasure ship has some effects:

• Potential insertion of agents.
• A negative effect on morale due to cultural contamination and external variables intruding on The Plan. Negligible below very high morale values.
• A wealth penalty, that can be made back by charging the intruding nation a portion of their profit?

Peel 03:37, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

• A treasure ship is a pirate target- a nation hosting a pirate ship runs an increased chance of having a 'random' pirate attack on their ports, resulting in potential loss of resources. say 1.5x the chance for core nations, 2x-3x the chance for ZOCU/PACT, and 3-4x the chance for League, representing the civility of the spaceways. These modifiers should be variable depending on the level of defence of a nation, as well as investiture into anti-piracy methods.

Kerrus 12:41, 6 February 2010 (EST)

You know,again, if people get penalties from accepting treasure ships, why'd they do it? While some penalities might be neat for space Opium Wars, it should give them something to accept it, or why would they?

FBH 13:57, 6th Febuary 2010 (UTC)

That's why you charge import duties and both sides make money. If you can't do so, sounds like you got unequal treatied. Peel 14:01, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

My suggestion would be that rather than a morale hit, a treasure ship gives you the benefit of having a more open economy for that quater, and helps to pay population maintenance.

FBH 14:04, 6th Febuary 2010 (UTC)

Trading Military Units

All military units require parts and components to upkeep that are generally not designed to be interchangeable between blocs. Although powers in the same bloc generally have standardized components, attempting to trade military units to powers out of one's bloc often makes them dependent on your generosity providing continued support and maintenance for these units. Otherwise, either one must reverse-engineer the necessary components and produce them domestically at exorbitant cost, or mothball the units and hope to scrounge spares somehow.

Foreign military units have an upkeep penalty which may be nonexistent (for a unit from the same bloc you can build without any difficulty) to absolutely crippling (a unit from a different bloc with significantly more advanced technology and signature technologies). The "Scraphunters" trait reduces this significantly, as your nation is great at smashing square pegs into round holes.

Upkeep cost is increased by:

Parts commonality-different blocs generally have different standards for connectors and couplings, and this further depends on the specific bloc. Although the EU and PACT may have some joint standards due to their relatively warm relations, ZOCU and, for example, the League, are unlikely to have any parts commonality. This roughly depends both on separation and relations.

Technical advancement-if you cannot build a unit, upkeeping it is more expensive.

Signature technologies-if you lack a signature technology that a unit requires, upkeep becomes yet more expensive.

Upkeep cost is decreased by:

Scraphunters-scraphunters significantly reduce the upkeep penalties suffered.

Fabricators-Fabricators also reduce the problems with foreign war machines having different plugs and power couplings.

Tentative Random Numbers (probably need to be changed a lot)

+1 upkeep if more advanced (unit cannot be built as a non-prototype by your nation)

+3 upkeep if radically more advanced (unit cannot be built period by your nation, even as a prototype design)

+2 upkeep for each signature technology incorporated

-3 upkeep (cannot reduce below normal upkeep) for Scraphunters trait

-1 upkeep (cannot reduce below normal upkeep) for active fabricators

Core Powers:

+0.5 upkeep cost for designs from other Core blocs

+1 upkeep cost for ZOCU designs

+2 upkeep cost for League and Magnate designs

ZOCU

+1 upkeep cost from Core designs

+2 upkeep cost for League and Magnate designs

League

+1 upkeep cost for Magnate designs

+2 upkeep cost for Core & ZOCU designs

Magnate

+1 upkeep cost for League designs

+2 upkeep cost for Core & ZOCU designs

Indie

+1 upkeep cost for all foreign designs

Acts as ZOCU power instead with Friends from ZOCU

Acts as Core power (choose bloc) instead with Core Subversion

These cost multipliers are additive: A League power purchasing a ZOCU Sarissa (with radically more advanced technology and a signature technology integrated) would suffer 1 + 1 + 3 + 2 + 2 = 9 times normal upkeep. This is intended to make domestic industrial production a far better idea for military production than outsourcing. If the League power had both fabricators and Scraphunters he would subtract 4, for a "mere" 5 times normal upkeep. Still punishing but it's not easy to keep things flying when you literally cannot build most of the components and have to use cheap replacements.

Of course, the faction you purchase from may also provide you supplies and spare parts, which they can build at normal cost, but this is dependent on not being blockaded and gives them a lot more negotiating muscle.

--MJ12 Commando 03:20, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Seems way to harsh. You do realize there's a bunch of third world nations who successfully maintain even fairly advanced foreign hardware right? Stop attempting to shut down the option to buy advanced military hardware, just try to make it somewhat more costly.

--FBH 13:08, 7 February 2010 (British Time)

The option exists as long as you want to pay for it. These third world nations successfully maintain fairly advanced foreign hardware either by buying the spare parts (still an option) or sucking the hit (a completely valid option if you aren't ridiculously less advanced). The cost penalty is only absolutely harsh if you're buying things you can't even theoretically build that also happen to be built by powers far far away from you with entirely different construction standards, which means you shouldn't be able to maintain them at all. This is somewhat more costly, unless you're buying Sarissas as the League.

--MJ12 Commando 18:19, 7 February 2010 (UTC)